Beautiful regiment, reliable, loyal regiment -
Selected thugs in the regiment.

Vladimir Vysotsky "Kissing the flag in dusty silk..."

The airborne troops outlived their time in the Second World War, fully revealing their inefficiency and uselessness. In vain they were so intensively trained for mass deployments in the thirties - in the end, they were used in the same way as simple infantry.
The first in this war to use airborne assault were German formations in Belgium, the Netherlands, Norway and Greece. Initially, these were local landings in the size of one company, but already a whole regiment was dropped to capture the Corinth Canal, and the 7th division was sent to Crete. In Poland, they landed without parachutes in a landing method to capture airfields.

All these mentioned operations were successful under one condition - the paratroopers were dropped at the very beginning of the aggression on another country that was still at peace. Later, the Germans no longer carried out operations to land large formations, due to large losses and low efficiency. That is why, subsequently, only single groups of high-class professionals, like Otto Skorzeny, worked, and even then, they often landed on gliders, and not from parachutes.

In the Soviet Union, in the pre-war period, parachute training was also given great attention - it was here, near Voronezh, that the first exercises of the Airborne Forces took place. However, the Great Patriotic War does not give us examples of their effective mass use - entire corps turned out to be unclaimed in the quality in which they were created. Paratroopers were sometimes sent to the rear, however, at night. And all why? This was done in order to somehow counteract anti-aircraft guns. As a result, part of the dropped connection died during the landing, part did not find each other, and was exterminated one by one.

Attempts to use larger formations for parachute landing - brigades and regiments, invariably ended in failure. One of the first failures in this series was the landing of the 201st brigade in February 1940, thrown into the rear of the Finnish troops. The negative experience was not learned, and during the Great Patriotic War two mass operations were carried out to abandon large military formations - Vyazemskaya in early 1942 and Dnieper in 1943, which, in the end, also turned out to be unsuccessful. At the first stage of the Rzhev-Vyazemskaya, only 201 brigades landed from parachutes, and at the same time at night. An attempt to send the 4th Airborne Corps to the rear began with a complete failure. Due to enemy air raids, a significant part of the aircraft intended for dropping was destroyed. As a result, in the first batch of two, only 3 battalions of the 8th airborne brigade were landed, and even then, out of 2497 paratroopers, only 1300 reached the assembly point. In addition, most of the cargo of 34 tons was mainly ammunition and artillery were lost. In a word, the 1st Guards Cavalry Corps of General Belov, who broke through the front, acted most effectively in this operation, to which, in the end, the paratroopers passed into submission.

As for the Dnieper operation, or the Bukrinsky landing, it also turned out to be a failure. Due to the actions of anti-aircraft artillery, the release did not take place from the planned 600 meters in height, but from 2000, and at night, as a result of which the scatter strip was 60 kilometers. Many simply drowned in the Dnieper, while the rest were exterminated one by one and captured. In total, 4575 paratroopers of the 3rd and 5th airborne brigades were thrown out (230 of them by mistake over their territory). Already in the first day, 700 of them were killed, 200 were taken prisoner, and those who managed to connect with the rest, only about 2300 people, were scattered among 35 groups that fought in the environment. Communication with them was lost due to the death of radio operators and coder officers - as a result, the landing of the second echelon was abandoned.
In a word, the actions of small sabotage groups turned out to be the most effective, such as a landing of 37 volunteers at the Maykovsky airfield, of which he survived, and in 22 days only 21 people reached their destination. During a short battle, they destroyed, according to various sources, from 10 to 20 aircraft. The main result of this operation was the conclusion that it is still better to carry out such actions with the help of air raids.

Sooner or later, a similar situation developed among the Allies - the mass airborne landing in Normandy turned out to be the first and last operation of this kind. Since then, this has not been decided, given the negative experience gained. One of the reasons, although not the main one, is still the same - there was a possibility that the enemy would mobilize against a sudden landing rather than those units that were dropped in a chaotic manner would finally find their commanders and regroup.

The time of the Airborne Forces has gone without even starting. The parachute, invented a hundred years ago as a way to transfer military formations, is already obsolete, and is suitable, perhaps, only for saving the crews of aircraft. With the introduction of helicopters, paratroopers generally began to lose their importance, and were practically not used in a combat situation. Even in Afghanistan, the only case that can be remembered as an example of their use is the episode mentioned by Gromov during Operation Magistral in 1987. And even then, not living people, but dummies were dropped from parachutes in order to detect the firing points of the “dushmans” and suppress them with artillery fire. Therefore, if they still took domes with them to Afghanistan, then they no longer go to the Caucasus - an extra and completely useless burden.

In the same Afghanistan, landing operations were nevertheless carried out, but at the same time exclusively with the help of helicopters, for example, during the Kunar operation in 1985 or in the Pandsher Gorge. In the event that we suddenly had to fight not in local conflicts with partisan formations, but against a modern state, here our equipment would not justify the hopes placed on it.

Let me remind you that, except for the Mi-28, developed only in 1987, before the introduction of the so-called "Black Shark" (Ka-50), and the Ka-52 that replaced it, Soviet front-line aviation was distinguished by the virtual absence of a fire support helicopter. As for the available "flying BMD" Mi-24, which has the features of both a landing and a fire helicopter, this hybrid turned out to be rather weak due to the combination of these qualities. Neither this nor that. I saw him in battle when he fired at the neighboring hills - it looked effective, but all the same, due to the landing squad, the performance characteristics are cut off. In a word, we do not have enough alternatives to Apache and Comanche - for now, all hope is for the recently developed Mi-28N.

All this happened due to the fact that at one time the USSR relied not on the defensive, but on the offensive doctrine of sudden aggression. In order to one day throw a huge landing behind enemy lines, a huge fleet of An-12 and Il-76 aircraft is maintained, although in practice they were used for landing by the landing method.

Oriented to drop into the area of ​​hostilities only once and only in the event of sudden aggression, the BMD (airborne combat vehicle) is inferior in all respects to the infantry BMP (infantry combat vehicle) - it is no coincidence that the Novorossiysk paratroopers did not take them during Basayev's breakthrough to Botlikh. And all just because of the fact that a car was required that could be dropped to the rear, along with paratroopers. Can you tell me at least one case when this was not done during the exercises? I once happened to have a drink at the Salyut Hotel with Margelov Jr. himself, known for landing inside the BMD (twenty years later he would even receive the Hero of Russia star for this). There are no words, not everyone would have decided on this. However, from a practical point of view, the expensive systems "Centaur" and "Reaktaur" tested by him are of no use. Apart from the teachings, they have never been put into practice.
Meanwhile, the time of this winged infantry is already gone.

