Since then, he has published several studies, many of which are notable for the critical review of the official Soviet conceptions of World War II.
[8] Meltyukhov's Soviet-Polish Wars: Military and Political Confrontation in 1918-1939 was criticised by the Polish historian Andrzej Nowak.
According to Nowak, Meltyukhov interpreted Polish-Soviet conflicts as “fragments of eternal Western aggression against Russia.” Russian and Soviet aggressions “are presented as purely defensive postures”, which presents Soviet crimes in occupied Poland “as a ‘peacekeeping mission’”[9] In his 2004 book, Nowak lists in detail biases and inaccuracies concerning Polish-Russian relations in Meltyukhov's book by primarily pointing out that Poland is always portrayed as an aggressor and that many instances of Russian aggression toward Poland are ignored.
[9][a] Meltyukhov's study Stalin's Missed Chance has also been valued positively for covering Soviet military plans before the outbreak of German-Soviet war in 1941 by relying on documents that had been inaccessible.
[10] In 2020, Meltyukhov contributed to the Russian Federal archival project "Crimes of the Nazis and their accomplices against the civilian population of the USSR during the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945".