Red Army

This article is about the 1918–46 Workers-Peasants Red Army. For other uses, see Red Army (disambiguation).

Soviet Armed Forces
Components
General Staff Strategic Rocket Forces Red Army Soviet Army Air Defence Forces Air Forces Navy
Ranks of the Soviet Military
Military ranks of the Soviet Union
History of the Soviet Military
Military history of the Soviet Union History of Russian military ranks

Soviet Union
This article is part of a series on the politics and government of the Soviet Union
Leadership Leaders President (list Vice President) Collective leadership State Council Presidential Council
Communist Party Congress Central Committee History General Secretary Politburo Secretariat Orgburo
Legislature Congress of Soviets (Central Executive Committee) Supreme Soviet Soviet of the Union Soviet of Nationalities Presidium Congress of People's Deputies Speaker 1989 Legislative election
Governance Constitution 1924 1936 1977 Government Ministries State Committees Executive Officer Premiership Cabinets Council of People's Commissars Council of Ministers Cabinet of Ministers
Judiciary Law Supreme Court People's Court Procurator General
History and politics 1917–1927 Revolution Civil War 1927–1953 World War II 1953–1964 Khrushchev Thaw 1964–1982 Era of Stagnation 1982–1991 Dissolution Ideology Soviet democracy Marxism–Leninism Leninism Stalinism Khrushchevism
Society Economy Agriculture Consumer goods Five-Year Plan Kosygin reform New Economic Policy Science and technology Era of Stagnation Material balance planning Transport Culture Demographics Education Family Phraseology Religion Repression Censorship Censorship of images Economic repression Great purge Gulag system Collectivization Human rights Ideological repression Suppressed research Political abuse of psychiatry Political repression Population transfer Propaganda Red Terror
Other countries Atlas Soviet Union portal

The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army (Russian: Рабоче-крестьянская Красная армия; РККА, or Raboche-krest'yanskaya Krasnaya armiya: RKKA, frequently shortened in Russian to Красная aрмия; KA, in English: Red Army), was the army and the air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, which after 1922 was called the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. The army was established immediately after the 1917 October Revolution (Red October or Bolshevik Revolution); in which the Bolsheviks raised an army to oppose the military confederations (especially the combined groups summarized under the preamble White Army) of their adversaries, during the Russian Civil War. Beginning in February 1946, the Red Army, along with the Soviet Navy, embodied the main component of the Soviet Armed Forces; taking the official name "The Soviet Army" (Russian: Советская Армия (СА)/Sovetskaya Armija), until its dissolution in December 1991.

The Red Army is credited as being the decisive land force in the Allied victory in the European theatre of World War II. During operations on the Eastern Front, it defeated 75%–80% of the German land forces (Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS) deployed in the war.

Origins

Red guards unit of the Vulkan factory

In September 1917 Vladimir Lenin wrote: "There is only one way to prevent the restoration of the police, and that is to create a people's militia and to fuse it with the army (the standing army to be replaced by the arming of the entire people)." At the time, the Imperial Russian Army had started to collapse. 23%(about 19 million) of the male population of the Russian Empire were mobilized'; however most of them were not equipped with any weapons and had support roles maintaining the lines of communication and the base areas. The Tsarist general Nikolay Dukhonin estimated that there were 2 million deserters, 1.8 million dead, 5 million wounded and 2 million prisoners. He estimated the remaining troops as numbering 10 million.

The Council of People's Commissars decided to form the Red Army on 28 January 1918. They envisioned a body "formed from the class-conscious and best elements of the working classes". All citizens of the Russian republic over the age of 18 were eligible. Its role being the defense "of the Soviet authority, the creation of a basis for the transformation of the standing army into a force deriving its strength from a nation in arms, and, furthermore, the creation of a basis for the support of the coming Socialist Revolution in Europe.". Enlistment was conditional upon "guarantees being given by a military or civil committee functioning within the territory of the Soviet Power or by party or trade union committees or, in extreme cases, by two persons belonging to one of the above organizations". In the event of an entire unit wanting to join the Red Army, a "collective guarantee and the affirmative vote of all its members" would be necessary.

The Council of People's Commissars appointed itself the supreme head of the Red Army, delegating command and administration of the Army to the Commissariat for Military Affairs and the Special All-Russian College within this commissariat. Nikolai Krylenko was the Supreme Commander in Chief, with Aleksandr Myasnikyan as deputy. Nikolai Podvoisky became the Commissar for War, Pavel Dybenko Commissar for the Fleet. Proshyan, Samoisky, Steinberg were also specified as People's Commissars with Vladimir Bonch-Bruyevich from the Bureau of Commissars. At a joint meeting of Bolsheviks and Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, held on 22 February 1918, Krylenko remarked: "We have no army. The demoralized soldiers are flying panic-stricken as soon as they see a German helmet appear on the horizon, abandoning their artillery, convoys and all war material to the triumphantly advancing enemy. The Red Guard units are brushed aside like flies. We have no power to stay the enemy; only an immediate signing of the peace treaty will save us from destruction."