I have bad news for the Airborne Forces - since the 40s, the Air Defense Forces have stepped far forward, and now they include anti-aircraft missile systems and jet aircraft. At present, it is no longer difficult to detect even one parachutist hovering down, armed with metal weapons, at any time of the day. Here one could say that after landing it would be covered by artillery fire, but I'm afraid it won't even come to that. The thing is that neither the IL-76, nor the An-12, nor even the An-70 are equipped with the "Stealth" technology, which makes them invisible on the locator screen - the game is not worth the candle. And therefore, with their dimensions, subsonic speed and high flight altitude, they are the most tasty target for modern air defense. The question is not even how many percent of the aircraft during a mass raid will have time to drop troops - everything is much worse. I would put it differently - how many times in a row will they have time to shoot down all transport aircraft? Therefore, there will never be joint exercises of the Airborne Forces and Air Defense - everything will come down to the phrase: “guys, you don’t have to jump, we have already conditionally destroyed you 10 times”
Believe me, the mass landing, for which as many as four airborne divisions in Russia are still being prepared, is nothing more than a stupid utopia, the realization of which is inaccessible only to the intellect of "analysts" from their structures. This was still possible in the 1940s and 1950s, and even then, only at night.

Everything. The days of skydivers are over. While military equipment was being developed for the landing, which had only one advantage - it could be dropped from the air, all over the world, including ours, air defense systems were developed, which have long nullified all the prospects of this type of troops.

Unlike a helicopter, the Il-76 and An-70 cannot fly at ultra-low altitudes in the folds of the terrain, hiding from radars, and even with the current level of air defense development, even this does not save. These slow heavy trucks are also not capable of anti-missile maneuvers - they will be shot as if in a shooting range. One single anti-aircraft missile system, even without rush, with laziness, can destroy an entire airborne division in the air - the same thing can be done by a modern fighter.
I do not understand the meaning of parachute training in the conditions of modern warfare. The helicopter lands troops without landing from a height, simply approaching the ground. In turn, transport aircraft will be able to safely operate over foreign territory only when the air defense of the country in which aggression is planned is completely destroyed. That is, when there will no longer be any need for that landing. So why, then, is this training needed, unclaimed for several decades in a row? Why are there 4 divisions of the Airborne Forces in the Russian army (in the USA, at present, only 2), which teach skills that they will never need in war for most of the training time?

For a long time I tried to find in history the very last time when the last combat mass parachute landing was carried out, which 4 divisions are working out so diligently in exercises. The more I study this issue, the more I am convinced that in 1945, during the defeat of the Japanese troops. As a rule, they landed in small units - about a company, and, as a rule, not always from parachutes, but mainly by landing method, with the help of Li-2 and S-47 transport aircraft.

The last Soviet combat parachute landing took place on August 24, 1945, when about a battalion of the 113th rifle brigade was dropped in the area of ​​​​Toyohara, that is, Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk. The command was forced to take risks because of the haste - they were in a hurry to quickly create a bridgehead for the occupation of Hokkaido, although the Americans objected to the invasion of our troops on Japanese territory, and negotiations were still ongoing on this issue.

And that's it. Cavalry even played an order of magnitude greater role in the Great Patriotic War. It's time to prepare for the release of the commemorative medal - "70 years without combat landing from a parachute."

No matter how I tried to find something similar to the mass airborne assault in post-war history, it was all in vain. As you and I have already found out, there were no parachute drops in Afghanistan. Even during the invasion at the end of 1979, the 103rd Guards Airborne Division landed in Kabul and Bagram. Yes, they kept two battalions ready for parachute landings, but they were not useful. There was no drop during the invasion of Czechoslovakia - the airfield for landing was seized by fraudulent means - a passenger plane with saboteurs of the 7th Airborne Division made an emergency landing, allegedly due to a malfunction on board.

For some time, in 1946-1948, the name "landing" even began to appear in the name of the airborne units - it was understood that they would land on captured airfields using transport aircraft or gliders. Moreover, during the exercises in the late 40s, it was gliders that played a special role - they were not abandoned in the 50s. That is, following the results of the war, then everyone understood that there would never be mass parachute landings.

What else did we have? The capture on November 3, 1956 of the Tekel airfield, which is 17 kilometers from Budapest, by the 3rd company under the leadership of the guard captain Nikolai Kharlamov, which allowed all 108 RAPs to land on transport aircraft. I've been looking for evidence - how his unit was landed - by parachute, or is it still "landing method", as most sources claim? Margelov, when planning an invasion operation, initially ruled out paratroopers altogether. It is possible that they landed on gliders. Nevertheless, they captured the airfield, the attendants and anti-aircraft gun crews were “disarmed”. And then they "disarmed" the soldiers who went over to the side of the "counter-revolution", students and other "rebels". Perhaps even women who actively helped the rebels. It was Kharlamov who managed to walk over the corpses and take the Korvin cinema by storm. His feat was highly appreciated by the Motherland - he received the Gold Star of the Hero of the Soviet Union for drowning the people's choice in blood.

In a word, having carefully looked at the history of this type of troops, I come to the conclusion that the favorite plot of our filmmakers - from the air into battle, so diligently worked out in exercises, is a stupid utopia, suitable only for "window dressing" and patriotic filming. These are rather highly mobile troops, designed to land on airfields not of the enemy, but in those republics that are about to get out of the control of the Kremlin. In a word, these are political gendarmes and executioners, nothing more. Hence such a reverent supply, which cannot be compared with the rest of the troops.

Well, all this props with parachute training, which have not been abandoned for 68 years after the Yuzhno-Sakhalin landing, is needed to justify the existence of this kind of troops. And yet, it is an additional element of training, which will allow you to train the most disciplined troops, who will not doubt the most senseless and bloody order for a second.

I repeat - in their spirit, these are the troops of political control. How are they different from internal troops? Those that do not leave alive

A branch of the Armed Forces, which is a reserve of the Supreme High Command and is specially designed to cover the enemy by air and perform tasks in his rear to disrupt command and control, capture and destroy ground elements of high-precision weapons, disrupt the advancement and deployment of reserves, disrupt the rear and communications, as well as covering (defending) certain areas, areas, open flanks, blocking and destroying airborne assault forces, enemy groupings that have broken through, and performing many other tasks.

In peacetime, the Airborne Forces perform the main tasks of maintaining combat and mobilization readiness at a level that ensures their successful use as intended.

In the Russian Armed Forces they are a separate branch of the military.

Also, the Airborne Forces are often used as rapid reaction forces.

The main method of delivery of the Airborne Forces is parachute landing, they can also be delivered by helicopter; during World War II, glider delivery was practiced.

Airborne Forces of the USSR

pre-war period

At the end of 1930, near Voronezh, in the 11th Infantry Division, a Soviet airborne unit was created - an airborne assault detachment. In December 1932, he was deployed to the 3rd Special Purpose Aviation Brigade (OsNaz), which since 1938 became known as the 201st Airborne Brigade.

