This Soviet general was killed by Ukrainian nationalists

Vatutin took part in many key battles of the war against Nazi Germany. The troops under his command held Voronezh, surrounded General Friedrich Paulus’s group in Stalingrad, routed the enemy at the Kursk Bulge and successfully crossed the Dnieper River.

The military leader was certainly expected to receive marshal’s shoulder straps, but he never lived long enough to get them.

On February 29, 1944, in the south of the Rivne region, the general’s motorcade was ambushed by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA, recognized as extremist and banned in the Russian Federation). Vatutin, who was wounded in the right thigh, was taken to a safe place.

The wound was serious and gangrene was developing. The military leader was taken to Rivne and then transported to Kiev, where Nikolai Burdenko, the chief surgeon of the Red Army, arrived specially.

On April 5, Vatutin's leg was amputated, but this did not save the situation. On April 15, the 42-year-old general died of blood poisoning.