Despite tens of thousands of publications about the Soviet-German war, its true history is still missing. In the many “ideologically consistent” works of political workers, generals, and party historians, it is useless to look for answers to questions about how and why the Red Army rolled back to the Volga, how and why 27 million people were lost in the war. The truth about the war, even 60 years after its end, still makes its way through the mountains of lies with great difficulty. One of the few domestic authors trying to recreate its true picture bit by bit is V.V. Beshanov. In the proposed book, he examines the issues of preparing Red Army personnel in the pre-war period for the “coming battles with the imperialists.” What were the people who commanded the armed forces of the USSR like, what was the Soviet military doctrine, what methods were used to train personnel, how all this turned out on the battlefields in 1941-1942. The book is intended for a wide range of readers.