Glazunov, Vasilii Afanasevich

Glazunov, Vasilii Afanas’evich 

Born Dec. 20, 1895 (Jan. 1, 1896), in the village of Varvarovka, present-day Saratov Oblast; died June 26, 1967, in Moscow. Lieutenant general (1944). Twice Hero of the Soviet Union (Mar. 19, 1944, and Apr. 6, 1945). Member of the CPSU from 1926.

Glazunov was born into a peasant family. In the army from 1915, he fought in World War I with the ranks of private and junior noncommissioned officer. He joined the Soviet Army in July 1918 and fought in the Civil War in Turkestan, commanding a platoon, a company, and a battalion. Glazunov graduated from Vystrel, the higher infantry school of the Soviet Army (1929), advanced courses for the training of command personnel (1941), and courses at the Academy of the General Staff (1950). During World War II he participated in battles on the Southwestern and Western Ukrainian and the First Byelorussian fronts, commanding an airborne landing corps (June-August 1941) and airborne landing troops (from September 1941 to August 1943). He was deputy commander of the corps, but from November 1943 to September 1944 he was commander of the IV Guards Rifle Corps. After the war Glazunov was commander of a large unit, inspector-general of airborne forces, and assistant to the commander of the troops of a military district. He entered the reserves in 1954. Glazunov was awarded three Orders of Lenin, three Orders of the Red Badge, the Order of Suvorov Second Class, the Order of Kutuzov Second Class, the Order of the Red Star, and various medals.