The 'Yelnya Offensive Operation' was a Soviet successful tactical offensive within the 'Smolensk Strategic Defensive and Offensive Operation' (30 August/8 September 1941).

The undertaking was one of nine sub-operations within what the Soviets designed as the 'Smolensk Strategic Defensive and Offensive Operation'. The other elements of this undertaking were the 'Polotsk Defensive Operation' (2 July/16 July), the 'Smolensk Defensive Operation' (10 July/10 August), the 'Smolensk Offensive Operation' (21 July/7 August), the 'Siege of Mogilev Operation' (3/26 July), the 'Rogachev-Zhlobin Offensive Operation' (13/24 July), the 'Gomel-Trubchevsk Defensive Operation' (24 July/30 August) and the 'Dukhovschina Offensive Operation' (17 August/8 September).

The 'Yelnya Offensive Operation' was thus a Soviet military undertaking in the early stages of the German 'Barbarossa' invasion of the USSR. The offensive was an attack against the semi-circular Yelnya salient which Generalfeldmarschall Günther von Kluge’s German 4^th Army of Generalfeldmarschall Fedor von Bock’s Heeresgruppe 'Mitte' had extended some 50 miles (80 km) to the south-east of Smolensk, thus establishing a staging area which Generaloberst Heinz Guderian believed to be the ideal launch area for his 2^nd Panzergruppe to launch its planned offensive toward Vyaz’ma and thence eventually toward Moscow. Under heavy pressure on its flanks, the Germans had evacuated the salient by 8 September, leaving in their wake a devastated and depopulated region. As the first significant reverse that the German army had suffered during 'Barbarossa' and the first recapture of Soviet territory by the Soviet army, the outcome of the battle was concealed by the Nazi propaganda machine, but constituted a morale booster for the Soviet armed forces and population.

Initially located in the salient were Generalleutnant Ferdinand Schaal’s 10^th Panzerdivision, SS-Obergruppenführer und General der Waffen-SS Paul Hausser’s SS Division 'Das Reich', Generalleutnant Erich Straube’s 268^th Division and Major Dr Hans Marder’s 202^nd Sturmgeschützabteilung among other elements, but the first two of these were replaced by Generalleutnant Friedrich Bergmann’s 137^th Division, Generalleutnant Curt Gallenkamp’s 78^th Division and Generalleutnant Martin Dehmel’s 292^nd Division in addition to the 268^th Division, for a total of about 70,000 men, some 500 pieces of artillery and the 40 StuG III assault guns of the 202^nd Sturmgeschützabteilung, the last three part of General Friedrich Materna’s XX Corps.

The northern and southern shoulders of the salient’s base were held by Generalleutnant Ernst-Eberhard Hell’s 15^th Division and Generalleutnant Eccard Freiherr von Gablenz’s 7^th Division respectively.

On 1 August the Stavka authorised the formation of the Reserve Front under the command of General Georgi K. Zhukov, with several new armies under his command. These formations were generally poorly trained and had few tanks and pieces of artillery. Two of the new formations, namely the 24^th Army under the command of General Major Konstantin I. Rakutin and the 43^rd Army under the command of General Leytenent Pavel A. Kurochkin, were to support the West Front under the command of Marshal Sovetskogo Soyuza Semyon K. Timoshenko by destroying the German forces at Yelnya and then advancing across the Desna river to retake Roslavl, which had been lost to the 2^nd Panzergruppe early in August.

The commander of the 2^nd Panzergruppe, Guderian had proposed a withdrawal during a meeting with Adolf Hitler and other senior German commanders on the Eastern Front at Novy Borisov on 4 August, but this suggestion had been rejected.

On 26 August the Stavka ordered Rakutin’s 24^th Army of Zhukov’s Reserve Front to begin an offensive against the salient on 30 August. This offensive was planned on the basis of attacks the 102^nd Tank Division and part of the 303^rd Division against the salient’s base as the outer pincer arms of a planned double encirclement, with the 107^th and 100^th Divisions and the 106^th Mechanised Division and part of the 303^rd Division as the northern and southern arms of the inner pincer. Containing the salient from any further advance to the east were the 19^th Division and 309^th Division.

The 103^rd Motorised Division and 120^th Division were deployed on the northern and southern sides of the salient in heavily fortified field positions to prevent possible routes of escape by the German forces. However, the 24^th Army was allocated only 20 aircraft for reconnaissance and artillery fire correction, but without dedicated fighter or attack units.

On 3 September, under the threat of encirclement, the Germans started to retreat from the salient while still maintaining resistance on its shoulders and flanks, and on 6 September the Soviet forces retook Yelnya. The Soviet offensive continued until 8 September, when it was stopped at the new German defence line.

This was the most substantial reverse that the German army had suffered up to that date, and was also the first successful planned Soviet offensive operation in the 'Great Patriotic War'. German losses were in the order of 45,000 men killed, wounded or captured. The 'Yelnya Offensive Operation' is also associated with the creation of the elite Guards units within the Soviet forces to reflect a high level of combat performance under arduous operational conditions: the 100^th and 127^th Divisions were renamed as the 1^st and 2^nd Guards Divisions, and soon after this 107^th and 120^th Divisions were designated as the 5^th and 6^th Guards Divisions.