Kravchenko, Andrei

Kravchenko, Andrei Grigor’evich 

Born Nov. 18 (30), 1899, in the village of Sulimovka, now in lagotin Raion, Kiev Oblast; died Oct. 18, 1963, in Moscow. Soviet military commander; colonel general of the tank forces (1944); twice Hero of the Soviet Union (Jan. 10, 1944, and Sept. 8, 1945). Member of the CPSU from 1925.

Kravchenko entered the Soviet Army in 1918 and fought as a private in the Civil War of 1918–20. He graduated from the Poltava Military Infantry School in 1923, from the Frunze Military Academy in 1928, and from the Higher Academic Training Courses of the Military Academy of the General Staff in 1949. In the Soviet-Finnish War of 1939–40 he was chief of staff of a division. In the Great Patriotic War (1941–45), Kravchenko participated in fighting on several fronts with the position of commander of a tank brigade (from September 1941), chief of staff of a tank corps (from March 1942), commander of a tank corps (from July 1942), and commander of the Sixth Guards Tank Army (from January 1944 to September 1945). After the war he held responsible positions. Kravchenko went into the reserves in October 1955 for reasons of health. Kravchenko was awarded two Orders of Lenin, three Orders of the Red Banner, two Orders of Suvorov First Class, the Order of Suvorov Second Class, the Order of Kutuzov Second Class, the Order of Bogdan Khmel’nitskii First Class, various medals, and nine foreign orders.