While the Russian army was being taken apart, "it became apparent that the rag-tag Red Guard units and elements of the imperial army who had gone over the side of the Bolsheviks were quite inadequate to [sic] the task of defending the new government against external foes". Therefore, in January 1918, Sovnarkom decided that the Worker-Peasant Red Army would consist of volunteers from "the most class conscious and organized elements of the toiling masses". This signalled the end of the Red Guards and the creation of the Red Army.

Because the Red Army was composed mainly of peasants, the families of those who served were guaranteed rations and assistance with farm work. Some peasants who remained at home yearned to join the Army; men, along with some women, flooded the recruitment centres. If they were turned away they would collect scrap metal and prepare care-packages. In some cases the money they earned would go towards tanks for the Army.

History

Russian Civil War

For more details on this topic, see Russian Civil War.

Military insignia of the Red Army 1919–1924

The Russian Civil War (1917–23) occurred in two periods:

• The first period: October 1917 – November 1918, from the Bolshevik Revolution to the First World War (1914–18) Armistice, developed from the Bolshevik government's November 1917 nationalization of traditional Cossack lands. This provoked the insurrection of General Alexey Maximovich Kaledin's Volunteer Army in the River Don region. The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk also aggravated Russian internal politics. This allowed direct Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War, in which twelve foreign countries created anti-Bolshevik militias. There was a series of engagements between the Czechoslovak Legion, the Polish 5th Rifle Division, and the pro-Bolshevik Red Latvian Riflemen, et al.
• The second period: January–November 1919, saw the White armies' successfully advancing: from the south, under Gen. Anton Denikin, from the east, under Gen. Aleksandr Vasilevich Kolchak, and from the northwest, under Gen. Nikolai Nikolaevich Yudenich. The Whites defeated the Red Army on each front. Leon Trotsky reformed and counterattacked; the Red Army repelled Gen. Kolchak's army in June, and the armies of Gen. Denikin and Gen. Yudenich in October. By mid-November, the White Armies were all almost completely exhausted, and, in January 1920, Budenny's First Cavalry Army entered Rostov-on-Don.

At the war's start, the Red Army consisted of 299 infantry regiments. Civil war intensified after Lenin dissolved the Russian Constituent Assembly (5–6 January 1918) and the Soviet government signed the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (3 March 1918) removing Russia from the Great War. Free from international war, the Red Army confronted an internecine war with a loose alliance of anti-Communist forces, comprising the Revolutionary Insurrectionary Army of Ukraine, the "Black Army" led by Nestor Makhno, the anti-White and anti-Red Green armies, and others. The 23 February 1918 "Red Army Day" has a twofold, historical significance; the first day of drafting recruits (in Petrograd and Moscow) and the first day of combat against the occupying Imperial German Army.

On 6 September 1918 the Bolshevik militias consolidated under the supreme command of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic Russian: Revvoyensoviet, Revolyutsionny Voyenny Sovyet, People's Commissar for War (1918–24), Trotsky, Chairman, and Jukums Vācietis, Commander-in-Chief of the Red Army. Soon afterwards Trotsky established the GRU (military intelligence) to provide political and military intelligence to Red Army commanders. Trotsky founded the Red Army with an initial Red Guard organization, and a core soldiery of Red Guard militiamen and Chekist secret police; conscription began in June 1918, and opposition to it was violently suppressed. To control the multi-ethnic and multi-cultural Red Army soldiery, the Cheka operated special punitive brigades which suppressed anti-communists, deserters, and "enemies of the state". Wartime pragmatism allowed the recruitment of ex-Tsarist officers and sergeants (non-commissioned officers, NCOs) to the Red Army. Lev Glezarov's special commission screened and recruited; by mid-August 1920 the Red Army's former Tsarist personnel included 48,000 officers, 10,300 administrators, and 214,000 NCOs. At the Civil War's start, ex-Tsarists made up 75% of the Red Army officer-corps, who were employed as voenspetsy (military specialists, ru:Военный советник), whose loyalty was occasionally enforced with hostage families. At war's end in 1922, ex-Tsarists constituted 83% of the Red Army's divisional and corps commanders.

Vladimir Lenin, Klim Voroshilov and Leon Trotsky and soldiers, Petrograd, 1921

The Red Army used special regiments for ethnic minorities, like the Dungan Cavalry Regiment commanded by the Dungan Magaza Masanchi. The Red Army also co-operated with armed Bolshevik Party-oriented volunteer units, the Части особого назначения (ЧОН) [chasti osobogo naznacheniya - special task units or ChON] which functioned from 1919 to 1925.

The slogan "Exhortation, Organization, and Reprisals" expressed the discipline and motivation ensuring the Red Army's tactical and strategic success. On campaign, the attached Cheka Special Punitive Brigades conducted summary field courts-martial and executions of deserters and slackers. Under Commissar Jānis K. Bērziņš the Special Punitive Brigades took hostages from the villages of deserters to compel their surrender; one in ten was executed. The same tactic also suppressed peasant rebellions in areas controlled by the Red Army. The Soviets enforced the loyalty of the political, ethnic, and national varieties of men in the Red Army through political commissars attached at the brigade and regiment levels and tasked with spying on commanders for political incorrectness. Despite such coercion, the political commissars whose Chekist detachments retreated or broke in the face of the enemy earned the death penalty. In August 1918, Trotsky authorized General Mikhail Tukhachevsky to place blocking units behind politically unreliable Red Army units, to shoot anyone who retreated without permission. In 1942, during the Great Patriotic War (1941–1945), Joseph Stalin reintroduced the policy, using penal battalions.

