guard army and some reinforcement units : the 4th Guards Rifle Corps, the 6th Guards Rifle Corps, the 153rd Rifle Division, and the 18th Tank Corps. After the German relief operation was held, the 1st Guards Army, along with the 6th Army and 3rd Guards Army, launched an attack in Operation Little Saturn. During the operation the Soviets defeated the Italian Eighth Army and gained a respectable amount of territory. By the end of the year, the 1st Guards Army was outside Millerovo. The 1st Guards Army also took part in Operation Saturn, where the Red Army successfully drove back Army Group South to the Donets Basin in the Ukraine. The 1st Guards Army was part of the Soviet Southwestern Front, and took part in the victorious Soviet pushing into Germany in 1943 to 1945. Also, in 1943, the 1st Guards Army was the first unit of the soviet army to operate the new T-34/85 tank. Among its units when the war ended in 1945 was the 81st Rifle Division. In August, the 1st Guards Army became the headquarters of the Kiev Military District. Commanders Lieutenant-General, and from May 1943, Colonel-General Vasily Ivanovich Kuznetsov (December 1942 – December 1943 ) Colonel-General Andrei Antonovich Grechko (December 1943 – the end of the war). After World War II In July 1958, the 1st Separate Combined Arms Army (the Special Mechanized Army until 1957) was moved from its headquarters in Budapest to Chernigov and renamed the 1st Combined Arms Army. The 1st Combined Arms Army was subordinated to the Kiev Military District and in 1960 consisted of the 72nd, 81st and 115th Guards Motor Rifle Divisions, as well as the 35th Guards Tank Division. On 5 October 1967, it was renamed the 1st Guards Combined Arms Army at the request of now-Minister of Defense Grechko, who had commanded the army's third formation during World War II. On 22 February 1968, it was awarded the Order of the Red Banner. For a period the army HQ was actually an operations group of the District. By this time it had been awarded the Order of Lenin. It included among its forces the 72nd Guards Motor Rifle Division, and the 25th Guards Motor Rifle Division. After the collapse of the Soviet Union the Army became the 1st Army Corps of the Ukrainian Ground Forces, and then Territorial Directorate "North". Commanders The following officers commanded the 1st