# Soviet Red Army in WW II **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 22, 2002, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043 "2002-08-22T06:15:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2002, 6:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/1 "2002-08-22T06:15:50Z")
My high school history teacher claimed that during WW II, the standard training proceedure for the Red Army was not to issue the soldiers a rifle until just before entering combat. According to him the theory was that the sheer terror the soldier experienced as he ran on to the battlefield with a weapon for the first time would compensate for his lack of training and able him to survive. Now, I can readily imagine the Soviets being forced to do that during the opening phases of the war given how rapidly the Germans were able to advance against them and that throwing a warm body into a meat grinder was the only hope the Soviets had of slowing the German advance long enough for them to mobilize the trained forces further back. So what really happened and why? ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2002, 7:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/2 "2002-08-22T07:33:00Z")
Rifles were often issued at battle strictly be necesity. I don’t believe there was anything doctrinal behind it. During the early war, in some places, there was a critical shortage of rifles, and so training rifles wouldn’t be plentiful, and a rifle might not be issued until right before combat. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2002, 7:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/3 "2002-08-22T07:42:18Z")
I agree with **SenorBeef** : Remember that early in the war, the Soviet Union was so ill-prepared for battle it got its ass whipped by _Finland_ fer chrissake. Stalin’s relentless purges of anyone with talent coupled with a chronically inefficient manufacturing base hamstrung the Soviet Union as the Nazis progressed leaps and bounds in the direction of battle-readiness. Rifles would have been a precious item in the Soviet Army throughout the war. ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2002, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/4 "2002-08-22T13:48:36Z")
If you look at old newsreel footage of U.S. soldiers training in the early days after Pearl Harbor, you’ll find that many of them are using toy guns, large wooden crates labeled “tank” and so on. ---
**Author:** ![Boobka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c6cbf5/32.png) [@Boobka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boobka)\ **Post date:** [August 22, 2002, 2:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/5 "2002-08-22T14:29:49Z")
Don’t forget many russian soldiers went into battle without a rifle. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2002, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/6 "2002-08-23T04:48:27Z")
Boobka, although I’m sure it happened a handful of time on a small scale, it’s largely myth that Russians just threw unarmed people at German machine guns. ---
**Author:** ![Riboflavin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Riboflavin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Riboflavin)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2002, 5:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/7 "2002-08-23T05:32:36Z")
Your teacher is wrong - ‘run him into the field and he’ll learn how to use a rifle’ was never a standard Soviet training procedure. I’m sure it happened, but it was a matter of having to get someone in the field in an emergency and not something that was a planned procedure. The thinking would be more along the lines of ‘get that man out there with a rifle even if he’s not trained, since he’ll die when we get overrun anyway’. While the Red Army was in dire straights from June to December, once they stopped the initial German advance they did actually train their soldiers, though not to the standards the US, UK, or Germany (with big exceptions later on) considered acceptable. One thing that did happen is that they’d send men out to the field with only a few rifles in the unit, and expect the unarmed men pick up weapons when they started taking casualties. Pretty much all of the desperation tactics stopped getting used once things settled down at the end of 1941, though the Red Army was far more willing to accept casualties than other forces throughout the war. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2002, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/8 "2002-08-23T12:15:04Z")
> [@](#): > > Boobka, although I’m sure it happened a handful of time on a small scale, it’s largely myth that Russians just threw unarmed people at German machine guns. True. There was one freaky thing though - I’ve seen footage of Russian soldiers forcing conscripts to do minefield clearing. THing was they were forcing them to clear the field by - WALKING OVER IT! The armed soldiers had a machine gun on a tripodn in the snow, and the poor consripts had to walk across or be shot. Scary stuff, man. > [@](#): > > though the Red Army was far more willing to accept casualties than other forces throughout the war. Yup. There were some good Russian officers, but mostly it was a case of, “You hundred thousand men charge here. If you die, make sure the next guy gets the objective.” The actual casualty numbers were appalling. ---
**Author:** ![Beagle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/85f322/32.png) [@Beagle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beagle)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2002, 1:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/9 "2002-08-23T13:53:47Z")
Of course, by the end of the war, each Soviet soldier had his own warm coat, Soviet [“tommy gun,”](http://www.continet.com/montyipsc/ppsh.html) grenades, the works. Not to mention their excellent tanks, best exemplifed by the T-34, which they produced en masse. The basic Soviet offensive military strategy involved a huge artillery barrage, and a massed tank / infantry attack (infantry with firearms). Once they had the numerical advantage and the requisite equipment it worked pretty well. During Operation Barbarossa, yes, unarmed Soviet conscripts were supposed to take a rifle off the nearest dead soldier. There was no shortage of dead Soviet soldiers or poor conscripts. Did I mention that Stalin was not only a paranoid genocidal maniac but a lousy military leader? For some time, he would not believe that Hitler had broken the non-aggression agreement. I could go on for days, the Eastern Front is my favorite subject. Read War Without Garlands - Operation Barbarossa 1941/1942 by Robert J. Kershaw for a pretty exhaustive coverage that is well illustrated and not too heavy on military jargon and strategy. ---
**Author:** ![Beagle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/85f322/32.png) [@Beagle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beagle)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2002, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/10 "2002-08-23T14:22:34Z")
I should add, I called the standard Soviet SMG a “tommy gun” because it resembles the U.S. made Thompson submachine gun with the drum magazine in place. There is no other connection that I know of. This is not like the B-29, where the Soviets copied it bolt for bolt. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2002, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/11 "2002-08-23T14:51:56Z")
