“When Barbarossa begins, the world will hold its breath and be speechless!” - that's what Hitler said. And after the defeat of France, the Fuhrer said: “Believe me, in comparison with this, the campaign against Russia will be child’s play.” However, the very first day of the war against the USSR showed how wrong he was - already on June 22, 1941, the Nazis had to admit: “The enemy fights stubbornly and bravely to the last. There are no reports of defectors or those who surrendered. The fighting is much more serious than during the Polish and Western campaigns...” In this book, the leading military historian not only reconstructs the course of the Invasion on all fronts, from the Baltic to the Black Sea, but also refutes numerous myths about the first day of the Great Patriotic War: “What allows us to look on June 22nd through different eyes? First of all, this is work with enemy documents, the comparison of which with domestic data provided a lot of food for thought. It turned out that already on the first day of the war, the German command was forced to seriously adjust the initial plan of action of its troops in Ukraine under the influence of the stubborn resistance of the Red Army. This is the deepest misconception that June 22, 1941 unfolded like clockwork for the invasion forces...” (Alexey Isaev)