The very first use of airborne assault in the history of military affairs took place in the spring of 1929. In the city of Garm besieged by the Basmachi, a group of armed Red Army soldiers was landed from the air, and with the support of local residents, they completely defeated the gang that had invaded the territory of Tajikistan from abroad. But still, the Day of the Airborne Forces in Russia and a number of other countries is considered to be August 2, in honor of the parachute landing at the military exercise of the Moscow Military District near Voronezh on August 2, 1930.

in 1931, on the basis of an order dated March 18, a non-standard, experienced aviation motorized landing detachment (airborne landing detachment) was formed in the Leningrad Military District. It was intended to study issues of operational-tactical use and the most advantageous organizational forms of airborne landing (airborne) units, units and formations. The detachment consisted of 164 personnel and consisted of:

One rifle company;
-individual platoons: sapper, communications and light vehicles;
- heavy bomber aviation squadron (air squadron) (12 aircraft - TB-1);
- one corps aviation detachment (air detachment) (10 aircraft - R-5).
The detachment was armed with:

Two 76-mm Kurchevsky dynamo-reactive cannons (DRP);
-two wedges - T-27;
-4 grenade launchers;
-3 light armored vehicles (armored vehicles);
-14 light and 4 heavy machine guns;
-10 trucks and 16 cars;
-4 motorcycles and one scooter
E. D. Lukin was appointed commander of the detachment. Subsequently, a non-standard paratrooper detachment was formed in the same air brigade.

In 1932, the Revolutionary Military Council of the USSR issued a decree on the deployment of detachments into special aviation battalions (bOSNAZ). By the end of 1933, there were already 29 airborne battalions and brigades that were part of the Air Force. The LenVO (Leningrad Military District) was entrusted with the task of training airborne instructors and developing operational and tactical standards.

By the standards of that time, the airborne units were an effective means of disorganizing the control and rear of the enemy. They were to be used where other branches of the armed forces (infantry, artillery, cavalry, armored forces) could not solve this problem at the moment, and were also intended to be used by the high command in cooperation with troops advancing from the front, airborne assault forces were supposed to help encirclement and defeat of the enemy in this direction.

Staff No. 015/890 of 1936 of the "Airborne Brigade" (Adbr) of wartime and peacetime. Name of units, number of wartime personnel (number of peacetime personnel in parentheses):

Management, 49 (50);
- communications company, 56 (46);
-musician platoon, 11 (11);
-3 airborne battalions, each, 521 (381);
- school of junior officers, 0 (115);
-services, 144 (135);
Total: in the brigade, 1823 (1500); Personnel:

Command staff, 107 (118);
- Commanding staff, 69 (60);
- Junior command and command staff, 330 (264);
- Privates, 1317 (1058);
-Total: 1823 (1500);

Material part:

45 mm anti-tank gun, 18 (19);
-Light machine guns, 90 (69);
-Radio stations, 20 (20);
-Automatic carbines, 1286 (1005);
-Light mortars, 27 (20);
- Cars, 6 (6);
- Trucks, 63 (51);
-Special vehicles, 14 (14);
- Cars "Pickup", 9 (8);
-Motorcycles, 31 (31);
- Tractors ChTZ, 2 (2);
- Tractor trailers, 4 (4);
In the prewar years, a lot of forces and funds were allocated for the development of airborne troops, the development of the theory of their combat use, as well as practical training. In 1934, 600 paratroopers were involved in the exercises of the Red Army. In 1935, during the maneuvers of the Kyiv Military District, 1,188 paratroopers were parachuted and a landing force consisting of 2,500 people landed along with military equipment.

In 1936, 3,000 paratroopers were parachuted into the Belarusian Military District, 8,200 people with artillery and other military equipment were landed by landing method. The invited foreign military delegations present at these exercises were amazed by the size of the landings and the skill of landing.

"31. Airborne units, as a new type of airborne infantry, are a means of disorganizing the enemy's command and rear. They are used by the high command.
In cooperation with the troops advancing from the front, the air infantry helps encircle and defeat the enemy in a given direction.

The use of air infantry must be strictly in accordance with the conditions of the situation and requires reliable provision and observance of measures of secrecy and surprise.
- Chapter two "Organization of the troops of the Red Army" 1. Types of troops and their combat use, Field Charter of the Red Army (PU-39)

The paratroopers gained experience in real battles. In 1939, the 212th Airborne Brigade took part in the defeat of the Japanese at Khalkhin Gol. For their courage and heroism, 352 paratroopers were awarded orders and medals. In 1939-1940, during the Soviet-Finnish war, the 201st, 202nd and 214th airborne brigades fought together with rifle units.

Based on the experience gained in 1940, new staffs of brigades were approved as part of three combat groups: parachute, glider and landing.

In preparation for the operation to annex Bessarabia to the USSR, occupied by Romania, as well as Northern Bukovina, the command of the Red Army enlisted the 201st, 204th and 214th airborne brigades in the Southern Front. During the operation, combat missions were received by the 204th and 201st adbrs and landings were thrown into the area of ​​​​Bolgrad and the city of Izmail, and after the closure of the state border to organize Soviet governments in settlements.

The Great Patriotic War

By the beginning of 1941, on the basis of the existing airborne brigades, airborne corps were deployed, numbering more than 10 thousand people each.
On September 4, 1941, by order of the People's Commissar, the Office of the Airborne Forces was transformed into the Office of the Commander of the Airborne Forces of the Red Army, and the formations and units of the Airborne Forces were removed from the command of the commanders of the active fronts and transferred to the direct subordination of the commander of the Airborne Forces. In accordance with this order, ten airborne corps, five maneuverable airborne brigades, five reserve airborne regiments and an airborne school (Kuibyshev) were formed. At the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, the Airborne Forces were an independent branch of the forces (troops) of the Red Army Air Force.

In the counter-offensive near Moscow, conditions appeared for the widespread use of the Airborne Forces. In the winter of 1942, the Vyazemsky airborne operation was carried out with the participation of the 4th airborne corps. In September 1943, an airborne assault consisting of two brigades was used to help the troops of the Voronezh Front in forcing the Dnieper River. In the Manchurian strategic operation in August 1945, more than 4 thousand people of the personnel of rifle units were landed for landing operations by landing method, who quite successfully completed their tasks.

In October 1944, the Airborne Forces were transformed into a separate Guards Airborne Army, which became part of the long-range aviation. In December 1944, this army was, on the basis of the order of the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command of December 18, 1944, transformed into the 9th Guards Army, on the basis of the command of the 7th Army and formations of a separate Guards Airborne Army with direct subordination to the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command. The airborne divisions were reorganized into rifle divisions.
At the same time, the Airborne Forces Directorate was created with direct subordination to the Air Force Commander. Three airborne brigades, a training airborne regiment, advanced training courses for officers and an aeronautical division remained in the Airborne Forces. At the end of the winter of 1945, the 9th Guards Army, consisting of the 37th, 38th, and 39th Guards Rifle Corps, was concentrated in Hungary southeast of Budapest; On February 27, she became part of the 2nd Ukrainian Front, on March 9 she was reassigned to the 3rd Ukrainian Front. In March - April 1945, the army took part in the Vienna strategic operation (March 16 - April 15), advancing in the direction of the front's main attack. In early May 1945, the army, as part of the 2nd Ukrainian Front, took part in the Prague operation (May 6-11). The 9th Guards Army ended its combat path with an exit to the Elbe. The army was disbanded on May 11, 1945. The army commander was Colonel General Glagolev VV (December 1944 - until the end of the war). On June 10, 1945, in accordance with the order of the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command of May 29, 1945, the Central Group of Forces was formed, which included the 9th Guards Army. Later it was withdrawn to the Moscow District, where in 1946 its department was transformed into the Directorate of the Airborne Forces, and all its formations again became guards airborne - the 37th, 38th, 39th corps and 98, 99, 100, 103, 104 , 105, 106, 107, 114 airborne division (airborne division).

post-war period

Since 1946, they were transferred to the ground forces of the Armed Forces of the USSR, were directly subordinate to the Minister of Defense of the USSR, being the reserve of the Supreme Commander.
In 1956, two airborne divisions took part in the Hungarian events. In 1968, after the capture of two airfields near Prague and Bratislava, the 7th and 103rd Guards Airborne Divisions were landed, which ensured the successful completion of the task by formations and units of the United Armed Forces of the countries participating in the Warsaw Pact during the Czechoslovak events.