Polish-Soviet War and prelude

The Soviet westward offensive of 1918–1919 occurred at the same time as the general Soviet move into the areas abandoned by the Ober Ost garrisons. This merged into the 1919–21 Polish-Soviet war, in which the Red Army reached central Poland in 1920, but then suffered a defeat there, which put an end to the war. During the Polish Campaign the Red Army numbered some 6.5 million men, many of which the Army had difficulty supporting, around 581,000 in the two operational fronts, western and southwestern. Around 2.5 million men and woman were 'immobilized in the interior' as part of reserve armies.

Doctrinal development in the 1920s and 1930s

After four years of warfare, the Red Army's defeat of Pyotr Nikolayevich Wrangel in the south allowed the foundation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in 1922. Historian John Erickson dates 1 February 1924, when Mikhail Frunze became head of the Red Army Staff, as the ascent of the General Staff, which dominated Soviet military planning and operations. By 1 October 1924 the Red Army's strength diminished to 530,000. List of Soviet Union divisions 1917–45 details the formations of the Red Army in that time.

In the late 1920s and throughout the 1930s, Soviet military theoreticians led by Marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky developed the Deep operations doctrine, a direct consequence of their Polish-Soviet War and Russian Civil War experience. To achieve victory, deep operations comprehend simultaneous Corps- and Army-size unit maneuvers of simultaneous parallel attacks throughout the depth of the enemy's ground forces, inducing catastrophic defensive failure. The deep battle doctrine relies upon aviation and armor advances in the hope that maneuver warfare offers quick, efficient, and decisive victory. Marshal Tukhachevsky said that aerial warfare must be "employed against targets beyond the range of infantry, artillery, and other arms. For maximum tactical effect aircraft should be employed en masse, concentrated in time and space, against targets of the highest tactical importance."

Soviet tanks in the Battle of Khalkhin Gol, August 1939

Red Army Deep Operations were first formally expressed in the 1929 Field Regulations, and codified in the 1936 Provisional Field Regulations (PU-36). The Great Purge of 1937–1939 and Purge of 1940–1942 removed many leading officers from the Red Army, including Tukhachevsky and many of his followers, and the doctrine was abandoned. Thus at the Battle of Lake Khasan, in 1938, and the Battle of Khalkhin Gol, in 1939, major border clashes with the Imperial Japanese Army, the doctrine was not used. It was not until the Second World War that deep operations were to be reused.

Chinese-Soviet War

The Republic of China waged war against invading Soviet and White Russian forces during the Sino-Soviet conflict (1929), the Soviet Invasion of Xinjiang and the Xinjiang War. The Red Army achieved its objectives; it maintained effective control over the Manchurian Chinese Eastern Railway, and successfully installed a pro-Soviet regime in Xinjiang.

The XI Congress of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) (RCP (b)) adopted a resolution on the strengthening of the Red Army. It decided to establish strictly organized military, educational and economic conditions in the army. However it was recognized that an army of 1,600,000 would be burdensome. By the end of 1922, after the Congress, the Party Central Committee decided to reduce the Red Army to 800 thousand people. Reduction of the army necessitated the restructuring of management and organizational structure of troops. The supreme military unit became corps of two or three divisions. Divisions consisted of three regiments. Brigades as independent units were abolished. The formation of departments' rifle corps began.

The Winter War with Finland

For more details on this topic, see Winter War.

Red Army soldiers display a captured Finnish banner, March 1940.

The Winter War (Finnish: talvisota, Swedish: vinterkriget, Russian: Зи́мняя война́) was a war between the Soviet Union and Finland. It began with a Soviet offensive on 30 November 1939—three months after the start of World War II and the Soviet invasion of Poland, and ended on 13 March 1940 with the Moscow Peace Treaty. The League of Nations deemed the attack illegal and expelled the Soviet Union on 14 December 1939.

The Soviet forces had three times as many soldiers as the Finns, thirty times as many aircraft, and a hundred times as many tanks. The Red Army, however, had been crippled by Soviet leader Joseph Stalin's Great Purge of 1937, reducing the army's morale and efficiency shortly before the outbreak of the fighting. With over 30,000 of its army officers executed or imprisoned, most of which were of the highest ranks, the Red Army in 1939 had many inexperienced senior officers. Because of these factors, and high commitment and morale in the Finnish forces, Finland was able to resist the Soviet invasion for much longer than the Soviets expected; Finnish forces inflicted stunning losses on the Red Army for the first three to four months while suffering very few losses themselves.

