It is very difficult to talk about artillery today. To put it simply, that is, Shirokorad, and those who are interested in artillery issues are well aware of the names of other Russian and foreign historians of artillery. This is in particular. Survey things are easier to do, and the articles are so good precisely because they push readers to an independent search for material, to independent conclusions. Ultimately - to the formation of their own views on the topic of the article.
But it so happened that several readers at once raised a rather interesting question about heavy guns in the Russian army before and during the First World War.
How could it happen that Russia "missed" the increasing importance of heavy weapons at the beginning of the 20th century? And how did it happen that Soviet Russia was among the world leaders in the production of such weapons before World War II?
We will try to answer both of these questions, especially since the answers are fraught with several interesting points.
In fact, everything was very, very natural!
To understand what Russian artillery was, it is necessary to clearly understand the structure of artillery units and subunits. In 1910, the organization of the Russian artillery was adopted.
So, the division of artillery:
- Field, designed to support the combat operations of ground (field) forces. It included light and horse, mountain and horse-mountain, howitzer and field heavy.
- Fortress, intended for the defense of fortresses (land and coastal), ports and roadsteads.
- Siege, designed to destroy fortress walls, destroy enemy fortifications and ensure the offensive of ground forces.
As you can see, the presence of heavy weapons seems to be a must. Even in the category of field implements.
But why then did we meet the war practically unarmed in this sense? Agree, the 122-mm field howitzer of the 1909 model (firing range up to 7,700 m), the 152-mm field howitzer of the 1910 model and the 152-mm siege gun of the 1910 model are not enough for the army of a country like Russia. Moreover, if you follow the "letter of the law", out of three guns with a caliber of more than 120 mm, only 152-mm can "legally" be attributed to heavy artillery.
Siege cannon 152 mm
The generals of the General Staff should be considered guilty of the fact that heavy artillery disappeared from the Russian army at the beginning of the century. It was the General Staff who was actively developing the idea of a fast, mobile war. But this is not a Russian invention. This is the French doctrine of war, for which the presence of a large number of heavy weapons is not necessary. And even harmful because of the difficulties in maneuvering and changing positions.
It is worth recalling that France at the beginning of the 20th century was the trendsetter of military fashion, and the Russian Empire was allied with France. So - everything is natural.
It was this concept, as well as the clear lag of Russian heavy artillery from modern models in other armies of the world, that led to the fact that the then existing siege artillery was disbanded.
The guns of the first half of the 19th century were sent to the warehouse or to the fortress. It was believed that 152-mm guns would be enough for a new war. The larger caliber was disposed of or sent to storage.
Instead of siege artillery, heavy army artillery units should have been. But … There were no modern weapons for these formations!
At the beginning of the war (August 1, 1914), the Russian army had 7,088 guns. Of these, 512 howitzers. In addition to the already listed heavy guns, there were other developments.
152mm siege weapon (mentioned above) - 1 piece.
203 mm howitzer mod. 1913 - 1 piece.
Prototypes. We can safely assume that at the beginning of the war, the army had only a 152-mm howitzer out of heavy guns.
We will see an even more depressing picture if we look at the documents on the production of ammunition. For 107-mm cannons and 152-mm howitzers, 1,000 rounds were produced per gun. 48% of the required volume. But on the other hand, the plan for the production of shells for 76-mm cannons was more than doubled.
The organization of the Russian ground forces cannot be ignored either. It is from the point of view of artillery.
The infantry division included an artillery brigade consisting of two divisions, each of which consisted of 3 batteries of 76-mm light cannons. 48 guns in the brigade. The chiefs of artillery, the main organizers of the action of artillery in battle, were not envisaged in the states at all. The army corps (two infantry divisions) had a division of 122 mm light howitzers (12 guns).
Through simple mathematical operations, we get terrible figures for the provision of artillery pieces of the Russian army. The army corps had only 108 guns! Of these, 12 are howitzers. And not a single heavy one!
Even a simple mathematical calculation of the striking power of the army corps shows that in reality this unit did not possess the necessary not only defensive, but also offensive force. And immediately another major miscalculation of our generals was highlighted. 12 howitzers per hull indicates an underestimation of the weapons for the mounted fire. There are light howitzers, but there were no mortars at all!
So, the transition to trench warfare showed the shortcomings of the Russian army. Guns for flat fire could not provide suppression of enemy infantry and fire weapons in the presence of a developed positional system. The deeply echeloned defense perfectly defended against the guns.
The understanding came that mortars and howitzers are simply vital. Moreover, the tools are needed with increased power. The enemy not only uses natural obstacles, but also builds serious engineering structures.
So, on the second line of defense, the Germans built dugouts up to 15 (!) Meters deep to shelter the infantry! Cannons or light howitzers are simply powerless here. But heavy howitzers or mortars will do just fine.
203-mm howitzer model 1913
Here the answer to one important question even today emerges. A versatile tool! When we wrote about universal tools, we believed in the need for such tools. But! Not a single "generalist" can surpass the "narrow specialist". This means that all types of artillery are needed.
The command of the Russian army quickly learned the lessons of the first months of the war. In 1915-16, based on combat experience, several artillery systems were developed in Russia - a 203-mm howitzer of the 1915 model, a 280-mm mortar of the 1914-1915 model and a 305-mm howitzer of 1916. True, they were released very few.