In the post-war period, a lot of work was done in the Airborne Forces to increase the firepower and mobility of personnel. Numerous samples of airborne armored vehicles (BMD, BTR-D), automotive equipment (TPK, GAZ-66), artillery systems (ASU-57, ASU-85, 2S9 Nona, 107-mm B-11 recoilless rifle) were made. Complex parachute systems were created for landing all types of weapons - "Centaur", "Reaktaur" and others. The fleet of military transport aviation, called for the mass transfer of landing formations in the event of large-scale hostilities, was also greatly increased. Large-body transport aircraft were made capable of parachute landing of military equipment (An-12, An-22, Il-76).

In the USSR, for the first time in the world, airborne troops were created, which had their own armored vehicles and self-propelled artillery. At large army exercises (like Shield-82 or Druzhba-82), personnel were landed with standard equipment numbering no more than two parachute regiments. The state of the military transport aviation of the USSR Armed Forces at the end of the 1980s allowed 75% of the personnel and standard military equipment of one airborne division to be dropped by parachute in just one general sortie.

By the fall of 1979, the 105th Guards Vienna Red Banner Airborne Division was disbanded, specially designed for combat operations in mountainous desert areas. Parts of the 105th Guards Airborne Division were deployed in the cities of Ferghana, Namangan and Chirchik of the Uzbek SSR and in the city of Osh of the Kirghiz SSR. As a result of the disbandment of the 105th Guards Airborne Division, the 4th separate airborne assault brigades (35th Guards, 38th Guards and 56th Guards), 40th (without the status of "Guards") and 345th Guards Separate Parachute Regiment.

The entry of Soviet troops into Afghanistan, which followed the disbandment of the 105th Guards Airborne Division in 1979, showed the profound fallacy of the decision taken by the leadership of the USSR Armed Forces - an airborne formation specially adapted for combat operations in mountainous desert areas was thoughtlessly and rather hastily was disbanded, and the 103rd Guards Airborne Division was eventually sent to Afghanistan, the personnel of which had no training at all for combat operations in such a theater of operations:

105th Guards Airborne Vienna Red Banner Division (mountain and desert).:
“... in 1986, the Commander of the Airborne Forces, Army General Sukhorukov D.F., arrived, he then said what fools we were, having disbanded the 105th airborne division, because it was specially designed for combat operations in mountainous desert areas. And we had to spend huge amounts of money to deliver the 103rd airborne division to Kabul by air ... "

By the mid-80s, the airborne troops of the USSR Armed Forces included 7 airborne divisions and three separate regiments with the following names and locations:

7th Guards Red Banner Order of Kutuzov II degree airborne division. Based in Kaunas, Lithuanian SSR, Baltic Military District.
-76th Guards Red Banner Order of Kutuzov II degree Chernihiv Airborne Division. It was stationed in Pskov, RSFSR, Leningrad Military District.
-98th Guards Red Banner Order of Kutuzov II degree Svir airborne division. It was based in the city of Bolgrad, Ukrainian SSR, KOdVO and in the city of Chisinau, Moldavian SSR, KOdVO.
-103rd Guards Red Banner Order of Lenin Order of Kutuzov II degree airborne division named after the 60th anniversary of the USSR. It was stationed in the city of Kabul (Afghanistan) as part of OKSVA. Until December 1979 and after February 1989, it was stationed in the city of Vitebsk, Byelorussian SSR, Belorussian Military District.
-104th Guards Red Banner Order of Kutuzov II degree airborne division, specially designed for combat operations in mountainous areas. It was stationed in the city of Kirovabad of the Azerbaijan SSR, Transcaucasian Military District.
-106th Guards Red Banner Order of Kutuzov II degree airborne division. It was stationed in the city of Tula and in the city of Ryazan of the RSFSR, Moscow Military District.
-44th Training Red Banner Order of Suvorov II degree and Bogdan Khmelnitsky II degree Ovruch airborne division. Located in the village Gayzhyunay of the Lithuanian SSR, Baltic VO.
-345th Guards Vienna Red Banner Order of Suvorov III degree parachute regiment named after the 70th anniversary of the Lenin Komsomol. It was located in the city of Bagram (Afghanistan) as part of OKSVA. Until December 1979, it was based in the city of Fergana, Uzbek SSR, after February 1989 - in Kirovabad, Azerbaijan SSR, Transcaucasian Military District.
-387th training separate parachute regiment (387th oopdp). Until 1982, he was part of the 104th Guards Airborne Division. In the period from 1982 to 1988, young recruits were trained in the 387th opdp to be sent to the airborne and airborne assault units as part of the OKSVA. In cinematography, in the film "9th Company", the training part means precisely the 387th opdp. Based in the city of Fergana, Uzbek SSR, Turkestan Military District.
-196th Separate Communications Regiment of the Airborne Troops. Settled in the village. Bear Lakes, Moscow Region, RSFSR.
Each of these divisions included: a directorate (headquarters), three airborne regiments, one self-propelled artillery regiment, and combat support and logistics support units.

In addition to parachute units and formations, the airborne troops also had air assault units and formations, but they were directly subordinate to the commanders of the troops of military districts (groups of troops), armies or corps. They practically did not differ in anything, except for tasks, subordination and OShS (organizational staff structure). Methods of combat use, combat training programs for personnel, weapons and uniforms for military personnel were the same as for paratrooper units and formations of the Airborne Forces (central subordination). Air assault formations were represented by separate air assault brigades (ODSHBR), separate air assault regiments (ODSHP) and separate air assault battalions (ODSHB).

The reason for the creation of air assault units in the late 60s was the revision of tactics in the fight against the enemy in the event of a full-scale war. The stake was placed on the concept of using massive landings in the near rear of the enemy, capable of disorganizing the defense. The technical possibility for such a landing was provided by the fleet of transport helicopters in army aviation, which had significantly increased by this time.

