WORLD WAR II - SUBSCRIBE TO EXCELLENT WORLD WAR II VIDEOS The Siege of Leningrad September 8, 1941 - January 27, 1944 For centuries the cultural heart of Russia and the second largest city in the Soviet Union, Leningrad was a prime target of the advancing German Army Group North in June 1941. One of the stated reasons for the Soviet-Finnish War of 1939-1940 was to protect the former Czarist capital, St. Petersburg, later called Leningrad, from Finnish attack. When the Germans invaded, they called on the Finns to attack Leningrad from the north. On the shore of Lake Ladoga, Leningrad had political significance as the city named for the founder of the Russian Revolution, but it also had military significance as it prevented the Germans from sweeping around the north of Russia and attacking Moscow from behind. The population of Leningrad turned out shortly after the invasion and dug antitank ditches around the city. Two hundred thousand Red Army defenders protected 3,000,000 inhabitants. Withi
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