Marshal of the Soviet Union

Marshal of the Soviet Union Маршал Советского Союза
Uniform shoulder strap (1955–1990)
Marshal's star – big
Country	Soviet Union
Service branch	Soviet Army
Rank	General officer
NATO rank code	OF-10
Formation	22 September 1935
Abolished	December 1991
Next higher rank	None
Next lower rank	Chief marshal of the branch
Equivalent ranks	Admiral of the fleet of the Soviet Union

Rank insignias of Marshal of the Soviet Union

Gorget patch
1935–40

Gorget patch
1940–43

Sleeve chevron
1940–43

Shoulder board
1943–55

Marshal of the Soviet Union (Russian: Маршал Советского Союза, pronounced [ˈmarʂəl sɐˈvʲetskəvə sɐˈjuzə]) was the highest military rank of the Soviet Union.

The rank of Marshal of the Soviet Union was created in 1935 and abolished in 1991. Forty-one people held this rank. The equivalent naval rank was until 1955 admiral of the fleet and from 1955 Admiral of the Fleet of the Soviet Union. Both ranks were comparable to NATO rank codes OF-10.

While the supreme rank of Generalissimus of the Soviet Union, which would have been senior to Marshal of the Soviet Union, was proposed for Joseph Stalin after the Second World War, it was never officially approved.

History of the rank[]

The first five marshals of the Soviet Union from left to right: Tukhachevsky, Budyonny, Voroshilov, Blyukher, and Yegorov. Only Budyonny and Voroshilov would survive the Great Purge.

The military rank of Marshal of the Soviet Union was established by a decree of the Soviet Cabinet, the Council of People's Commissars (Sovnarkom), on 22 September 1935. On 20 November, the rank was conferred on five people: People's Commissar of Defence and veteran Bolshevik Kliment Voroshilov, Chief of the General Staff of the Red Army Alexander Yegorov, and three senior commanders, Vasily Blyukher, Semyon Budyonny, and Mikhail Tukhachevsky.

Of these, Blyukher, Tukhachevsky, and Yegorov were executed during Stalin's Great Purge of 1937–38. On 7 May 1940, three new Marshals were appointed: the new People's Commissar of Defence, Semyon Timoshenko, Boris Shaposhnikov, and Grigory Kulik.

During World War II, Kulik was demoted for incompetence, and the rank of Marshal of the Soviet Union was given to a number of military commanders who earned it on merit. These included Georgy Zhukov, Ivan Konev and Konstantin Rokossovsky to name a few. In 1943, Stalin himself was made a Marshal of the Soviet Union, and in 1945, he was joined by his intelligence and police chief Lavrenti Beria. These non-military Marshals were joined in 1947 by politician Nikolai Bulganin.

Two Marshals were executed in postwar purges: Kulik in 1950 and Beria in 1953, following Stalin's death. Thereafter the rank was awarded only to professional soldiers, with the exception of Leonid Brezhnev, who made himself a Marshal in 1976, and Dmitry Ustinov, who was prominent in the arms industry and was appointed Defence Minister in July 1976. The last Marshal of the Soviet Union was Dmitry Yazov, appointed in 1990, who was imprisoned after the failed coup against Mikhail Gorbachev in 1991. Marshal Sergei Akhromeev committed suicide in 1991 during the fall of the Soviet Union.

The Marshals fell into three generational groups.

• Those who had gained their reputations during the Russian Civil War. These included both those who were purged in 1937–38 (Blyukher, Tukhachevsky, and Yegorov), and those who held high commands in the early years of World War II (Budyonny, Kulik, Shaposhnikov, Timoshenko and Voroshilov). All of the latter except Shaposhnikov and Timoshenko proved out-of-step with modern warfare and were removed from commanding positions.
• Those who made their reputations in World War II and assumed high commands in the latter part of the war. These included Zhukov, Vasilievsky, Konev, Rokossovsky, Malinovsky, Tolbukhin, Govorov, Meretskov and Sokolovsky.
• Those who assumed high command in the Cold War era. All of these were officers in World War II, but their higher commands were held in the Warsaw Pact or as Soviet Defence Ministers. These included Grechko, Yakubovsky, Kulikov, Ogarkov, Akhromeev, and Yazov.