By the mid-80s, the USSR Armed Forces included 14 separate brigades, two separate regiments and about 20 separate battalions. The brigades were based on the territory of the USSR according to the principle - one brigade per one military district, which has land access to the State border of the USSR, one brigade in the inner Kiev Military District (23rd brigade in Kremenchug, subordinate to the High Command of the southwestern direction) and two brigades for the group Soviet troops abroad (35gv.odshbr in the GSVG in the city of Cottbus and 83odshbr in the SGV in the city of Bialogard). 56ogdshbr in OKSVA, located in the city of Gardez of the Republic of Afghanistan, belonged to the Turkestan Military District, in which it was created.

Individual air assault regiments were subordinate to the commanders of individual army corps.

The difference between the parachute and airborne assault formations of the Airborne Forces was as follows:

In the presence of standard airborne armored vehicles (BMD, BTR-D, self-propelled guns "Nona", etc.). In the airborne assault units, only a quarter of all units were equipped with it - in contrast to 100% of its staffing in the paratrooper units.
- In the subordination of the troops. Airborne assault units, operationally, were directly subordinate to the command of military districts (groups of troops), armies, and corps. The parachute units were subordinate only to the command of the Airborne Forces, whose headquarters was in Moscow.
- In assigned tasks. It was assumed that the air assault units, in the event of the start of large-scale hostilities, would be used to land in the near rear of the enemy, mainly by landing from helicopters. Parachute units were supposed to be used in a deeper rear of the enemy with a parachute landing from VTA aircraft (military transport aviation). At the same time, airborne training with planned training parachute landings of personnel and military equipment was mandatory for both types of airborne forces.
-Unlike the guards airborne units of the Airborne Forces deployed in full force, some airborne assault brigades were cadre (incomplete) and were not guards. The exception was three brigades that received the names of the Guards, created on the basis of the Guards parachute regiments, disbanded in 1979 by the 105th Vienna Red Banner Guards Airborne Division - the 35th, 38th and 56th. The 40th air assault brigade, created on the basis of the 612th separate airborne support battalion and the 100th separate reconnaissance company of the same division, did not receive the status of "guards".
In the mid-80s, the following brigades and regiments were part of the Airborne Forces of the USSR Armed Forces:

11th separate airborne assault brigade in the Trans-Baikal Military District (Chita region, Mogocha and Amazar),
-13th separate airborne assault brigade in the Far Eastern Military District (Amur Region, Magdagachi and Zavitinsk),
-21st separate airborne assault brigade in the Transcaucasian Military District (Georgian SSR, Kutaisi),
-23rd separate air assault brigade of the South-Western direction (on the territory of the Kyiv Military District), (Ukrainian SSR, Kremenchug),
-35th Separate Guards Airborne Assault Brigade in the Group of Soviet Forces in Germany (German Democratic Republic, Cottbus),
-36th separate airborne assault brigade in the Leningrad Military District (Leningrad region, Garbolovo township),
-37th separate airborne assault brigade in the Baltic Military District (Kaliningrad region, Chernyakhovsk),
-38th Separate Guards Airborne Assault Brigade in the Belarusian Military District (Belarusian SSR, Brest),
-39th separate airborne assault brigade in the Carpathian Military District (Ukrainian SSR, Khyriv),
-40th separate airborne assault brigade in the Odessa Military District (Ukrainian SSR, village Bolshaya Korenikha, Nikolaev region),
-56th Guards Separate Air Assault Brigade in the Turkestan Military District (created in the city of Chirchik, Uzbek SSR and introduced into Afghanistan),
-57th separate airborne assault brigade in the Central Asian Military District (Kazakh SSR, Aktogay township),
-58th separate airborne assault brigade in the Kiev Military District (Ukrainian SSR, Kremenchug),
-83rd separate airborne assault brigade in the Northern Group of Forces, (Polish People's Republic, Bialogard),
-1318th separate airborne assault regiment in the Belarusian Military District (Belarusian SSR, Polotsk) subordinate to the 5th separate army corps (5oak)
-1319th separate airborne assault regiment in the Trans-Baikal Military District (Buryat ASSR, Kyakhta) subordinate to the 48th separate army corps (48oak)
These brigades had in their composition management, 3 or 4 air assault battalions, one artillery battalion and combat support and logistics support units. The personnel of fully deployed brigades ranged from 2,500 to 3,000 troops.
For example, the regular strength of the personnel of the 56th brigade on December 1, 1986 was 2452 military personnel (261 officers, 109 ensigns, 416 sergeants, 1666 soldiers).

The regiments differed from the brigades in the presence of only two battalions: one paratrooper and one air assault (on the BMD), as well as a slightly reduced composition of the regimental units.

Participation of the Airborne Forces in the Afghan War

In the Afghan war, from the airborne and airborne assault formations of the USSR Armed Forces, one airborne division (103 guards airborne division), one separate airborne assault brigade (56gdshbr), one separate parachute regiment (345gv.opdp) and two air assault battalions as part of separate motorized rifle brigades (in the 66th brigade and in the 70th brigade). In total, for 1987, these were 18 "linear" battalions (13 paratroopers and 5 airborne assaults), which accounted for a fifth of the total number of all OKSVA "linear" battalions (which included another 18 tank and 43 motorized rifle battalions).

In virtually the entire history of the Afghan war, not a single situation has arisen that would justify the use of parachute landing for the transfer of personnel. The main reasons here were the complexity of the mountainous terrain, as well as the unjustified material costs in using such methods in the counter-guerrilla war. The delivery of the personnel of the parachute and airborne assault units to the mountainous areas of hostilities, impassable for armored vehicles, was carried out only by the landing method using helicopters. Therefore, the division of the line battalions of the Airborne Forces in OKSVA into air assault and parachute assault should be considered conditional. Both types of battalions operated in the same way.

As in all motorized rifle, tank and artillery units as part of the OKSVA, up to half of all units of the airborne and airborne assault formations were assigned to guard outposts, which made it possible to control roads, mountain passes and the vast territory of the country, significantly restricting the the very actions of the enemy. For example, battalions of the 350th Guards RAP were often based in various parts of Afghanistan (in Kunar, Girishka, Surubi), controlling the situation in these areas. The 2nd Airborne Battalion from the 345th Guards Opdp was distributed to 20 outposts in the Panjshir Gorge near the village of Anava. By this very 2pdb 345opdp (together with the 682nd motorized rifle regiment of the 108th motorized rifle division stationed in the village of Rukha) completely blocked the western exit from the gorge, which was the main transport artery of the enemy from Pakistan to the strategically important Charikar Valley.

The most massive combat airborne operation in the USSR Armed Forces, in the period after the Great Patriotic War, must be considered the 5th Panjshir Operation in May-June 1982, during which the first mass landing of the 103rd Guards Airborne Forces in Afghanistan was carried out: only during the first three days, more than 4 thousand people were parachuted from helicopters. In total, about 12 thousand military personnel of various branches of the armed forces participated in this operation. The operation took place simultaneously for all 120 km deep into the gorge. As a result of the operation, most of the Panjshir Gorge was taken under control.

