Early Life
He was born in the village of Obrazhiyevka, a settlement in the Sumy region, during the wartime period between the Ukrainian People's Republic and Soviet Ukraine. He was the youngest of five children. For two years he attended a school for young workers, and in early 1940 graduated from the Shostka chemical technical school. Kozhedub learned to fly aircraft in the Shostkinsk aeroclub and joined the Soviet army in 1940. He graduated from the Chuguyevsk Military Air School in 1941 at the start of the German invasion of the Soviet Union, but he was retained as an instructor. Kozhedub remained at the school for two years where he trained many young Soviet pilots.
Feeling his talents would be better used in combat, he requested a transfer to an operational unit and in March 1943 was posted, as a Starshii Serzhant (Senior Sergeant), to 240th IAP, one of the first units to receive the new Lavochkin La-5.
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