A strategic offensive is often a Campaign, and would involve use of over 100,000 troops as part of a general Strategy of the conflict in a given Theatre. For example the Operation Barbarossa was a Theatre Offensive composed of three distinct and inter-related Campaigns in the Southern, Central and Northern parts of USSR territory. Soviet strategic offensive operations during World War II often involved multi-front coordinated operations. Along with the Wehrmacht operations on the Eastern Front of World War II, these were the largest military operations of the twentieth century. Strategic operations of the Red Army in World War II provides a listing of large scale Soviet operations.
A strategic offensive is the aggressive expression of war planning and use of strategic forces as a whole, combining all resources available for achieving defined and definitive goals that would fundamentally alter the balance of power between belligerents. However, the planning and execution of strategic offensives are always based on theoretical considerations because it is impractical, uneconomic and difficult to hide a full scale rehearsal of large scale operations.
A strategic offensive consists of simultaneous, tandem or phased operational offensives that seek to achieve specific operational objectives that eventually lead to the achievement of a strategic goal, usually a complete defeat of the opposition, but also destruction of a significant enemy force or occupation of strategically significant territory, such as the Manchurian Strategic Offensive Operation.
Any given strategic offensive is a derivative of a combination of factors such as national military doctrine, past military experience, and analysis of socio-political, economic and military circumstances.
Read more about this topic: Offensive (military)
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