In the period from 1982 to 1986, in all airborne divisions of OKSVA, a systematic replacement of regular airborne armored vehicles (BMD-1, BTR-D) with armored vehicles, standard for motorized rifle units (BMP-2D, BTR-70) was carried out. First of all, this was due to the rather low security and low motor resource of the structurally lightweight armored vehicles of the Airborne Forces, as well as the nature of the hostilities, where combat missions performed by paratroopers will not differ much from the tasks assigned to motorized rifles.

Also, to increase the firepower of the landing units, additional artillery and tank units will be introduced into their composition. For example, 345opdp, modeled on a motorized rifle regiment, will be supplemented with an artillery howitzer battalion and a tank company, in the 56th brigade the artillery battalion was deployed up to 5 fire batteries (instead of the prescribed 3 batteries), and the 103rd Guards Airborne Division will be given to reinforce the 62nd separate tank battalion, which was unusual for the organizational and staff structure of the Airborne Forces units on the territory of the USSR.

Training of officers for the airborne troops

Officers were trained by the following military educational institutions in the following military specialties:

Ryazan Higher Airborne Command School - commander of an airborne (airborne assault) platoon, commander of a reconnaissance platoon.
- Landing Department of the Ryazan Military Automobile Institute - commander of an automobile / transport platoon.
- Landing Department of the Ryazan Higher Military Command School of Communications - commander of a communications platoon.
-Airborne faculty of the Novosibirsk Higher Military Command School - deputy company commander for political affairs (educational work).
-Airborne Department of the Kolomna Higher Artillery Command School - commander of an artillery platoon.
-Poltava Higher Anti-Aircraft Missile Command Red Banner School - commander of an anti-aircraft artillery, anti-aircraft missile platoon.
- Landing department of the Kamenetz-Podolsky Higher Military Engineering Command School - commander of an engineering platoon.
In addition to graduates of these educational institutions, the Airborne Forces often appointed platoon commanders, graduates of higher combined arms schools (VOKU) and military departments that trained motorized rifle platoon commanders. This was due to the fact that the specialized Ryazan Higher Airborne Command School, which produced an average of about 300 lieutenants every year, was simply not able to fully meet the needs of the Airborne Forces (at the end of the 80s they had about 60,000 personnel) in platoon leaders. For example, the former commander of 247gv.pdp (7gv.vdd), Hero of the Russian Federation Em Yuri Pavlovich, who began his service in the Airborne Forces as a platoon commander in 111gv.pdp 105gv.vdd, graduated from the Alma-Ata Higher Combined Arms Command School.

For quite a long time, military units and units of the Special Forces (the so-called now army special forces) were erroneously and / or deliberately called paratroopers. This circumstance is connected with the fact that in the Soviet period, as now, the Russian Armed Forces did not have and do not have special forces, but there were and are units and units of the Special Forces (SpN) of the GRU of the General Staff of the USSR Armed Forces. In the press and in the media, the phrases “special forces” or “commandos” were mentioned only in relation to the troops of a potential enemy (“Green Berets”, “Rangers”, “Commandos”).

Starting from the formation of these units in the USSR Armed Forces in 1950 until the end of the 80s, the existence of such units and units was completely denied. It got to the point that conscripts learned about their existence only when they were accepted into the personnel of these units and units. Officially, in the Soviet press and on television, units and units of the Special Forces of the GRU of the General Staff of the USSR Armed Forces were announced either as parts of the Airborne Forces - as in the case of the GSVG (officially there were no Special Forces units in the GDR), or as in the case of OKSVA - separate motorized rifle battalions (omsb). For example, the 173rd separate special forces detachment (173ooSpN), based near the city of Kandahar, was called the 3rd separate motorized rifle battalion (3omsb)

In everyday life, servicemen of subdivisions and units of the Special Forces wore full dress and field uniforms adopted in the Airborne Forces, although they did not belong to the Airborne Forces either in terms of subordination or in terms of the assigned tasks of reconnaissance and sabotage activities. The only thing that united the Airborne Forces and units and units of the Special Forces was most of the officers - RVVDKU graduates, airborne training and possible combat use behind enemy lines.

Airborne Forces of Russia

The decisive role in the formation of the theory of combat use and the development of weapons of the airborne troops belongs to the Soviet military leader Vasily Filippovich Margelov, commander of the Airborne Forces from 1954 to 1979. The name of Margelov is also associated with the positioning of airborne formations as highly maneuverable, covered with armor and having sufficient fire efficiency units to participate in modern strategic operations in various theaters of military operations. On his initiative, the technical re-equipment of the Airborne Forces was launched: serial production of landing equipment was launched at defense production enterprises, modifications of small arms designed specifically for paratroopers were made, new military equipment was modernized and created (including the first BMD-1 tracked combat vehicle), were taken to armament and new military transport aircraft entered the troops, and finally, their own symbols of the Airborne Forces were created - vests and blue berets. His personal contribution to the formation of the Airborne Forces in their modern form was formulated by General Pavel Fedoseevich Pavlenko:

"In the history of the Airborne Forces, and in the Armed Forces of Russia and other countries of the former Soviet Union, his name will remain forever. He personified a whole era in the development and formation of the Airborne Forces, their authority and popularity are associated with his name not only in our country, but and abroad...
…AT. F. Margelov realized that in modern operations, only highly mobile, capable of wide maneuver landing forces would be able to successfully operate deep behind enemy lines. He categorically rejected the installation of holding the area captured by the landing until the approach of the troops advancing from the front by the method of tough defense as disastrous, because in this case the landing would be quickly destroyed.

During the Second World War, the largest operational-tactical formations of the airborne troops (forces) - the army - were formed. The Airborne Army (VDA) was specially designed to carry out major operational and strategic tasks behind enemy lines. It was first created at the end of 1943 in Nazi Germany as part of several airborne divisions. In 1944, the Anglo-American command also created such an army, consisting of two airborne corps (a total of five airborne divisions) and several military transport aviation formations. These armies never took part in hostilities in full strength.
-During the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945, tens of thousands of soldiers, sergeants, officers of the airborne units of the Red Army Air Force were awarded orders and medals, and 126 people were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
-After the end of the Great Patriotic War and for several decades, the Airborne Forces of the USSR (Russia) were and probably remain the most massive airborne troops on Earth.
-Only Soviet paratroopers in full combat gear were able to land on the North Pole, back in the late 40s
- Only Soviet paratroopers dared to jump from many kilometers in airborne combat vehicles.
-The abbreviation of the Airborne Forces is sometimes deciphered as "Two hundred options are possible", "Uncle Vasya's troops", "Your girls are widows", "It is unlikely that I will return home", "The paratrooper will withstand everything", "Everything for you", "Troops for the war", etc. d.

To The largest airborne operation of the Soviet troops during the Great Patriotic War was the Vyazemskaya landing operation, carried out during the offensive phase of the Battle of Moscow in the winter of 1942. Alas, dragging on for almost two months (from January 4 to February 28, it did not lead to the desired results.

