A very interesting historical figure is Alexander Novikov, Marshal of the USSR Aviation. He was born in the village of Kryukovo (Kostroma region) in 1900. In 1919 he joined the Red Army and took part in the civil war. Since 1920 is a member of the RCP (b). In the same year he graduated from infantry courses, and in 1922 - courses "Shot". He commanded units from platoon to battalion. In 1930, Novikov Alexander Alexandrovich graduated from the Military Academy. After that, he was sent to staff work in the rifle corps.
During the Soviet-Finnish conflict, the future Marshal Novikov was on the North-Western Front, where he headed the headquarters of the Air Force. In 1940, Alexander Alexandrovich was appointed to the post of commander of the Air Force of the Leningrad Military District, and in 1941 he received the rank of Major General of Aviation. During the Second World War, Novikov led the Air Force of the North, and then the aviation of the Leningrad Fronts. In April 1942, he was appointed commander of the Air Force of the
Soviet Army. In 1942-1943, he simultaneously held the post of Deputy Commissar of Defense. Novikov was the first in the USSR to be awarded the rank of Air Marshal.
As a representative of the headquarters, Alexander Alexandrovich repeatedly coordinated the military operations of the Air Force on several fronts - during the offensive near Stalingrad, during the Battle of Kursk, during offensive operations in the North Caucasus, Belarus, Ukraine, the Baltic States, Germany and during battles with the Kwantung Army. In 1944, he became Chief Marshal of Aviation. This title appeared in the USSR for the first time.
Marshal Novikov led the air blockade of the encircled Paulus army and the defeat of German aircraft in air battles in the Kuban. He participated in the transfer of the USSR Air Force to the same type of formations (fighter, assault, bomber) and in the creation of a new organizational structure (air corps, air armies). After the war ended, Marshal Novikov worked in various command posts in the Air Force. In 1946, he became a deputy of the Supreme Council.
At the Potsdam conference , I. Stalin met with his son Vasily, who was a military pilot. He told the leader that American planes are much better than domestic. Stalin ordered an investigation. The head of the MGB Abakumov decided to “bend over” and started a company against aviators. In March 1946, Marshal Novikov was arrested along with the People’s Commissar of the Aviation Industry Shakhurin and several other officials.
Investigators demanded that Aleksandr Aleksandrovich confess to criminal acts, otherwise they promised to shoot the whole family. After a whole week of nightly interrogations, Marshal Novikov signed a typewritten document in the name of Stalin, with compromising evidence on Zhukov and Malenkov. However, here the investigators made a mistake. In the “sincere confession” signed by Marshal Novikov, there was a list of persons known to him unknown. Abakumov, as if nothing had happened, the investigator Likhachev made a remark: "It seems that they overdid it here ...". According to Novikov's memoirs, he was given some kind of cigarette, after which the marshal finally lost his sense of reality of what was happening. Under her action, he page-by-page signed a revised document.
It is believed that the MGB needed knocked out "confessions" of the marshal and the rest of the arrested aviators in order to use them against G.K. Zhukov. Alexander Alexandrovich was sentenced to a significant term, which he was serving in one of the institutions of the Gulag. He was rehabilitated after the death of Stalin in 1953 and was appointed to the post of commander of the ADD (long - range aviation). In 1956, Marshal Novikov resigned. He lived in Moscow and published his memoirs. Alexander Alexandrovich died in 1976.