In the postwar decades, Soviet cinema created many films dedicated to the events of the Great Patriotic War. Most of them in one way or another touched on the theme of the tragedy of the summer of 1941. Episodes in which small groups of Red Army fighters armed with one rifle for several people confront formidable terrible bulks (their role was played by T-54 plywood or other modern cars), were very common in films. Without questioning the prowess of the Red Army soldiers who crushed the Hitler war machine, it is worth analyzing some statistical data available to a modern reader who is interested in history. It is enough to compare the staff of the tank division of the Soviet Army and the Wehrmacht to make sure that the fascist military power by the movie screen artists was somewhat exaggerated. With our qualitative superiority, there was a quantitative advantage, which was especially pronounced in the second half of the war.
Questions to be answered
The tank divisions of the Wehrmacht sought to Moscow, they were held by the famous Panfilov or company unknown to anyone, and sometimes even units. Why did it happen that a country in which industrialization was carried out, possessing a cyclopean industrial-defense potential, lost a significant part of its territory and millions of citizens taken prisoner, mutilated and dead during the first six months of the war? Perhaps the Germans had some monstrous tanks? Or was the organizational structure of their mechanized military units superior to the Soviet? This question worries our fellow citizens of three post-war generations. How did the fascist German division differ from ours?
The structure of the Soviet armored forces 1939-1940
Until June 1939, the Red Army had four tank corps. After the Deputy People's Commissar of Defense E. A. Kulik headed the commission that checked the activities of the General Staff, the reorganization of the subordination system of this kind of troops began. One can only guess about the reasons for the change in the hull structure, but the result was the creation of 42 tank brigades, which, respectively, had fewer pieces of equipment. Most likely, the goal of the transformations was the possible implementation of an updated military doctrine, which provides for deep penetrating strategic offensive operations. Nevertheless, by the end of the year, at the direct direction of I.V. Stalin, this concept was revised. Instead of brigades, not the former tank, but mechanized corps were formed. Six months later, in June 1940, their number reached nine. Each staffing structure included 2 tank and 1 motorized divisions. Tank, in turn, consisted of regiments, a motorized rifle, artillery and two directly tank. Thus, the mechanized corps became a formidable force. He possessed an armored fist (more than a thousand formidable vehicles) and the enormous power of artillery and infantry support with all the necessary infrastructure, ensuring the vital activity of the giant mechanism.
Prewar plans
The Soviet tank division of the pre-war period was armed with 375 vehicles. A simple multiplication of this figure by 9 (the number of mechanized corps), and then by 2 (the number of divisions in the corps) gives the result - 6750 units of armored vehicles. But that is not all. In the same 1940, two separate divisions were formed, also armored. Then events began to develop with uncontrollable swiftness. Exactly four months before the attack of Nazi Germany, the Red Army General Staff decided to create two dozen mechanized corps. The Soviet command did not succeed in fully implementing this plan, but the process began. This is evidenced by number 17 of the corps, which received number 4 in 1943. The Kantemirov armored division succeeded the military glory of this large military unit immediately after the Victory.
The reality of the Stalinist plans
29 mechanized corps in two divisions plus two more separate. Only 61. In each according to the staffing list there are 375 units, in total 28 thousand 375 tanks. This is the plan. But in fact? Maybe these figures are only for paper, and Stalin simply dreamed, looking at them and smoking his famous pipe?
As of February 1941, the Red Army as a part of nine mechanized corps had almost 14,690 tanks. In 1941, the Soviet defense industry produced 6,590 vehicles. The totality of these numbers, of course, is less than that required for 29 corps (and this is 61 armored divisions) of 28,375 units, but the general trend indicates that the plan was generally implemented. The war began, and objectively, far from all tractor plants could withstand full-fledged productivity. It took time to carry out a hasty evacuation, and the Leningrad Kirovets was in general blockade. And still continued to work. Another tractor and tank giant, KhTZ, remained in Kharkov occupied by the Nazis.
