The Day of Engineering Troops is celebrated in the Russian Federation on January 21. Compared to paratroopers or sailors, tankers or scouts, their service is not so often covered in the media, but this does not make it less necessary and important for the armed forces and for the country as a whole.
Engineering troops are a branch of the army that performs the most difficult and most dangerous tasks. "Minesweeper is wrong only once" - this is about them, about military engineers. The personnel of the engineering troops solve combat missions both in wartime and in peacetime. Demining of terrain and objects, the organization of engineering obstacles - minefields, anti-tank ditches, etc., the construction of fortifications - trenches, trenches, communications, dugouts, preparation and maintenance of routes for the advance of troops and many other tasks are solved by engineering troops.
The engineering troops of Russia took part in all military conflicts, without exception, in which our country participated. The combat path of the engineering troops is very large. Many feats were accomplished by servicemen of the engineering troops both in wartime and in peacetime. By the way, engineering troops "fight" in peacetime - they eliminate ammunition, carry out demining, take part in eliminating the consequences of man-made disasters and natural disasters. Special training of personnel and the availability of a variety of specialized equipment in service allow the engineering troops to solve a wide variety of tasks.
As for the holiday date, the day of January 21 was not chosen for a professional holiday by chance. It was on January 21, 1701 that Peter I signed a decree on the creation of the Pushkarsky Prikaz School in Moscow. As the name implies, the artillerymen were to be trained in it, but the training of military engineers - specialists in fortification and mine work - began there as well.
In his decree, Peter I noted:
… engineers are very much in need of the essence when attacking or defending, what is the place and should have such who did not only understand the fortification thoroughly and have already served in that, but to be courageous, this rank is even more endangered than others.
Already in 1702, graduates of the School of the Pushkar Prikaz went to the first miner units of the Russian army. However, unlike the artillery units, the number of the engineering forces of the Russian Empire was initially small. For the first twenty-odd years of its existence, the number of troops increased to only 12 staff officers, 67 chief officers and 274 conductors.
However, in 1722, officers - engineers were placed on the Table of Ranks above the rank of officers of the infantry and cavalry. This was due to the higher requirements for military engineers. They were paid a higher salary, since the status of a military engineer required not only good general military training, but also special knowledge. A military engineer had to constantly improve his professional knowledge and skills and have the proper incentives for this. So the state tried to separate military engineers from the general army environment. In the same 1722, the position of regimental engineer was introduced in every Russian regiment. A military engineer in the rank of chief officer was responsible for all engineering work.
With the development and complication of military affairs, the requirements for the training of officers and non-commissioned officers of engineering services increased, and the number of engineering troops also grew. Military engineers during the 18th - 19th centuries participated in the construction of numerous fortresses, various fortifications on the borders of the Russian Empire, in border areas, in large cities. In 1797, a special three-battalion Pioneer regiment was formed. Each battalion of the regiment had three pioneer and one mine-mining companies. The regiment performed the tasks of organizing military construction work during hostilities and military campaigns, while the regiment was allowed to be used only at the direction of the commander-in-chief of the army.
The Patriotic War of 1812 became a real test for military engineers. By this time, the engineering forces of the empire included 10 miner and pioneer companies, in addition, they included pontoon companies with artillery units and 14 fortress pontoon and miner companies. The composition of such companies consisted only of officers and conductors (non-commissioned officers), and the soldiers as a labor force were supplied by infantry regiments and the local population for the duration of specific tasks. Engineers were able to build 178 bridges only at the beginning of the war, repair 1920 versts of roads, which allowed the Russian army to effectively maneuver.
A few years after the defeat of the Napoleonic army, the engineering service underwent a new reform - the battalions were consolidated into three pioneer brigades, and in 1822 the pontoon companies were transferred to the engineering department. Guards and army horse-pioneer squadrons were formed. In 1844, all engineering units of the Russian army were renamed into sappers by a special imperial decree.
A separate page in the history of the domestic engineering troops is the Crimean War of 1853-1856, when the Russian army and navy faced superior forces of large and powerful powers - Great Britain, France, the Ottoman Empire and the Sardinian kingdom that joined them. By the time the hostilities began, the Russian army consisted of 9 sapper battalions, 1 training sapper battalion, 2 reserve battalions and 2 cavalry pioneer battalions.
It was military engineers under the leadership of Eduard Totleben who built such a defense system of Sevastopol, which made it possible to repel enemy attacks for almost a whole year. During the Russian-Turkish War of 1877-1878. the knowledge of military engineers was also in demand. For example, during the famous battles on Shipka, it was possible to repel the attacks of the Ottoman troops without the use of artillery and small arms at all. The secret of success was the use of electrically controlled landmines, which put the Ottoman army, inferior in engineering respect, to flight.