By the beginning of January 1942, an extremely difficult situation for both sides had developed near Moscow. The Soviet troops, which had been conducting an active offensive for almost a month, were sufficiently exhausted, while the German troops, who had suffered a serious defeat, were drained of blood and demoralized. In the conditions of a cold winter, both sides experienced a lack of supplies: parts of the Red Army - due to the fact that they were far off the established communications and moved along the territory scorched by the enemy, the Germans - due to the weakness of the railway and automobile network, which was also constantly subjected to partisan attacks. .

The greatest success in the December battles was achieved by units of the Western Front. In less than a month, they fought from 100 to 300 kilometers, and parts of the 10th Army of General Golikov and the 1st Guards Cavalry Corps of General P. A. Belov were far ahead of their neighbors and, having surrounded the German garrison in Sukhinichi, went to the railway Moscow-Bryansk north of the city.

Golikov Philip Ivanovich Belov Pavel Alekseevich

The advanced parts of the corps of General Belov were only 8 kilometers from the Warsaw highway. To the right of them, the 50th, 49th and 43rd armies were advancing, the last on January 1, 1942 occupied Maloyaroslavets. A 40-kilometer breakthrough was outlined in the German defense on the Sukhinichi-Babynino line, a real opportunity was created for the Soviet troops to reach the Yukhnov area on the Warsaw highway and further advance to Vyazma - to the rear of the German 4th and 4th tank armies and to the vital communications of the group armies "Center".

To assist the 43rd and 49th armies, advancing from the northeast on both sides of the Warsaw highway, the command of the Western Front decided to land an airborne assault. The landing party was supposed to cut the highway from Medyn to Gzhatsk, capture Myatlevo station and stop traffic from the Kaluga region to Vyazma, as well as prevent the withdrawal of troops of the 57th German army corps along the Warsaw highway from Maloyaroslavets and Aleshkovo through Medyn to Yukhnov and cover the approaches to the station Myatlevo from a possible enemy counterattack from the Yukhnov area.

The main landing force was the 250th Airborne Regiment of Major N.L. Soldatov, consisting of 1300 people, which was supposed to land by landing.

Soldatov Nikolai Lavrentievich

This landing was to be carried out by two parachute detachments. One detachment of 202 people was supposed to land at the airfield near Bolshoy Fatyanov (5 km east of Myatlevo, on the western bank of the Shan River, capture the airfield and prepare it to receive landing troops. The second parachute detachment of 348 people was thrown out near the villages of Gusevo, Burdukovo and Gusakovo, 12-15 km northwest of Medyn near the Medyn-Gzhatsk highway, he was supposed to put up a barrier against the advance of the enemy from Gzhatsk, and then go to the Varshavskoe highway and, blowing up the bridge over the Shan River (10 km southeast of Medyn) , to cover the landing area of ​​the main forces from the enemy's attack from the side of Maloyaroslavets.

21 TB-3 aircraft and 10 PS-84 aircraft were allocated for the operation.

The entire landing was supposed to be carried out in four flights - paratroopers were transferred first, and then infantrymen and equipment were delivered in three flights. However, plans were later changed, and on the first flight on the night of January 4, only one parachute detachment was sent to capture the Bolshoye Fatyanovo airfield, the number of which was increased to 416 people. The landing party was thrown away from the airfield and captured it with a fight only by the end of the day on January 4th.

However, due to the beginning of a snow blizzard, it was decided to stop the operation and cancel the landing. In the future, the paratroopers acted as saboteurs - they captured the Myatlevo station, destroyed two echelons with equipment located here, and on January 19 they went to the location of the 49th Army.

7 In January 1942, a directive of the Supreme Command Headquarters was signed, defining the tasks of a strategic operation to encircle and defeat the main forces of Army Group Center. The left wing of the Western Front with the forces of the 43rd, 49th, 50th armies and the 1st Guards Cavalry Corps was to deliver a flank attack from the Kaluga and Mosalsk region in the general direction to Yukhnov-Vyazma with a simultaneous frontal offensive of the right wing armies to Sychevka and Gzhatsk. At the same time, the right wing of the Kalinin Front, consisting of the 22nd and 39th armies, with the 29th army in reserve, attacked Rzhev and Sychevka from the north. Both shock groups were to meet in the Vyazma region, completing the final defeat of the main forces of Army Group Center.

On January 8, the strike force of the Kalinin Front broke through the enemy defenses northwest of Rzhev. Already on January 10, the forward units of the 39th Army cut the Rzhev-Velikiye Luki highway and reached the Sychevka area. The headquarters of the 9th German Army, which was defending the Rzhev sector of the front, moved to Vyazma in order not to be surrounded.

Walter Model (left) and Wilhelm Guderian

The army commander, Colonel General Strauss, resigned and was replaced by General Walter Model.

In the Yukhnov direction, by mid-January, there was also success: units of the 49th Army came close to the Myatlevo station, units of the 43rd Army occupied Medyn and continued their offensive to the west through the Shan plant. On January 14, 1942, the commander of the Western Front, G.K. Zhukov, ordered: the 49th Army - by January 15, go to the Pogoreloe area, the 43rd Army - no later than January 16, capture Myatlevo, the 50th Army - take Yukhnov by January 17 , Belov's 1st Guards Cavalry Corps - by January 20, break through the enemy's defenses and reach Vyazma.

cavalrymen P.A. Belova

To ensure these actions, on the night of January 16, a reinforced parachute company from the 1st battalion of the 201st airborne brigade was thrown out to help the advancing troops 20 km northwest of Medyn. The paratroopers acted on the withdrawal routes of the German troops, and later connected with the units of the 43rd Army that had come out here.

Partly the result of the actions of this landing group was the decision of the German command to withdraw its units not to the northwest, but to the west of Medyn. As a result, a gap was formed in the enemy defenses, where the 33rd army of General M. G. Efremov, advancing to the north, entered, breaking contact between the 4th tank and 4th combined arms armies of the enemy.

Efremov Mikhail Grigorievich

The main forces of the 4th German Army, numbering up to 9 divisions near Yukhnov, were under the threat of a bypass from the north. South of Yukhnov, by the 20th of January, units of the right flank of the 10th Army reached the Vyazma-Bryansk railway in the Kirov region, disrupting the communication between the 4th tank and 4th combined arms armies of the enemy. However, units of the 50th Army and the corps of General Belov were still standing 10-15 km from the Warsaw highway, and the main forces of the 10th Army, together with the 16th Army, were busy eliminating the group of General von Gilza surrounded in Sukhinichi (6 infantry battalions) and repelling a counterattack by the German 24th Panzer Corps, which on January 16 launched an offensive from the Zhizdra area to Sukhinichi in order to unblock the city.

Preparation of the Vyazemsky airborne operation and the disposition of forces on January 27, 1942.

Under these conditions, the command of the Western Front decided to support the offensive of the 50th Army and Belov's corps by landing an airborne assault behind enemy lines. The landing site was the area of ​​the village of Znamenka and the village of Zhelanye, 40 km south of Vyazma. The task of the landing was to cut the highway from Vyazma to Yukhnov and the Vyazma-Bryansk railway, intercept enemy communications and assist the troops of the Western Front surrounded by his Yukhnov group. Simultaneously with the offensive in the direction of the village of Temkino, the landing force was supposed to contribute to the advance of the 33rd Army.