Germany before the war
At the time of the invasion of the USSR, Panzervaffen troops had 5639 tanks. There were no heavy ones among them, TI, included in this number (there were 877 of them), can be attributed, rather, to wedges. Since Germany was at war on other fronts, and Hitler needed to ensure the presence of his troops in Western Europe, against the Soviet Union, he sent not all of his armored vehicles, but most of it, in the amount of about 3330 vehicles. In addition to the mentioned TIs, the Nazis had Czech tanks (772 units) with extremely low combat characteristics. All the equipment before the war was transferred to the four tank groups being created. This organization scheme paid off during the aggression in Europe, but in the USSR it turned out to be ineffective. Instead of groups, the Germans soon organized armies, each of which had 2-3 corps. The Wehrmacht's tank divisions were armed with about 160 armored vehicles in 1941. It should be noted that before the attack on the USSR their number was doubled, without increasing the total fleet, which led to a decrease in the composition of each of them.
1942 year. Panzergrenadier regiments of tank divisions
If in June-September 1941 the German units quickly advanced deep into Soviet territory, then by the fall the offensive had slowed down. The initial success, expressed in the encirclement of the protruding sections of the border, which had become the front since June 22, the destruction and seizure of huge reserves of material resources of the Red Army, the capture of a large number of soldiers and professional commanders, eventually began to exhaust its potential. By 1942, the regular number of vehicles was brought to two hundred, but not every division could support it due to heavy losses. Wehrmacht tank armada was losing more than it could get as a replenishment. Shelves began to be renamed into panzergrenadier (usually there were two), which more reflected their composition. The infantry component began to prevail.
1943, structural transformation
So, the German division (armored) in 1943 consisted of two panzergrenadier regiments. It was assumed that each battalion should have five companies (4 rifle and 1 combat engineer), but in practice they cost four. By the summer, the situation worsened, the entire tank regiment, which was part of the division (one) often consisted of one battalion of Pz Kpfw IV tanks, although by that time the Panthers Pz Kpfw V were in service, which could already be classified as medium tanks. New equipment hurriedly arrived at the front from Germany uncracked, often out of order. This happened in the midst of preparations for Operation Citadel, that is, the famous Battle of Kursk. In 1944, the Germans on the Eastern Front of the tank armies had 4. The tank division as the main tactical unit had various quantitative technical content, from 149 to 200 vehicles. In the same year, tank armies actually ceased to be such, and they began to be reorganized into conventional ones.
SS divisions and separate battalions
The transformations and reorganizations that took place at Panzervaffen were forced. The material part suffered from military losses, was out of order, and the industry of the Third Reich, which experienced a constant shortage of resources, did not have time to make up for the loss. Special heavy battalions were formed from the new types of heavy vehicles (self-propelled guns of the Yagdpenter, Yagdtiger Ferdinand and the Royal Tiger tanks), as a rule, they did not enter the tank divisions. The SS tank divisions, which were considered elite, practically did not undergo transformations. There were seven of them:
- Adolf Hitler (No. 1).
- Das Reich (No. 2).
- “The Dead Head” (No. 3).
- Viking (No. 5).
- Hohenstaufen (No. 9).
- Frundsberg (No. 10).
- The Hitler Youth (No. 12).
The German General Staff used separate battalions and SS tank divisions as special reserves sent to the most dangerous sections of the fronts in both the East and the West.
Soviet tank division
The war of the twentieth century was characterized by the confrontation of resource bases. Despite the impressive successes of the Wehrmacht of 1941-1942, German military experts, three months after the attack on the USSR, for the most part understood that victory was becoming impossible, and hopes for it were vain. Blitzkrieg in the USSR did not work. The industry, which survived a large-scale evacuation, worked at full capacity, providing the front with a huge amount of military equipment of excellent quality. There was no need to reduce the staff of the Soviet Army.
Guards tank divisions (and there were practically no others, this honorary title was awarded to all advance combat units leaving for the front) were equipped with a regular number of pieces of equipment since 1943. Many of them were formed on the basis of reserves. An example is the 32nd Red Banner Poltava Panzer Division, created on the basis of the 1st corps of the Airborne Forces at the end of 1942 and received initially number 9. It, in addition to the full-time tank regiments, included 4 more (three rifle, one artillery), and also an anti-tank division, combat engineer battalion, communications companies, reconnaissance and chemical defense.