**Beagle** : And when Stalin realzied the Nazis were advancing upon Moscow, he cowered in his office and waited for someone to assassinate him, something that wouldn’t be matched until Hitler’s bunker in 1945. ---
**Author:** ![Montezuma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3be4f8/32.png) [@Montezuma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Montezuma)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2002, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/12 "2002-08-24T14:03:14Z")
Where did you get that information from? All I can tell is that when Hitler invaded, Kruschev, Beria and Malenkov walked into his office, Stalin alarmed, thought they were their to arrest him, when he realised this was not going to happen, he recovered his face and then ’ got on with it’ ---
**Author:** ![Daoloth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/82dd89/32.png) [@Daoloth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daoloth)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2002, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/13 "2002-08-24T18:42:37Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by smiling bandit \* > \*\* > > True. There was one freaky thing though - I’ve seen footage of Russian soldiers forcing conscripts to do minefield clearing. THing was they were forcing them to clear the field by - > > WALKING OVER IT! > > The armed soldiers had a machine gun on a tripodn in the snow, and the poor consripts had to walk across or be shot. Scary stuff, man. > \*\* Yup, I forgot the name of the mine clearing squad, but the vast majority were convicts. This included your typical group of rapists, murderers and robbers, as well as people who openly disagreed with the Party. IIRC, if they served enough time doing that dangerous job (very high casualty rate…) they would earn freedom upon the end of the war. ---
**Author:** ![Ringo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/779978/32.png) [@Ringo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ringo)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2002, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/14 "2002-08-24T19:39:49Z")
You are probably thinking of the Soviets’ **penal battalions**. From [The Best Army of World War Two?](http://www.warfarehq.com/Articles/Wargame%20Articles/best_ww2.htm): > [@](#): > > Discipline in the Red Army was harsh. This was a totalitarian army where even minor offenses were punishable by death or duty in one of the “penal battalions.” These units performed duties that even regular Red Army soldiers feared. This could include clearing minefields by marching across them at gunpoint. These soldiers were called “tramplers.” During the assault on the Stalingrad cauldron no less than sixteen penal battalions were concentrated in the 21st Army area and twenty-three in the 65th Army area on the Don Front. Casualties in these units were extreme. Bodies by the score littered the ground and marked the Red Army’s passage through the minefields. Often little or no attempt was made to substantiate the guilt of an accused offender. Punishment was meted out with brutal effectiveness and rank was no protection. Hundreds of senior Soviet officers were shot or imprisoned during the course of the war for failing to produce the expected results. Stalin had once said “it takes a brave man to be a coward in the Red Army!” Another fate that could befall a member of such a battalion was assignment as a gunner in an aircraft, where they were locked into their position. ---
**Author:** ![Crusoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/49beb7/32.png) [@Crusoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crusoe)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2002, 7:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/15 "2002-08-27T07:45:35Z")
The German film **Stalingrad** features the main characters being assigned to a penal battalion, forced to fend off a Russian T-34 attack with a single anti-tank gun. ---
**Author:** ![Motog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85e7bf/32.png) [@Motog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Motog)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2002, 8:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/16 "2002-08-27T08:10:17Z")
“If we come to a minefield, our infantry attacks exactly as it were not there.” - Marshall Geogi Zhukov to General Eisenhower, 1945 ---
**Author:** ![Crusoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/49beb7/32.png) [@Crusoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crusoe)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2002, 10:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/17 "2002-08-27T10:25:25Z")
> [@](#): > > The German film Stalingrad features the main characters being assigned to a penal battalion, forced to fend off a Russian T-34 attack with a single anti-tank gun. It would’ve been nice if I’d remembered the point of saying this: that penal battalion on both sides of the Eastern Front got some pretty rough duties. ---
**Author:** ![Tranquilis](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tranquilis/32/3639_2.png) [@Tranquilis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tranquilis)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2002, 12:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/18 "2002-08-27T12:49:08Z")
I’ve heard, though I have no cite, that at the end of the war, there were virtually no Russian boys of age 18 or 19 left alive. Anyone have the numbers on this? Is it even _remotely_ close to true? ---
**Author:** ![Beagle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/85f322/32.png) [@Beagle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beagle)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 11:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/19 "2002-08-28T11:45:25Z")
Some [Soviet](http://www.military.cz/panzer/tanks/soviet_union/index_en.htm) [tank](http://www.nemo.nu/ibisportal/5pansar/5index.htm) and general [WWII information.](http://www.angelfire.com/ct/ww2europe/weapons.html) ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2002, 12:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/soviet-red-army-in-ww-ii/125043/20 "2002-08-28T12:49:44Z")
I think it can be safety summarized that the answer to the OP depends on what Red Army were’n ttalking about. The Red Army was, by December 1941, a badly mauled, desperate force, still burdened with a lot of incompetent officers, plugging holes any way it possibly could in a desperate attempt to keep Russia alive. There are documented cases of men going into battle with instructions to “just grab a rifle when someone dies.” The Red Army by 1943-1944 was one hell of an army, very tactically and strategically capable, whose soldiers were BETTER supplied than their German counterparts (by a very wide margin), and which in the last year or two of the war inflicted more casualties than it took. A Soviet soldier in 1944 could have had all the state-of-the-art weapons he wanted to carry, drag, or fit onto a vehicle. The difference between the Red Army in 1941 and in 1944 was all the difference in the world.