Born in central Russia, Vasilevsky began his military career in the Imperial Russian Army during World War I and earned the rank of captain by 1917.

In these capacities, Vasilevsky coordinated fronts and often planned offensives in collaboration with Georgy Zhukov, particularly at the Battle of Kursk in 1943 and in Operation Bagration in 1944.

Vasilevsky was born on September 30, 1895, in Novaya Golchikha in the Kineshma Uyezd (now part of the city of Vichuga, Ivanovo Oblast) in a family of Russian ethnicity.

Vasilevsky reportedly broke off all contact with his parents after 1926 because of his Communist Party membership and his military duties in the Red Army; three of his brothers did so also.

[8] After completing his studies in the seminary and spending a few years working as a teacher, Vasilevsky intended to become an agronomist or a surveyor, but the outbreak of the First World War changed his plans.

[14] In May 1916, he led his men during the Brusilov offensive, becoming a battalion commander after heavy casualties among officers, and gaining the rank of captain by age 22.

However, the local military authorities recommended that he decline the proposal because of the heavy fighting taking place in Ukraine between pro-Soviet forces and the pro-independence Ukrainian government (the Central Rada).

[24] After the Treaty of Riga, Vasilevsky fought against remaining White forces and peasant uprisings in Belarus and in the Smolensk Oblast until August 1921.

[6][26] During these years, Vasilevsky established friendships with higher commanders and Party members, including Kliment Voroshilov,[27] Vladimir Triandafillov[28] and Boris Shaposhnikov.

He also met several senior military commanders, such as Mikhail Tukhachevsky and Georgy Zhukov, then the Deputy Cavalry Inspector of the Red Army.

Zhukov would later characterize Vasilevsky as "a man who knew his job as he spent a long time commanding a regiment and who earned great respect from everybody.

[6] While in this position he and Shaposhnikov were responsible for the planning of the Winter War, and after the Moscow peace treaty, for setting the demarcation line with Finland.

[citation needed] In May 1942 one of the most controversial episodes in Vasilevsky's career occurred: the Second Battle of Kharkov, a failed counteroffensive that led to a stinging Red Army defeat, and ultimately to a successful German offensive (Operation Blue) in the south.

In his memoirs, Khrushchev accused Vasilevsky of being too passive and indecisive, as well as being unable to defend his point of view in front of Stalin during that particular operation.

"[52] In June 1942, Vasilevsky was briefly sent to Leningrad to coordinate an attempt to break the encirclement of the 2nd Shock Army led by General Andrei Vlasov.

[59] The army in question was Rodion Malinovsky's 2nd Guards' which Vasilevsky committed against a dangerous German counter-attack launched from Kotelnikovo by the 57th Panzer corps that was designed to deblockade the Stalingrad pocket.

[citation needed] In January 1943, Vasilevsky coordinated the offensives on the upper Don River near Voronezh and Ostrogozhsk, leading to decisive encirclements of several Axis divisions.

[citation needed] In March 1943, after the creation of the Kursk salient and the failure of the Third Battle of Kharkov, Stalin and the Stavka had to decide if the offensive should be resumed despite this setback, or if it was better to adopt a defensive stance.

[61] When it became clear that the supposed German offensive was postponed and would no longer take place in May 1943 as expected, Vasilevsky successfully defended continuing to wait for the Wehrmacht to attack, rather than making a preemptive strike as Khrushchev wanted.

[39] After the German failure at Kursk and the start of the general counteroffensive on the left bank of the Dnieper, Vasilevsky planned and executed offensive operations in the Donbas region.

[39] In February 1945, Vasilevsky was again appointed commander of 3rd Belorussian Front to lead the East Prussian Operation, leaving the post of General Chief of Staff to Aleksei Antonov.

Instead, Lasch remained in prison for 10 years and returned to Germany only in 1955, as did many of the Wehrmacht soldiers and officers, while all German population was expelled from Eastern Prussia.

[71] During the 1944 summer offensive, Stalin announced that he would appoint Vasilevsky Commander-in-Chief of USSR Forces in the Far East once the war against Germany ended.

Vasilevsky then received the appointment of Commander-in-Chief of USSR Forces in the Far East and travelled by armoured train to Chita to execute the plan.

[citation needed] Vasilevsky was awarded the Gold Star of Hero of the Soviet Union twice for operations on the German and Japanese fronts.

[75] Several years before the war, Zhukov described Vasilevsky as "a man who knew his job as he spent a long time commanding a regiment and who earned great respect from everybody.

[citation needed] American military historians David M. Glantz and Jonathan M. House wrote that Vasilevsky "exercised a calm, rational influence" on Stalin and was "far less temperamental than Zhukov.

In particular, Nikita Khrushchev defined Vasilevsky in his memoirs as a passive commander completely under the control of Stalin, and blamed him for the Kharkov failure in Spring 1942.

According to him, Vasilevsky was the only officer responsible for the successful planning and execution of the Soviet counteroffensive at Stalingrad, and Zhukov played no role whatsoever in it.

He also points out that Vasilevsky and Zhukov probably deliberately under-reported the estimated strength of the 6th Army to gain Stalin's approval for that risky operation.