XXII MECHANIZED CORPS
As mentioned in the previous chapter, the XXII Mechanized Corps was the closest unit to the border in the Fifth Army’s area of operations. A new formation, numbering 712 tanks and 82 armored cars and formed in March 1941, the XXII Mechanized Corps was commanded by Maj. Gen. Semyon M. Kondrusev. Major combat units of the XXII Mechanized Corps were the 19th and 41st Tank and 215th Motorized Rifle divisions.
Corps headquarters, along with 19th Tank and 215th Motorized Rifle Divisions and corps support units, were located in Rovno, over sixty miles from the border. The 41st Tank Division was situated in Vladimir-Volynskiy, with its motorized rifle regiment in direct vicinity of the border at Lyuboml.
In the previously mentioned report, Major General Morgunov described the XXII Mechanized Corps at the start of war: “Only the 41st Tank division was combat capable, equipped with T-26 tanks and thirty-one KV-2 tanks; the other divisions had ‘training park.’ “Taking a closer look at the 41st Tank Division would demonstrate the bleak shape the other two divisions were in, if the 41st Tank was the best one.
Even though KV-2s were not exactly new tanks, they were new to the 41st Tank Division. Various sources place them between eighteen to thirty-one machines. These vehicles were received by the 41st Tank Division in the evening of June 17. Needless to say, by the time the war started six days later, not a single crew was trained to effectively operate these new tanks. Division’s Chief of Staff Colonel Konstantin A. Malygin remembered:
In the evening of June 17th, a train with KV-2 tanks for the heavy tank battalion arrived at the Vladimir-Volynskiy railroad station. There were eighteen machines, five each per company and three for the command platoon. These tanks were classified [secret]; we were permitted to unload them and move them to [our] division only at night, covered by tarps…. With the exceptions of drivers who were sent to the factory to receive and escort the KV-2s, no one in the division has seen them yet.
In the morning of June 20th, division’s commanding officer [Colonel Petr P. Pavlov] delegated his deputy for technical affairs, Lt. Col. D. A. Vasilyev, to conduct a briefing for command personnel about these new machines. Reading from the manual, Vasilyev pointed out that due to the extreme weight of these tanks, close to fifty tons, they could be towed only by a specially made heavy “Voroshilovets” tractor, of which the division had none. If one of the new KV-2s would become immobilized, it could only be moved by one or two other KV-2s.
It soon became clear that KV-2, even though being a mighty combat vehicle, had major shortcomings: heavy, with poor maneuverability, could not fight against tanks because its 152mm cannon had a steep… trajectory…. Examining the tank, everybody voiced their opinions, but common opinion was sketchy: the tank, of course, is powerful, but… we counted many of these “buts.”[2]
In his summary report of July 25, 1941, Col. Petr P. Pavlov described condition of his division on the eve of the war:
The artillery regiment, equipped with sixteen 122mm and 152mm howitzers, did not have a single tractor. Thirty-one KV tanks with naval turrets [KV-2], armed with 152mm cannons, did not have a single round of ammunition. The air defense battalion had four cannons and no ammunition either. Shortage of wheeled vehicles was seven hundred trucks, which were not received from the civilian sector. Drivers of KV tanks were not trained, since these tanks were received seven to eight days before the war. 15 KV tanks, arriving before the start of the war, turned out to have major defects…. At the start of combat operations, the following tanks were made ready for action, albeit without spare parts: 312 T-26s and 31 KV-2s.[3]
Colonel Malygin seconded his commanding officer:
While the tank regiments were formed on basis of two good existing tank brigades, the 41st Motorized Rifle Regiment was formed from scratch. Personnel, armaments, and equipment for it began arriving at the beginning of May. Overwhelming majority of soldiers were brand new recruits, never having held a rifle in their hands. The 41st Howitzer Regiment by that time received men and cannon, but did not have a single tractor. The 41st Air Defense Battalion had three batteries–worth of personnel, but only one of [the batteries] had four 37mm air defense cannons.[4]
The 19th Tank Division was not a combat-ready unit. Formed from scratch, by the start of the war the division had 163 tanks, all of them light BT and T-26 models, many of which were nonoperational, plus 58 armored cars. Lower ranks of the 19th Tank Division, being mainly recent draftees, were not fully trained. In addition, almost 60 percent of lower enlisted personnel came from various non-Slavic ethnic groups. Of this number, approximately 30 percent, or almost two thousand men, did not speak Russian language.[6]
The 215th Motorized Rifle Division was formed around a previously existing rifle brigade and had a relatively well-trained core of enlisted personnel, supplemented by a large number of recent draftees. Like many other motorized rifle divisions, the 215th suffered from dearth of wheeled transport and, in effect, was a regular foot-slogging formation. The tank regiment of this motorized division, however, had almost as many tanks as the whole of the 19th Tank Division, albeit most of them being old and in poor condition.
XV MECHANIZED CORPS
XV Mechanized Corps, commanded by Maj. Gen. Ignatiy I. Karpezo, was another corps located close to the border. Its major components were 10th and 37th Tank and 212th Motorized Rifle divisions. Even though the 15th Mechanized was formed in the second wave, in March 1941, it was a relatively strong formation, numbering sixty-four KV-1s and seventy-two T-34s among its 740 tanks, plus 160 armored cars.
The new T-34 tanks were split roughly equally between the two tank divisions of the XV Mechanized Corps. All but one KV-1 were concentrated in the one battalion of 10th Tank Division. This division was transferred from the IV Mechanized Corps in the summer of 1940 and was a veteran formation with well-trained personnel. They were augmented by an influx of new recruits, called-up reservists, and transferred personnel. The 37th Tank Division was created in the spring of 1941 around the 18th Light Tank Brigade relocated from the Baltic region.[7] Like its brethren corps, the XV was almost fully staffed with lower enlisted personnel, but suffering from shortage of commissioned and noncommissioned officers.
Colonel Yermolayev, who in late June replaced wounded Major General Karpezo, shed light on the condition of the XV Mechanized Corps immediately before the war. The following two charts were made from his report.[8]
