Georgy Lobov

Georgy Ageevich Lobov (Гео́ргий Аге́евич Ло́бов; 7 May 1915 – 6 January 1994) was a Soviet fighter pilot and squadron commander of the 7th Guards Fighter Aviation Division during World War II who was credited with 10 solo and 7 shared aerial victories.

Lobov was born on 7 May 1915 at the city of Yekaterinodar, to a family of a railway workers.

He graduated from a seven-year school to become a factory teacher.

He later worked at the Proletariat cement plant in Novorossiysk, as a roaster, instructor and secretary of the Komsomol organization of the plant.

In 1934 he graduated from the Rostov branch of the Institute of Mass Extramural Education of the Party activist under the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks.

In 1934, he entered the Novocherkassk Aviation Institute and in 1935 he graduated from the first course of the institute.

In 1935, he was drafted into the Red Army and later to the Red Army Air Force.

He was sent to study at the 7th Military Pilot School named after the Stalingrad Red Banner Proletariat in Stalingrad, from which he graduated in 1938 with honors.

From November 1938, he served in the 19th Fighter Aviation Regiment of the 54th Aviation Brigade at the Air Force of the Leningrad Military District, where he served as flight commander.

In June 1939, he was appointed as assistant military commissar of the squadron.

In the ranks of the 19th Fighter Aviation Regiment from 17 September 1939, to 8 October 1939, he participated in the 1939 Soviet invasion of Poland, and from November 1939 to March 1940, he flew 66 sorties during the Winter War.

During this war.

he was awarded his first Order of the Red Star.

In 1939, he joined the Communist Party of Soviet Union.

He flew Polikarpov I-16 in both the war campaigns.

Following the outbreak of Operation Barbarossa on 22 June 1941, Lobov took part an air battle over an airfield in Wysokie Mazowieckie, during which he was slightly wounded, but did not quit the battle.

From September 1941, he was assigned to the Leningrad Front.

While flying a MiG-3, he scored his first aerial victory on 3 October 1941 over Lake Ladoga, while repelling a Luftwaffe raid on ships delivering cargo to Leningrad.

From October 1941, he was assigned as a military commissar of the squadron of the 26th Air Defense Fighter Aviation Regiment at the Leningrad Front.

Lobov scored three more aerial victories by January 1942.

From February 1942, he was appointed military commissar of the 286th Fighter Aviation Regiment of the Leningrad Front.

In 1942, he flew 70 escort sorties to ensure the safety of transport aircraft flights to besieged Leningrad, without losing any of them to enemy fighters, while flying a I-16.

From May 1942 to June 1943, Lobov was the commander of the escort of Second Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Andrei Zhdanov's weekly in and out flights from Leningrad.

From November 1942, he fought as deputy commander for political affairs of the 275th Fighter Aviation Division, flying Yak-1 and La-5.

For two years, he fought in air battles over Leningrad, Kronstadt and Road of Life in Lake Ladoga.

From June 1943, Lobov was appointed as Deputy Commander of the 322nd Fighter Aviation Division.

Flying La-5 and La-7s, he fought in the Western, Bryansk, 1st Baltic, 3rd Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian fronts.

He participated in the Battle of Kursk, Bryansk, Nevel, Gorodok, Belorussian and Vistula-Oder offensives.

On 25 July 1944, he led an aerial assault at a railway station in Tilsit, East Prussia.

In August 1944, Lobov organized and personally led a series of 4 assault air strikes against the largest enemy airfields in East Prussia.

During the change of command of the division from 1 to 14 November 1944, he temporarily served as division commander.

In February 1945, he was appointed commander of the 7th Guards Fighter Aviation Division and commanded it until the end of the war.

The division provided air cover for crossings across the Neisse River in preparation for the Berlin offensive.

It participated in Berlin and Prague offensives.

He later commanded the 64th Fighter Aviation Corps, during the Korean War.

Lobov scored his 10th and last aerial victory of the war, when he shot down a Heinkel He 111 bomber over the Czechoslovak city of Mělník.

It is also considered as the last of the enemy aircraft destroyed by Soviet pilots in the Great Patriotic War.

During the war, Lobov flew I-16, MiG-3, Yak-1, La-5, La-7 and Yak-3 fighters.

He flew 346 sorties, and shot down 10 enemy aircraft personally and 7 in the group.

He fought with the Western Front, in the ranks of the 19th Fighter Aviation Regiment.