The book describes one of the most terrible tragedies of the past war and the events preceding it. For the first time in such detail, at a fairly high professional level, with the involvement of unknown and little-known documents of both opposing sides, a fairly complete picture of the fighting at the first stage of the Moscow defensive operation is drawn. In Soviet times, gross miscalculation , the Headquarters and Fronts Command , detrimental to the course and outcome of defensive battles in the most important Western strategic direction in official works were presented in a simplified form. and the scale of the disaster under Vyazma was simply silenced. The book details the decisions that ultimately led to the capture and death of hundreds of thousands of Soviet people. The author introduces documents into scientific circulation, including German ones, which will undoubtedly interest not only the general public, but also researchers. The epilogue briefly describes his work to establish the circumstances of the deaths of soldiers still missing, in order to perpetuate their memory. The book is intended for anyone interested in the military history of the Fatherland ..