By January 1917, the General Staff of the Russian Army had created the Special Purpose Heavy Artillery (TAON), or "48th Corps". The TAON consisted of 6 brigades with 388 guns, the most powerful of which were the new 120-mm long-range guns, 152-mm Kane coastal guns, 245-mm coastal guns, 152 and 203-mm. howitzers and new 305-mm howitzers of the Obukhov plant of the 1915 model, 280-mm mortars.
305-mm howitzer model 1915
The First World War showed commanders and military engineers the necessary and sufficient ratio of artillery, cannons and howitzers (mortars). In 1917, there were 4 howitzers for 5 guns! For comparison, at the beginning of the war, the numbers were different. There is one howitzer for two guns.
But in general, if we talk specifically about heavy artillery, at the end of the war the Russian army had 1,430 heavy guns. For comparison, the Germans had 7,862 guns. Even fighting on two fronts, the figure is indicative.
It was this war that made artillery the most important factor in any victory. God of War!
And pushed Soviet engineers to actively work on the design and creation of a truly "divine" weapon.
Understanding the importance of heavy artillery and the possibility of creating it are really different things. But in the new country this was well understood. Exactly the same thing had to be done with tanks and planes - if you can't create it yourself - copy it.
It was easier with the guns. There were Russian (quite good) models, there were a huge number of imported systems. Fortunately, many of them were affected, both by capturing on the fields of the First World War and during the intervention, and also due to the fact that yesterday's allies in the Entente were actively supplying military equipment to Yudenich, Kolchak, Denikin and others.
There were also officially purchased guns, such as this 114-mm howitzer from the Vickers company. We will tell you about it separately, as well as about all guns, with a caliber of 120 mm and above.
114, 3-mm rapid-fire howitzer "Vickers" model 1910
In addition, the Red Army got howitzers located on opposite sides of the front: Krupp and Schneider. The Putilovsky plant was engaged in the production of the Krupp model, and the Motovilikhsky and Obukhovsky plants were engaged in the production of the Schneider model. And these two guns became the support base for all further development of heavy artillery.
122 mm howitzer model 1909
152-mm howitzer model 1910
In the Soviet Union, they understood: no bread, no guns, too. Therefore, having finished with economic issues, it was Stalin who took up the defense. The year 1930 can be called the starting point, because it was in this year that huge transformations began in the army and navy.
This also affected the artillery. The "old ladies" howitzers have been modernized. But that was only the beginning. British, German and French women became participants in the experiments of Soviet gunsmiths, the purpose of which was to obtain suitable and modern artillery systems. And, I must say, often success accompanied our engineers.
We will describe in detail and in color the history of the creation and service of almost all of our large-caliber guns. The history of the creation of each is a separate detective story, since the authors did not even imagine such a thing at all. A sort of "Rubik's Cube" from the artillery developers. But interesting.
Meanwhile, while the design bureau was working on the design of new guns, the structure of the red army's artillery underwent very noticeable changes.
A paradox, perhaps, but for the better. Back in 1922, a military reform began in the army, which by 1930 yielded the first fruits and results.
The author of the reform and the executor was M. V. Frunze, a man who could become not only an outstanding commander, but also a practitioner of building an army. Alas, his early death did not allow this to be done. The work on reforming the Red Army, begun by Frunze, was completed by KE Voroshilov.
M. V. Frunze
K. E. Voroshilov
We have already talked about the "regimental", the 76-mm regimental cannon, which appeared in 1927. An epochal weapon, and not only outstanding performance characteristics. Yes, the gun fired at 6, 7 km, despite the fact that it weighed only 740 kg. The light weight made the gun very mobile, which was beneficial and made it possible for the artillerymen to closely interact with the units of the rifle regiment.
By the way, at the same time in the armies of other countries there was no regimental artillery at all, and support issues were resolved by separating infantry support weapons from the divisional artillery. So in this matter, the specialists of the Red Army wiped their nose over Europe. And the Great Patriotic War only confirmed the correctness of the way of organizing regimental artillery.
In 1923, such a unit was created as the rifle corps. At the same time, the task of introducing corps artillery into the Red Army was solved. Each rifle corps received, in addition to regimental artillery, a heavy artillery battalion, armed with 107-mm cannons and 152-mm howitzers. Subsequently, the corps artillery was reorganized into heavy artillery regiments.
In 1924, divisional artillery received a new organization. At the beginning, an artillery regiment of two divisions was introduced into the composition of the rifle division, as in the Russian army, then the number of divisions in the regiment was increased to three. With the same three batteries in the division. The armament of the divisional artillery consisted of 76-mm cannons of the 1902 model and 122-mm howitzers of the 1910 model. The number of guns increased to 54 units of 76 mm cannons and 18 units of howitzers.
The organizational structure of the Red Army artillery at the beginning of the Great Patriotic War will be considered separately, since this is a rather serious study, especially in comparison with the Wehrmacht artillery.
In general, today it is customary to talk about the lag of the Red Army from the armies of European countries in the 30s of the last century. This is true for some types of troops, but artillery is definitely not included in the sad list. If we look closely at large-caliber, field, anti-tank, anti-aircraft artillery, then a lot of nuances will be revealed, indicating that the artillery of the Red Army was not just at a certain height, but at least not inferior to the leading armies of the world. And in many respects it was superior.
Further materials on this topic will be devoted to proving this statement. The Red Army had a God of War.
