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Question: out of curiosity I open up the 1941-45 campaign as the Axis and advanced the turn without moving-attacking...nothing; and the Soviet losses were very high - can someone please explain this? Is this attrition by simply being adjacent to Axis units...which, btw, did not lose a single man...?

Thanks

Almost all the losses are disabled. At the start of Turn 1 the Soviets take automatic damage, see Manual 23.3.3.3, which is probably the reason for these numbers. The actual killed and captured are far smaller and are probably due to normal attrition.

Run the german turn and they will have attrition losses.   Those losses are calculated during that side's logistic phase.

I was wondering about this 1st turn automatic damage to the Soviets when I saw it in the manual. Is it supposed to represent the fact that many Soviet units were not at full strength on 6/22/41, or what?

The manual is very good at explaining the intricacies of this detailed game, but it doesn't always explain the reasoning behind some of the rules and events.

AFAIK, if enemy combat units are in contact with each other (as in adjacent hexes), casualties are still generated to represent low-level combat between the formations.

The attrition losses to the soviets amount to 25,000-30,000 men, some hundreds of artillery and 50 or so tanks per week.  It drops as the strength of the axis forces you are fighting drops and your experience increases.  Least I saw in terms of men was 18,000 or so.