Hostilities ceased in March 1940 with the signing of the Moscow Peace Treaty. Finland ceded 11% of its pre-war territory and 30% of its economic assets to the Soviet Union. Soviet losses on the front were heavy, and the country's international reputation suffered. The Soviet forces did not accomplish their objective of the total conquest of Finland but conquered sufficient territory along Lake Ladoga, Petsamo and Salla. The Finns retained their sovereignty and improved their international reputation (which increased the morale in the Continuation War).

World War II ("The Great Patriotic War")

For more details on Great Patriotic War (term), see Great Patriotic War (term).

For more details on Eastern Front (World War II), see Eastern Front (World War II).

Soviet gun crew in action during the Siege of Odessa, July 1941

In accordance with the Soviet-Nazi Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of 23 August 1939, the Red Army invaded Poland on 17 September 1939, after the Nazi invasion on 1 September 1939. On 30 November, the Red Army also attacked Finland, in the Winter War of 1939–40. By autumn 1940, after conquering its portion of Poland, the Third Reich shared an extensive border with USSR, with whom it remained neutrally bound by their non-aggression pact and trade agreements. Another consequence of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was the Soviet occupation of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina, carried out by the Southern Front in June–July 1940. This conquest also added to the border the Soviet Union shared with Nazi-controlled areas. For Adolf Hitler, the circumstance was no dilemma, because the Drang nach Osten ("Drive towards the East") policy secretly remained in force, culminating on 18 December 1940 with Directive No. 21, Operation Barbarossa, approved on 3 February 1941, and scheduled for mid-May 1941.

When Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941, in Operation Barbarossa, the Red Army's ground forces had 303 divisions and 22 separate brigades (6.8 million soldiers), including 166 divisions and 9 brigades (3.2 million soldiers) garrisoned in the western military districts. The Axis deployed on the Eastern Front had 181 divisions and 18 brigades (3 million soldiers). Three Fronts, the Northwestern, Western, and Southwestern conducted the defense of the western borders of the USSR. In the first weeks of the Great Patriotic War the Wehrmacht defeated many Red Army units. The Red Army lost millions of men as prisoners and lost much of its pre-war matériel. Stalin increased mobilization, and by 1 August 1941, despite 46 divisions lost in combat, the Red Army's strength was 401 divisions.

The unprepared Soviet forces suffered much damage in the field because of mediocre officers, partial mobilization, and an incomplete reorganization. The hasty pre-war forces expansion and the over-promotion of inexperienced officers (owing to the purging of experienced officers) favored the Wehrmacht in combat. The Axis's numeric superiority rendered the combatants' divisional strength approximately equal. A generation of Soviet commanders (notably Georgy Zhukov) learned from the defeats, and Soviet victories in the Battle of Moscow, at Stalingrad, Kursk and later in Operation Bagration proved decisive.

In 1941, the Soviet government raised the bloodied Red Army's esprit de corps with propaganda stressing the defense of Motherland and nation, employing historic exemplars of Russian courage and bravery against foreign aggressors. The anti-Nazi Great Patriotic War, was conflated with the Patriotic War of 1812 against Napoleon, and historical Russian military heroes, such as Alexander Nevski and Mikhail Kutuzov, appeared; repression of the Russian Orthodox Church temporarily ceased, and priests revived the tradition of blessing arms before battle.

To encourage the initiative of Red Army commanders, the CPSU temporarily abolished political commissars, reintroduced formal military ranks and decorations, and the Guards unit concept. Exceptionally heroic or high-performing units earned the Guards title (for example 1st Guards Special Rifle Corps, 6th Guards Tank Army), an elite designation denoting superior training, materiel, and pay. Punishment also was used; slackers and malingerers avoiding combat with self-inflicted wounds cowards, thieves, and deserters were disciplined with beatings, demotions, undesirable/dangerous duties, and summary execution by NKVD punitive detachments.

BM-13 "Katyusha" battery fire, during the Battle of Berlin, April 1945

In that time, the osobist (NKVD military counter-intelligence officer) became a key Red Army figure with the power to condemn to death and to spare the life of any soldier and (most any) officer of the unit to which he was attached. In 1942, Stalin established the penal battalions composed of gulag inmates, Soviet PoWs, disgraced soldiers, and deserters, for hazardous front-line duty as tramplers clearing Nazi minefields, et cetera. Given the dangers, the maximum sentence was three months. Likewise, the Soviet treatment of Red Army personnel captured by the Wehrmacht was especially harsh. A 1941 Stalin directive ordered the suicide of every Red Army officer and soldier rather than surrender; Soviet law regarded all captured Red Army soldiers as traitors. Soviet PoWs whom the Red Army liberated from enemy captivity usually were sentenced to penal battalions.