All Marshals in the third category had been officers in World War II, except Ustinov, who had been People's Commissar for Armaments. Even Yazov, who was 20 when the war ended, had been a platoon commander. Brezhnev was not a professional soldier, but was still commissioned as a political commissar in the war.

The rank was abolished with the dissolution of the Soviet Union in December 1991. It was succeeded in the new Russia by the rank of Marshal of the Russian Federation, which has been held by only one person, Marshal Igor Sergeyev, who was Russian Defence Minister from 1997 to 2001.

After the death of Marshal Yazov in 2020 there were no living Marshals of the Soviet Union.

Sequence of ranks
lower rank: Army General (Генерал армии)	Marshal of the Soviet Union (Маршал Советского Союза)	Higher rank: Generalissimus of the Soviet Union (highest)
Chief marshal of the branch (Главный ма́ршал ро́да во́йск)

List of Marshals of the Soviet Union[]

Note: All Marshals of the Soviet Union, with the exception of non-military Marshals, had at least started their military careers in the Army. The service branches listed are the services they served in during their respective tenures as Marshals of the Soviet Union.

Name	Portrait	Lifespan	Promoted	Service branch/Background
Kliment Voroshilov		1881–1969	November 1935	Political
Mikhail Tukhachevsky		1893–1937	November 1935	Army
Alexander Yegorov		1883–1939	November 1935	Army
Semyon Budyonny		1883–1973	November 1935	Army
Vasily Blyukher		1890–1938	November 1935	Army
Semyon Timoshenko		1895–1970	May 1940	Army
Grigory Kulik		1890–1950	May 1940	Army
Boris Shaposhnikov		1882–1945	May 1940	Army
Georgy Zhukov		1896–1974	January 1943	Army
Aleksandr Vasilevsky		1895–1977	February 1943	Army
Joseph Stalin[a]		1878–1953	March 1943	Political
Ivan Konev		1897–1973	February 1944	Army
Leonid Govorov		1897–1955	18 June 1944	Army
Konstantin Rokossovsky[b]		1896–1968	29 June 1944	Army
Rodion Malinovsky		1898–1967	10 September 1944	Army
Fyodor Tolbukhin		1894–1949	12 September 1944	Army
Kirill Meretskov		1897–1968	October 1944	Army
Lavrentiy Beria		1899–1953	July 1945	NKVD/MGB
Vasily Sokolovsky		1897–1968	July 1946	Army
Nikolai Bulganin		1895–1975	November 1947	Political
Ivan Bagramyan[c]		1897–1982	March 1955	Army
Sergey Biryuzov		1904–1964	March 1955	Army/Strategic Rocket Forces
Andrei Grechko		1903–1976	March 1955	Army
Andrei Yeremenko		1892–1970	March 1955	Army
Kirill Moskalenko		1902–1985	March 1955	Army/Strategic Rocket Forces
Vasily Chuikov		1900–1982	March 1955	Army
Matvei Zakharov		1898–1972	May 1959	Army
Filipp Golikov		1900–1980	May 1961	Army
Nikolay Krylov		1903–1972	May 1962	Army/Strategic Rocket Forces
Ivan Yakubovsky		1912–1976	April 1967	Army
Pavel Batitsky		1910–1984	April 1968	Air Defence
Pyotr Koshevoy		1904–1976	April 1968	Army
Leonid Brezhnev		1906–1982	May 1976	Political
Dmitriy Ustinov		1908–1984	July 1976	Defence Industry
Viktor Kulikov		1921–2013	January 1977	Army
Nikolai Ogarkov		1917–1994	January 1977	Army
Sergey Sokolov		1911–2012	February 1978	Army
Sergey Akhromeyev		1923–1991	March 1983	Army
Semyon Kurkotkin		1917–1990	March 1983	Army
Vasily Petrov		1917–2014	March 1983	Army
Dmitry Yazov		1924–2020	April 1990	Army

See also[]

• Generalissimus of the Soviet Union
• Admiral of the fleet of the Soviet Union
• Marshal of the Russian Federation
• History of Russian military ranks
• Military ranks of the Soviet Union
• Marshal of the branch
• Chief marshal of the branch
• Field Marshal of Imperial Russia
• Ranks and insignia of the Red Army and Navy 1935–1940, and 1940–1943
• Ranks and rank insignia of the Soviet Armed Forces 1943–1955, and 1955–1991

Notes[]

References[]

External links[]

• Biographies of all the Marshals of the USSR