The "G.K. Zhukov Museum" is named after Russian General Georgy Zhukov. He s famous mainly for commanding the defense of Stalingrad, but his first great victory was here. In the late thirties, "Manchuko" Manchuria was a Japanese puppet state and Mongolia very much in the Soviet sphere of influence; there were a series of border clashes. These ended when Zukov, commanding a mainly Soviet force with some Mongolian troops, inflicted a decisive defeat on Japanese forces at the Battle of Khalkhin Gol in August 1939.
This battle is not well-known in the West, but it was rather important. It was not a small battle; each side had well over 50,000 troops involved. The crushing result — estimates of Japanese casualties run from 15,000 to over 40,000 — greatly affected Japanese strategy in Asia. After Khalkin Gol, they gave up their plan to take Siberia and turned instead to planning attacks on South East Asia.