Victorious Soviet soldiers in Berlin

Red Army victory banner, raised above the German Reichstag in May 1945

During the Great Patriotic War, the Red Army conscripted 29,574,900 men in addition to the 4,826,907 in service at the beginning of the war. Of this total of 34,401,807 it lost 6,329,600 killed in action (KIA), 555,400 deaths by disease and 4,559,000 missing in action (MIA) (most captured). Of these 11,444,000, however, 939,700 rejoined the ranks in the subsequently liberated Soviet territory, and a further 1,836,000 returned from German captivity. Thus the grand total of losses amounted to 8,668,400. This is the official total dead, but other estimates give the number of total dead up to almost 11 million men, including 7.7 million killed or missing in action and 2.6 million POW dead (out of 5.2 million total POWs), plus 400,000 paramilitary and Soviet partisan losses. The majority of the losses, excluding POWs, being ethnic Russians (5,756,000), followed by ethnic Ukrainians (1,377,400). However, as many as 8 million of the 34 million mobilized were non-Slavic minority soldiers, and around 45 divisions formed from national minorities served from 1941 to 1943.

The German losses on the Eastern Front consisted of an estimated 3,604,800 KIA within the 1937 borders plus 900,000 ethnic Germans and Austrians outside the 1937 border (included in these numbers are men listed as missing in action or unaccounted for after the war) and 3,576,300 men reported captured (total 8,081,100); the losses of the German satellites on the Eastern Front approximated 668,163 KIA/MIA and 799,982 captured (total 1,468,145). Of these 9,549,245, the Soviets released 3,572,600 from captivity after the war, thus the grand total of the Axis losses came to an estimated 5,976,645. Regarding prisoners of war, both sides captured large numbers and had many die in captivity – one recent British figure says 3.6 of 6 million Soviet POWs died in German camps, while 300,000 of 3 million German POWs died in Soviet hands. From the fall of East Prussia, Soviet soldiers carried out large-scale rapes in Germany, especially noted in Berlin until the beginning of May 1945.

Shortcomings

In 1941 the rapid progress of the initial German air and land attacks into the Soviet Union made Red Army logistical support difficult, because many depots, and most of the USSR's industrial manufacturing base lay in the country's invaded western half, obliging their re-establishment east of the Ural Mountains. Until then, the Red Army was often required to improvise or go without weapons, vehicles, and other equipment. The 1941 decision to physically move their manufacturing capacity east of the Ural mountains kept the main Soviet support system out of German reach.

In the later stages of the war, the Red Army fielded some excellent weaponry, especially artillery and tanks. The Red Army's heavy KV-1 and medium T-34 tanks outclassed most Wehrmacht armor, but in 1941, most Soviet tank units used older models. The Soviet Air Force, though equipped with relatively modern aircraft, initially performed poorly against the Luftwaffe.

Administration

Until the establishment of the Red Army, military administration after the October Revolution was taken over by the People's Commissariat of war and marine affairs headed by a collective committee of Vladimir Antonov-Ovseyenko, Pavel Dybenko, and Nikolai Krylenko. At the same time, Nikolay Dukhonin was acting as the Supreme Commander-in-Chief after Alexander Kerensky fled from Russia. On 12 November 1917 the Soviet government appointed Krylenko as the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, and because of an "accident" during forceful displacement of commander-in-chief, Dukhonin was killed on 20 November 1917. Nikolai Podvoisky was appointed as the Narkom of War Affairs, leaving Dybenko in charge of Narkom of Marine Affairs and Ovseyenko - the expeditionary forces to the Southern Russia on 28 November 1917. Bolsheviks also sent out their own representative to replace front commanders of the Russian Imperial Army.

After the signing of Treaty of Brest-Litovsk on 3 March 1918, a major reshuffling took place in the Soviet military administration. On 13 March 1918 the Soviet government accepted the official resignation of Krylenko and the post of Supreme Commander-in-Chief was liquidated. On 14 March 1918 Leon Trotsky replaced Podvoisky as the Narkom of War Affairs. On 16 March 1918 Pavel Dybenko was relieved from the office of Narkom of Marine Affairs. On 8 May 1918 there was created the All-Russian Chief Headquarters headed by Nikolai Stogov and later Alexander Svechin.

On 2 September 1918 there was established the Revolutionary Military Council (RMC) as the main military administration that was governed by the Narkom of War Affairs Leon Trotsky. On 6 September 1918 along with already existing chief headquarters, there was created the Field Headquarters of RMC initially headed by Nikolai Rattel. The same day there was created office of the Commander-in-Chief of Armed Forces initially assigned to Jukums Vācietis (since July 1919 - Sergey Kamenev). The Commander-in-Chief of Armed Forces existed until April 1924, the end of Russian Civil War.

After the establishment of the Soviet Union, in November 1923 Russian Narkom of War Affairs was transformed into the Soviet Narkom of War and Marine Affairs.

Organization

For more details on this topic, see Formations of the Soviet Army.

Unofficial Red Army flag, since the Soviet ground forces never had an official flag.

At the beginning of its existence, the Red Army functioned as a voluntary formation, without ranks or insignia. Democratic elections selected the officers. However, a decree of 29 May 1918 imposed obligatory military service for men of ages 18 to 40. To service the massive draft, the Bolsheviks formed regional military commissariats (voyennyy komissariat, abbr. voyenkomat), which as of 2006 still exist in Russia in this function and under this name. Military commissariats however should not be confused with the institution of military political commissars.