By the end of the 19th century, the engineering troops were finally formed as an independent type of troops. Engineering troops were never particularly numerous and at that time amounted to 2-2, 5% of the total number of the Russian army. However, in addition to the sapper and pontoon units, new specialists appeared in their composition. So, it was the military engineers who were entrusted with the organization of the aeronautical service, pigeon mail, and the railway military units created in 1870 were also part of the engineering troops.
By the beginning of the twentieth century, the engineering troops included 7 sapper brigades (25 sapper battalions), 1 railway brigade, 2 separate railway battalions, 8 pontoon battalions, 6 field engineering parks, 2 siege parks, 12 separate companies, 6 fortress military telegraphs and 4 aeronautical parks.
The number of engineering troops was 31,329 people as of 1900. In addition, the actual reserve of the engineering troops were the fortress troops, which consisted of 53 fortress artillery battalions, 2 fortress regiments, 28 separate fortress battalions, 10 fortress artillery companies, 3 siege fortress battalions and 5 sortie batteries.
The engineering troops later also included electrical engineering units, automobile units, and the engineering department was also responsible for road construction for military purposes. The Corps of Engineers played a very important role during the First World War. The growth of their importance for the armed forces also contributed to an increase in the share of engineering units and subunits in the total number of the Russian army. By 1917, engineering troops accounted for 6% of the total number of the Russian army.
A new page in the history of the Russian engineering troops began after the October Revolution. In fact, the Soviet government, using the experience of the old Russian army, began building the Red Army engineering troops from scratch and achieved colossal successes in fulfilling this task. By 1929, full-time engineering units were created in all branches of the armed forces, which made it possible to increase their combat effectiveness and make them more independent in performing a variety of tasks.
In the Great Patriotic War, the engineering troops showed themselves in the best possible way, performing the most important tasks on the front line and in the rear. By 1945, the Red Army included 98 engineer-sapper, 11 pontoon-bridge brigades, 7 engineer-tank regiments, 11 pontoon-bridge regiments, 6 flamethrower-tank regiments, 1042 engineer and sapper, 87 pontoon-bridge battalions, 94 separate companies and 28 separate units. During the war years, military engineers planted more than 70 million anti-tank and anti-personnel mines, cleared 765 thousand square kilometers of territory and 400 thousand kilometers of track. The engineering troops of the Red Army erected 11 thousand posts, paved almost 500 thousand kilometers of tracks.
Naturally, such an intense and dangerous service, and in fact all these tasks had to be solved under enemy artillery fire, under air strikes, could not but be awarded. More than 100 thousand soldiers, sergeants, officers and generals who served in the engineering troops of the Red Army were awarded various orders and medals, 655 military engineers received the high title of Hero of the Soviet Union. It is worth noting such an important fact that the 201st engineering unit received the status of the Guards.
The period from the 1950s to the end of the 1980s. became a period of further development and strengthening of the engineering troops of the Soviet Army. Hundreds of thousands of Soviet servicemen served in units and subdivisions of the engineering troops. The war ended long ago, and military engineers continued to solve combat missions already in peacetime, participating in the demining of cities and towns, in neutralizing the "gifts of war" - aerial bombs, artillery shells, and other ammunition, which, by the way, are periodically detected even now.
The engineering troops, like other branches of the Soviet Army, went through the entire Afghan war. So, the 45th separate engineer-sapper Red Banner, the Order of the Red Star regiment, other units, formations and subunits of engineering troops were sent to Afghanistan. Military engineers had to operate in unfamiliar terrain, in difficult climatic conditions, under the threat of enemy attacks, but they still coped with the assigned tasks, performed the functions of combat support for OKSVA.
A separate heroic and tragic page in the history of the Soviet engineering troops is the Chernobyl disaster. Lieutenant-General Nikolai Georgievich Topilin, who then held the post of deputy chief of the engineering troops for armaments, recalled that it was the engineering troops who were most prepared for action in the conditions of the Chernobyl disaster, since they underwent special training for operations in the conditions of the use of weapons of mass destruction. It was military engineers who performed the tasks of reconnaissance of the facility, then participated in most of the work carried out at the nuclear power plant.
The collapse of the Soviet Union negatively affected the state of the armed forces of the post-Soviet states, and Russia was no exception in this regard. Nevertheless, military engineers took part in armed conflicts in the post-Soviet space, in anti-terrorist operations in the North Caucasus, in various peacekeeping missions.
Today, the engineering troops of the Russian Federation consist of engineer-sapper, engineer, pontoon-bridge brigades, engineer-sapper and engineer-camouflage regiments, include the Tyumen Higher Military Engineering Command School named after Marshal of Engineering Troops A. I. Proshlyakov, in which training of military specialists with higher and secondary education is carried out for the needs of the engineering troops of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. Military engineers remain one of the most important branches of the military and receive quality training.
On the Day of the Engineering Troops, Voennoye Obozreniye cordially congratulates all generals, officers, warrant officers, sergeants and soldiers of the engineering troops, cadets, reserve servicemen related to service in the engineering troops, on their professional holiday. The most important wish is the absence of combat and non-combat losses, and the rest will follow.
