To this day, the total number of tanks in the Red Army on the eve of the war cannot be accurately estimated. For a long time in the domestic literature it was said about him in one phrase: "The Soviet Army had tanks of various types in service, of which 1,861 were T-34 and KV tanks. The bulk of the vehicles were light tanks of outdated designs." Only recently, figures began to appear that actually estimate the number of tanks available in the Red Army, however, they also differ, due to the difference in data in different archival sources (one of the reasons for this is the well-known domestic attitude to the presentation of information and objectivity in reporting).
Major General LG Ivashov ("VIZH" No. 11'89) gives a figure of 23457 tanks, of which 30% are combat-ready. The General Staff publication "The secrecy stamp has been removed …" (Moscow, 1993) defines their number at 22,600 units (heavy - 500, medium - 900, light - 21,200). These data on some parameters are questionable: firstly, for many years now the number of KB tanks by the beginning of the war has been a textbook - 636, and there were still heavy T-35 tanks, which were released about 60. In total, the number of heavy tanks is much more than 500 Secondly, 1225 T-34 (also an established figure) plus several hundred T-28 (in the 3rd TD - 38, in the 8th - 68, in the 10th - 61, etc.) are equal to 900. The percentage of serviceable tanks is determined at 27. But in general, we can say that the secrecy label has not been removed in this book.
The most credible is the "Consolidated statement of the quantitative and qualitative composition of tanks and self-propelled guns located in military districts, at repair bases and warehouses of non-profit organizations as of June 1, 1941" N. P. Zolotov and S. I. Isaev ("VIZH" No. 1 G93). According to her, the Red Army was armed with 23,106 tanks and self-propelled guns. Of these, combat-ready - 18691 or 80.9%. But even this number is not final - from May 31 to June 21, 1941, 206 new tanks were shipped from the factories (KB - 41, T-34 - 138, T-40 -27). Tanks included in the 1st and 2nd categories, according to the Manual on accounting and reporting in the Red Army, are classified here as combat-ready vehicles:
1st category - new, not used, property that meets the requirements of technical conditions and is quite suitable for use for its intended purpose;
2nd category - former (being) in operation, quite serviceable and suitable for use for its intended purpose. This also includes property requiring military repair (current repairs carried out by the forces of the unit itself).
The authors make a reservation that there is no reliable information disclosing the state of the Red Army's tank fleet on June 22. But of all the data found, these seem to be the most plausible, although they contradict many well-established indicators, especially the qualitative condition of Soviet tanks (you must admit that there is a rather large difference between 27% of serviceable and 80, 9%).
BT-5 at the autumn tactical maneuvers of 1939
T-26 model 1933 at the Moscow Military District exercises in the winter of 1937. By the beginning of the war, the T-26 continued to serve as the "workhorse" of tank units and formations, remaining the most massive vehicle of the Red Army ABTV.
Despite the arrival of new tanks, by June 1941 more than 500 BT-2 tanks were still in service.
The total number of tanks here includes vehicles of mechanized corps, tank regiments of cavalry divisions, tank battalions of airborne corps and rifle divisions. Estimating the number of vehicles in the western direction, it should be borne in mind that the tank forces of KOVO, PribOVO, OdVO, LenVO and ZapVO with the beginning of the war were replenished with equipment transferred from the rear districts.
Table No. 4. The quantitative and qualitative composition of the tank fleet of the Red Army by June 1, 1941
BT-7 and T-26 on the outskirts of the village during pre-war exercises.
A tankman in a protective suit and a gas mask inspects a tank after a training chemical attack.
And how did the German command assess the state of the Red Army ABTV? Before the war, the main command of the Wehrmacht determined the number of tank divisions at 7, plus 38 tank (mechanized) brigades. The inaccuracy of this information was due to the fact that the formation of mechanized corps continued, and the regular materiel was absent. Already after the start of the war, the Chief of the General Staff of the German Ground Forces G. Halder made the following entry in his service diary: “The number of tanks available to the enemy is presumably 15,000 vehicles. This corresponds to 35 tank divisions. Of these, 22 were found at the front. the enemy turned out to be larger than expected (25.07.1941). In general, the idea of the Germans about the number of tank forces opposing them in the western districts was quite reliable, and one can only wonder how they risked starting a war, putting forward their 3329 tanks, most of them light, against this armada.
T-35 on Manezhnaya Square in Moscow on November 7, 1940. The column contains tanks of various designs, produced in small series - with cylindrical and conical towers, straight and inclined turret platforms, radio station handrail antennas and without them.
T-35 release in 1939 with a conical turret and thickened armor. Noteworthy is the sealing of machine gun masks in bullet-resistant spherical segments.
Almost all of our huge tank fleet (see Table 5) was lost in the battles of the summer and autumn of 1941. The total losses of Soviet tanks also remain in question. The figures from different sources, including the reports of units and formations, filed in the turmoil of retreat, vary significantly, so here are the official data of the General Staff, published in 1993:
Table No. 5. Losses of armored and mechanized troops in 1941
Table No. 6. Losses of armored vehicles in 1941 operations
A large amount of equipment was simply abandoned when the Soviet troops retreated. So, only in a warehouse in Dubno, German troops captured 215 tanks, 50 anti-tank guns and a lot of other property. In the 10th Panzer Division of the 15th MK, 140 tanks were left during the retreat (for comparison, combat losses were 110 vehicles). In the 8th Panzer Division of the 4th MK, the crews destroyed 107 tanks, 10 went missing, 6 got stuck in a swamp and were abandoned. Knowing all this, one can no longer be surprised at the average daily losses of the South-Western Division of 292 tanks. This level of losses was not even in the largest tank battles of the war, for example, in the Battle of Kursk, this figure ranged from 68 (in the Oryol offensive operation) to 89 (in the Belgorod-Kharkov offensive operation).
Heavy tank KV-1, adopted by the ABTV Red Army on December 19, 1939. Photo-KB-1 produced in December 1940 with an L-11 cannon and a welded turret in the courtyard of the Kirov plant.
T-34, model 1941, produced by STZ, which mastered the production of "thirty-fours" from the beginning of 1941. In the photo - tanks with an F-34 cannon and simplified rollers (without rubber tires) introduced at the beginning of the war. A characteristic feature of the Stalingrad vehicles is the armored hull assembled in a thorn.
T-34 model 1941 of the plant №112 "Krasnoe Sormovo". Almost all Sormovo tanks of the first series were equipped with an M-17T gasoline engine due to the catastrophic shortage of V-2 diesels at the time of the evacuation of factories beyond the Urals. The tank shown in the photo in the training unit survived until the end of the war and remained on the move back in 1947.
The tank commander Irshavsky sets a combat training task for the driver mechanics. The tankers are dressed in black overalls, winter jackets, bell-top gloves and helmets of two types - hard and soft, with canned glasses. An obligatory piece of equipment in the pre-war years was a shoulder bag with a gas mask.