In the mid-1920s the territorial principle of manning the Red Army was introduced. In each region able-bodied men were called up for a limited period of active duty in territorial units, which constituted about half the army's strength, each year, for five years. The first call-up period was for three months, with one month a year thereafter. A regular cadre provided a stable nucleus. By 1925 this system provided 46 of the 77 infantry divisions and one of the eleven cavalry divisions. The remainder consisted of regular officers and enlisted personnel serving two-year terms. The territorial system was finally abolished, with all remaining formations converted to the other cadre divisions, in 1937–38.

Mechanization

Red Army BT-7 tanks on parade

The Soviet military received ample funding and was innovative in its technology. An American journalist wrote in 1941:

Even in American terms the Soviet defense budget was large. In 1940 it was the equivalent of $11,000,000,000, and represented one-third of the national expenditure. Measure this against the fact that the infinitely richer United States will approximate the expenditure of that much yearly only in 1942 after two years of our greatest defense effort.

Most of the money spent on the Red Army and Air Force went for machines of war. Twenty-three years ago when the Bolshevik revolution took place there were few machines in Russia. Marx said Communism must come in a highly industrialized society. The Bolsheviks identified their dreams of socialist happiness with machines which would multiply production and reduce hours of labor until everyone would have everything he needed and would work only as much as he wished. Somehow this has not come about, but the Russians still worship machines, and this helped make the Red Army the most highly mechanized in the world, except perhaps the German Army now.

Like Americans, the Russians admire size, bigness, large numbers. They took pride in building a vast army of tanks, some of them the largest in the world, armored cars, airplanes, motorized guns, and every variety of mechanical weapons.

Under Stalin's campaign for mechanization, the army formed its first mechanized unit in 1930. The 1st Mechanized Brigade consisted of a tank regiment, a motorized infantry regiment, as well as reconnaissance and artillery battalions. From this humble beginning, the Soviets would go on to create the first operational-level armored formations in history, the 11th and 45th Mechanized Corps, in 1932. These were tank-heavy formations with combat support forces included so they could survive while operating in enemy rear areas without support from a parent front.

Impressed by the German campaign of 1940 against France, the Soviet People's Commissariat of Defence (Defence Ministry, Russian abbreviation NKO) ordered the creation of nine mechanized corps on 6 July 1940. Between February and March 1941 another twenty would be ordered, and all larger than those of Tukhachevsky. Even though the Red Army's 29 mechanized corps had no less than 29,899 tanks on paper by 1941, they proved to be a paper tiger. There were actually only 17,000 tanks available at the time, meaning several of the new mechanized corps were under strength. The pressure placed on factories and military planners to show production numbers also led to a situation where the majority of armored vehicles were obsolescent models, critically lacking in spare parts and support equipment, and nearly three quarters were overdue for major maintenance. By 22 June 1941 there were only 1,475 T-34s and KV series tanks available to the Red Army, and these were too dispersed along the front to provide enough mass for even local success. To put this into perspective, the 3rd Mechanized Corps in Lithuania was formed up of a total of 460 tanks; 109 of these were newer KV-1s and T-34s. This corps would prove to be one of the lucky few with a substantial number of newer tanks. However, the 4th Army was composed of 520 tanks, all of which were the obsolete T-26, as opposed to the authorized strength of 1,031 newer medium tanks. This problem was universal throughout the Red Army, and would play a crucial role in the initial defeats of the Red Army in 1941 at the hands of the German armed forces.

Wartime

See also: Red Army's tactics in World War II

War experience prompted changes to the way frontline forces were organized. After six months of combat against the Germans, the stavka abolished the rifle corps intermediate level between the army and division level because, while useful in theory, in the state of the Red Army in 1941, they proved ineffective in practice. Following the decisive victory in the Battle of Moscow in January 1942, the high command began to reintroduce rifle corps into its most experienced formations. The total number of rifle corps started at 62 on 22 June 1941, dropped to six by 1 January 1942, but then increased to 34 by February 1943, and 161 by New Year's Day 1944. Actual strengths of front-line rifle divisions, authorized to contain 11,000 men in July 1941, were mostly no more than 50% of established strengths during 1941, and divisions were often worn down on continuous operations to hundreds of men or even less.

On the outbreak of war the Red Army deployed mechanized corps and tank divisions whose development has been described above. The German attack caused many, and in the course of 1941 virtually all (barring two in the Transbaikal Military District) were disbanded. It was much easier to coordinate smaller forces, and separate tank brigades and battalions were substituted. It was late 1942 and early 1943 before larger tank formations of corps size were fielded to employ armor in mass again. By mid-1942 these corps were being grouped together into tank armies whose strength by the end of the war could be up to 700 tanks and 50,000 men.

Personnel

The Bolshevik authorities assigned to every unit of the Red Army a political commissar, or politruk, who had the authority to override unit commanders' decisions if they ran counter to the principles of the Communist Party. Although this sometimes resulted in inefficient command according to some American historians, the Party leadership considered political control over the military absolutely necessary, as the army relied more and more on officers from the pre-revolutionary Imperial period and understandably feared a military coup. This system was abolished in 1925, as there were by that time enough trained Communist officers that counter-signing of all orders was no longer necessary.

