Kharkov is the next biggest city in Ukraine. It is the administrative center of the Kharkiv Oblast (state), in addition to the administrative center of the nearby Kharkivskyi Raion (district) within the oblast. As of 2006, its population is 1,461,300. People residing in Kharkiv are known as Kharkovites.

Kharkiv is one of the primary industrial, cultural and educational centres of Ukraine. Its industry and research specialize on arms production and machines. There are dozens and dozens of industrial companies in the city. Among them are renowned giants Morozov Design Bureau and also Malyshev Tank Factory (Zavod Malysheva, a leader in tank production since the 1930s), Hartron (aerospace and atomic electronics) and Turboatom (aircraft manufacturer).

There’s an underground rapid transit system with 3-5 kilometers of track and 28 stations. The following milestone of Kharkiv is the Freedom Square (Ploshcha Svobody), that’s the second largest city square in Europe, and also the 4th largest square on earth.

Geography

Kharkiv rests at the confluence of the Kharkiv, Lopan, and Udy Rivers, in which they flow into the Seversky Donets landmark.

History

Archeological evidence discovered Ukrayna Üniversitesi within the area of presentday Kharkiv indicates that a neighborhood populace has been around in that area since the second millennium b.c.e. Cultural artifacts return to the Bronze Age, as well as those of later Scythian and Sarmatian lands. There is also evidence that the Chernyakhov culture flourished in the region from the second to the 6th century.

Founded in the midst of 17th century, the city has had a university since 1805. During the early years of the Soviet Union, Kharkiv has been the capital of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic (by 1917-1934). At the early 1930s, the Ukrainian famine (Holodomor) drove off many people the property to the cities, to Kharkiv particularly, looking for food. Some of these died and were buried in another of the town’s cemeteries. During April and May 1940 roughly 3800 Polish inmates of Starobelsk camp were murdered in the Kharkiv NKVD building, after buried in Pyatikhatky forest (part of the Katyn massacre).

During World War II Kharkiv was the site of several military engagements. The town was captured from Nazi Germany and its military allies, recaptured by the Red Army, captured again by the Nazis after which finally free on August 23, 1943. Seventy % of the city had been destroyed and tens and thousands of the inhabitants were killed. It is noted that Kharkiv has been the most inhabited city in the Soviet Union occupied by Nazis, as from recent years preceding World War II Kiev has been small of those two by population. Between December of 1941 during January of 1942, around 30,000 people were murdered by the nazis (mostly Jewish). These were laid to rest in among the most significant mass graves that is famous as Drubitsky Yar.

The Russian 38th Army set up a defense at the city. Meanwhile, the entire factories were dismantled for relocation farther east. By October 21, all of the mill equipment had been loaded on to rail trains. On this particular day that the Germans closed to within seven kilometers of the railyards.
2nd Battle of Kharkov
The Second Battle of Kharkov was a battle fought against 12 May to 28 May 1942, to the Eastern Front during World War II. After a thriving winter counter offensive that repulsed German troops from Moscow but also attacked the Red Army’s reservations, the Kharkov offensive was a new Soviet try to enlarge up on their own strategic initiative.

On 12 May 1942, Soviet forces under the command of Marshal Semyon Timoshenko launched an offensive in to the German Sixth Army, from the salient established during the Cold Temperatures Counter-offensive. After initial promising signs, the offensive has been stopped cold by German counter attacks. Critical errors of several staff officers and of Stalin himself, who failed to accurately estimate the Wehrmacht’s potential and overestimated their own newly trained forces, resulted in a prosperous German pincer attack around advancing Soviet troops, cutting them off from the remainder of the leading.

This bloody 17-day conflict resulted in the lack of 200,000 Red Army employees along with several billion tanks. In the long run, it’d award Friedrich Paulus his very first field victory and open the path for the eventual operations that resulted in the Operation Blue and the Battle of Stalingrad, pitching the Red Army into some other collection of defeats and retreats.

3rd Battle of Kharkov
The 3rd Battle of Kharkov has been the final important strategic German success of World War II. Kharkov had been seized on October 25, 1941, however, had fallen to the Soviets in February 1943, following the German defeat at the Battle of Stalingrad. Led by Field Marshal Erich von Manstein, the Germans counter attacked and after ruining Soviet spearheads, retook the town in bitter street fighting.

The II SS Panzer Korps, built with heavy Tiger tanks, also played a significant role. It was included of the Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler and Das Reich branches, which were resting and refitting for a long time period and were at full strength. Under the control of SS-Gruppenführer Paul Hausser, it assessed the Soviet progress on Kharkov, despite chances of six to one, but, threatened with encirclement, Hausser withdrew against explicit orders from Hitler. The behave infuriated Hitler, ” he refused to award Hausser following the conflict.

The II SS Panzer Korps (now fortified with all the Totenkopf branch) was attached with Manstein’s counter-thrust, which destroyed the Soviet spearheads and rescued Army Group South. The Leibstandarte branch then re-took Kharkov, for which Hitler renamed the central square “Leibstandarteplatz”. The battle is usually thought of as the last successful German offensive in the USSR and continues to be studied in military academies like a textbook example of judicial.

The city stayed only temporarily in Axis hands. On August 22, 1943, in the wake of the Battle of Kursk, the Germans were driven out once more.

However, it must be mentioned that after the German disaster at Stalingrad, von Manstein’s success in bolstering the leading must rank among the best (if not the biggest) accomplishments of World War II. He’d executed a successful withdrawal, then found a masterly counter-attack that inflicted on the Russians massive losses in material and men. Most of all, he re-established front from Taganrog to Belgorod as a nearly directly defensive lineup also, in little cost, re took the fourth largest city within the Soviet Union, of this while his opponent possessed a considerable numerical edge.