Ranks and titles

Memorial to the Red Army in Prague

Main article: Military ranks of the Soviet Union

The early Red Army abandoned the institution of a professional officer corps as a "heritage of tsarism" in the course of the Revolution. In particular, the Bolsheviks condemned the use of the word officer and used the word commander instead. The Red Army abandoned epaulettes and ranks, using purely functional titles such as "Division Commander", "Corps Commander", and similar titles. But insignia of these functional titles exists, consisting triangles, squares and rhombuses (so-called "diamonds").

In 1924 (2 October) "personal" or "service" categories introduced, from K1 (section leader, assistant squad leader, senior rifleman, etc.) to K14 (field commander, army commander, military district commander, army commisar and equal). Service categories insignia also consists triangles, squares and rhombuses, but also rectangles (1 - 3, for categories from K7 to K9).

On 22 September 1935 the Red Army abandoned service categories and introduced personal ranks. These ranks, however, used a unique mix of functional titles and traditional ranks. For example, the ranks included "Lieutenant" and "Comdiv" (Комдив, Division Commander). Further complications ensued from the functional and categorical ranks for political officers (e.g., "brigade commissar", "army commissar 2nd rank"), for technical corps (e.g., "engineer 3rd rank", "division engineer"), for administrative, medical and other non-combatant branches.

The Marshal of the Soviet Union (Маршал Советского Союза) rank was introduced on 22 September 1935. On 7 May 1940 further modifications to rationalise the ranks system were made on the proposal by Marshal Voroshilov: the ranks of "General" and "Admiral" replaced the senior functional ranks of Combrig, Comdiv, Comcor, Comandarm in the RKKA and Flagman 1st rank etc. in the Red Navy; the other senior functional ranks ("division commissar", "division engineer", etc.) remained unaffected. The arm or service distinctions remained (e.g. general of cavalry, marshal of armoured troops). For the most part the new system restored that used by the Imperial Russian Army at the conclusion of its participation in World War I.

In early 1943 a unification of the system saw the abolition of all the remaining functional ranks. The word "officer" became officially endorsed, together with the epaulettes that superseded the previous rank insignia. The ranks and insignia of 1943 did not change much until the last days of the USSR; the contemporary Russian Army uses largely the same system.

Military education

Kursants (cadets), Red Army Artillery School, Chuhuyiv, Ukraine, 1933

Main article: Soviet military academies

During the Civil War the commander cadres were trained at the Nicholas General Staff Academy of the Russian Empire, which became the Frunze Military Academy in the 1920s. Senior and supreme commanders were trained at the Higher Military Academic Courses, renamed the Advanced Courses for Supreme Command in 1925; the 1931 establishment of an Operations Faculty at the Frunze Military Academy supplemented these courses. The General Staff Academy was reinstated on 2 April 1936, and became the principal military school for the senior and supreme commanders of the Red Army.

Purges

Further information: Case of Trotskyist Anti-Soviet Military Organization

The late 1930s saw the purges of the Red Army leadership which occurred concurrently with Stalin's Great Purge of Soviet society. In 1936 and 1937, at the orders of Stalin, thousands of Red Army senior officers were dismissed from their commands. The purges had the objective of cleansing the Red Army of the "politically unreliable elements", mainly among higher-ranking officers. This inevitably provided a convenient pretext for the settling of personal vendettas or to eliminate competition by officers seeking the same command. Many army, corps, and divisional commanders were sacked, most were imprisoned or sent to labor camps; others were executed. Among the victims was the Red Army's primary military theorist, Marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky, perceived by Stalin as a potential political rival. Officers who remained soon found all of their decisions being closely examined by political officers, even in mundane matters such as record-keeping and field training exercises. An atmosphere of fear and unwillingness to take the initiative soon pervaded the Red Army; suicide rates among junior officers rose to record levels. The purges significantly impaired the combat capabilities of the Red Army. Hoyt concludes "the Soviet defense system was damaged to the point of incompetence" and stresses "the fear in which high officers lived." Clark says, " Stalin not only cut the heart out of the army, he also gave it brain damage." Lewin identifies three serious results: The loss of experienced and well-trained senior officers; the distrust it caused among potential allies especially France; and the encouragement it gave Germany.

Stalin with marshal Blyukher among Red Army military personnel

Red Army marshal Mikhail Tukhachevsky, executed during the Great Purge in June 1937.

Recently declassified data indicate that in 1937, at the height of the Purges, the Red Army had 114,300 officers, of whom 11,034 were dismissed. In 1938, the Red Army had 179,000 officers, 56% more than in 1937, of whom a further 6,742 were sacked. In the highest echelons of the Red Army the Purges removed 3 of 5 marshals, 13 of 15 army generals, 8 of 9 admirals, 50 of 57 army corps generals, 154 out of 186 division generals, all 16 army commissars, and 25 of 28 army corps commissars.

The result was that the Red Army officer corps in 1941 had many inexperienced senior officers. While 60% of regimental commanders had two years or more of command experience in June 1941, and almost 80% of rifle division commanders, only 20% of corps commanders, and 5% or fewer army and military district commanders, had the same level of experience.

The significant growth of the Red Army during the high point of the purges may have worsened matters. In 1937, the Red Army numbered around 1.3 million, increasing to almost three times that number by June 1941. The rapid growth of the army necessitated in turn the rapid promotion of officers regardless of experience or training. Junior officers were appointed to fill the ranks of the senior leadership, many of whom lacked broad experience. This action in turn resulted in many openings at the lower level of the officer corps, which were filled by new graduates from the service academies. In 1937, the entire junior class of one academy was graduated a year early to fill vacancies in the Red Army. Hamstrung by inexperience and fear of reprisals, many of these new officers failed to impress the large numbers of incoming draftees to the ranks; complaints of insubordination rose to the top of offenses punished in 1941, and may have exacerbated instances of Red Army soldiers deserting their units during the initial phases of the German offensive of that year.

By 1940, Stalin began to relent, restoring approximately one-third of previously dismissed officers to duty. However, the effect of the purges would soon manifest itself in the Winter War of 1940, where Red Army forces generally performed poorly against the much smaller Finnish Army, and later during the German invasion of 1941, in which the German were able to rout the Russians defenders partially due to inexperience amongst the Russian officers.

Weapons and equipment

See also: Tanks of the interwar period § Soviet Union, Tanks in World War II § Soviet Union and List of equipment of the Russian Ground Forces

The Soviet Union expanded its indigenous arms industry as part of Stalin's industrialization program in the 1920s and 1930s.

Bibliography

• Carrere D'Encausse, Helene. The End of the Soviet Empire: The Triumph of the Nations, Basic Books, 1992, ISBN 0-465-09818-5.
• Chamberlain, William Henry (1957), The Russian Revolution: 1917–1921, New York: Macmillan .
• Erickson, John (1962), The Soviet High Command 1918–41 – A Military-Political History, London: MacMillan, OCLC 569056 .
• Glantz, David M (1998), Stumbling Colossus: The Red Army on the Eve of World War, University Press of Kansas, ISBN 978-0-7006-0879-9 .
• ——— (2005), Colossus Reborn, University Press of Kansas, ISBN 978-0-7006-1353-3 .
• Harrison, Richard W. The Russian Way of War: Operational Art, 1904-1940 (University Press of Kansas, 2001)
• House, Jonathan M (1984), Toward Combined Arms Warfare: A Survey of 20th Century Tactics, Doctrine, and Organization (PDF), Fort Leavenworth, KS: US Army Command and General Staff College, OCLC 11650157, 66027–6900 .
• Isby, David C. Weapons and Tactics of the Soviet Army, Jane's, 1988, ISBN 978-0-7106-0352-4.
• Merridale, Catherine (2006), Ivan's War: Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939–1945, New York: Macmillan, ISBN 978-0-8050-7455-0 .
• ——— (2007) [2006], Ivan's War: Life and Death in the Red Army, 1939–1945, New York: Macmillan, ISBN 978-0-312-42652-1 .
• Moynahan, Brian. Claws of the Bear: The History of the Red Army from the Revolution to the Present (1989).
• Odom, William E. The Collapse of the Soviet Military, Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 1998, ISBN 978-0-300-07469-7.
• Overy, RJ (2004), The Dictators: Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia, WW Norton, ISBN 978-0-393-02030-4 .
• Overmans, Rüdiger (2000), Deutsche militärische Verluste im Zweiten Weltkrieg (in German), Oldenbourg, ISBN 3-486-56531-1 .
• Reese, Roger R. Why Stalin's Soldiers Fought: The Red Army's Military Effectiveness in World War II (University Press of Kansas; 2011) 400 pp. excerpt and text search
• Reese, Roger R. Red Commanders: A Social History of the Soviet Army Officer Corps, 1918-1991 (2005) excerpt and text search
• Reese, Roger R. Stalin's Reluctant Soldiers: A Social History of the Red Army, 1925-1941 (1996)
• Reese, Roger R. The Soviet Military Experience: A History of the Soviet Army, 1917-1991 (2000) excerpt and text search
• Schofield, Carey (1991), Inside the Soviet Army, London: Headline, ISBN 978-0-7472-0418-3 .
• Scott, Harriet Fast; Scott, William F (1984), The Armed Forces of the USSR (3rd ed.), Boulder, CO: Westview, ISBN 0-86531-792-5 .
• Shaw, John (1979), Red Army Resurgent, Alexandria, VA: Time-Life, ISBN 0-8094-2520-3 .
• Tolstoy, Nikolai (1981), Stalin's Secret War, New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, ISBN 0-03-047266-0 .
• Williams, Beryl (1987), The Russian Revolution 1917–1921, Blackwell, ISBN 978-0-631-15083-1 .
• Zaloga, Steven; Grandsen, James (1984), Soviet Tanks and Combat Vehicles of World War Two, London: Arms & Armour .