The landing group included the same 250th airborne regiment, as well as the 1st and 2nd battalions of the 201st airborne brigade (from the 5th airborne corps). The general landing scheme remained the same as during the failed operation in the Bolshoy Fatyanov area, the landing was thrown out in three steps - first, a group of paratroopers was supposed to capture the Znamensky airfield, after 2.5 hours the launch team was thrown out to equip it and prepare to receive the landing assault, and then, in groups of 3-4 aircraft (in order to avoid the accumulation of a large amount of equipment), infantrymen were transferred to the airfield. For the transportation of paratroopers, 21 PS-84 aircraft were allocated, and 3 TB-3 bombers were intended for the transportation of 45-mm anti-tank guns. The starting point of the operation was the Vnukovo airfield near Moscow.

PS-84

Due to a heavy snowstorm and low cloud cover, the landing scheduled for the morning of January 17 was postponed to the next night. On the night of January 18, 1942, in the area of ​​​​the village of Zhelanye, units of the 201st Airborne Brigade - the 2nd Battalion of Captain N.E. Kalashnikov and two companies of the 1st battalion under the command of Captain I.A. Surzhik with a total number of 452 fighters.

The next night, another 190 paratroopers were landed here (of the 10 aircraft that took off, some returned due to bad weather). In total, by 8 o'clock in the morning on January 19, 642 paratroopers gathered in the Zhelanye area, and Captain Surzhik took overall command of them. An attempt made the day before to capture the Znamensky airfield was unsuccessful, since the approaches to it were heavily fortified. However, one and a half kilometers south of Znamenka, the landing reconnaissance group discovered another airfield, where, after clearing the site at 17.50 on January 18, they managed to receive four PS-84 aircraft with 65 fighters of the starting team. However, lacking a ski landing gear, the planes were unable to take off from the site. The next day, the Germans attacked the airfield and destroyed all the vehicles, and the launch team and paratroopers withdrew to the Zhelanye area to join up with the main forces of the detachment.

Meanwhile, the fighters of Captain Surzhik, having joined with the partisan detachment of A.A. Petrukhin (about 1000 people), with the help of residents of nearby villages, they began preparing a snow airfield near the village of Plesnevo. On the night of January 20, the first group of aircraft was received here, and in total, by January 22, 1643 paratroopers from the 250th regiment were delivered, led by the regiment commander, Major N.L. Soldatov, as well as weapons and ammunition. The enemy discovered the airfield and attacked it from the air, while 3 PS-84 aircraft were lost, as well as 27 people were killed and 9 wounded. In total, the paratroopers were delivered two 45-mm guns, 34 mortars with a caliber of 82 and 50 mm, as well as 11 anti-tank rifles.

Already on January 20, the 250th regiment received an order from General G.K. Zhukov: " By the morning of January 21, part of the forces to capture the Keys and strike behind enemy lines in the direction of Lyudinovo to assist the Belov group and get in touch with it". A clarifying order soon followed: First, do not leave the Znamenka, Zhelanye, Luga region and at all costs keep the region by occupying Znamenka; the second - our units (formations of the 33rd Army) go to the Temkino area on January 22, they were tasked with contacting you; third - to assist Belov with part of the forces, approximately two battalions; fourth - by all means stop the movement of enemy troops along the Yukhnov-Vyazma highway". By decision of the regiment commander, the 1st and 2nd battalions of the 201st airborne brigade under the general command of Captain Surzhik were sent to the Klyuchi area for a subsequent offensive on Lyudinovo.

Having passed through the rear of the enemy, Surzhik's detachment occupied several villages, destroying the enemy garrisons in them, and on January 28, in the village of Tynovka, joined with the horsemen of General Belov. Meanwhile, the rest of the landing units (the so-called "Soldatov group"), together with the partisans, held the occupied area. On January 22 and 23, they tried several times to attack Znamenka, but were repulsed by superior enemy forces. The 1st battalion of the 250th regiment attacked the Ugra station on the Bryansk-Vyazma highway, occupied by units of the 365th German reserve infantry regiment, and in two places destroyed large sections of the railway track. The 3rd battalion of the 250th regiment and part of the 1st battalion of the 201st airborne brigade blocked the Yukhnov-Vyazma highway, preventing the movement of enemy troops. However, Znamenka, which was a major stronghold on this highway, still remained in the hands of the enemy - despite the resumption of fierce attacks on the night of January 29-30.

D To complete the encirclement of the Vyazemskaya and Yukhnovskaya groupings of German troops, it was decided to throw out new airborne assault forces. For this purpose, the 4th Airborne Corps, Major General A.F., was transferred to the operational subordination of the commander of the Western Front. Levashova.

Alexey Fedorovich Levashov

The development of the landing plan and the organization of the entire operation was entrusted to the headquarters of the Airborne Forces of the Red Army. For the landing of the corps, 65 transport aircraft and 30 cover fighters were allocated, however, in fact, only 80 vehicles were at the disposal of the landing troops: 22 TB-3 aircraft from the 23rd Air Division, 39 PS-84 transport vehicles and 19 fighters - four links out of 402 th Air Defense Fighter Aviation Regiment and a separate group of Pe-3 twin-engine fighters from the 9th Separate Bomber Aviation Regiment (the latter conducted long-range reconnaissance in the interests of the operation).

Three airfields in the Kaluga region, 180-200 km from the landing site, were assigned to deploy these forces and serve as the starting point for the operation.

The decision to carry out the operation was made on January 17, originally it was scheduled for January 21. However, the 4th airborne corps, sent to Kaluga by rail, was delayed in the Aleksin area due to the blown up bridge over the Oka and did not arrive at the concentration area by the right time. Therefore, the landing date was moved to January 27th.

Meanwhile, the corps of General Belov on January 26 finally broke through the defenses of the 40th tank corps of the enemy, the next day crossed the Warsaw highway, went into the valley of the Popolta and Reseta rivers and moved to Vyazma. Units of the 33rd Army were also advancing here from the east, having found a gap in the German defenses, and units of the Kalinin Front were moving from the north. The 29th Army and the 11th Cavalry Corps were introduced into the gap near Sychevka, rushing south. Already on January 27, units of the 11th Cavalry Corps reached the Minsk highway and the railway to Smolensk west of Vyazma. A “layer cake” was formed, the encirclement already threatened the main forces of Army Group Center - the 9th and 4th tank armies.

The 4th Airborne Corps had the following tasks:

8th airborne brigade - to land in the Ozerechnya area, take up defense at the Rebrovo-Gradino-Berezniki line and prevent the enemy from retreating to the west;

9th airborne brigade - to land in the Goryainovo-Ivanovka-Popovo area, saddle the highway and prevent the enemy from approaching from the west;

214th airborne brigade - together with a separate tank battalion and an artillery division, to land in the Vysotskoye-Pleshkovo-Uvarovo area and remain in the reserve of the corps.

Thus, the units of the corps landed at points far apart from each other, and the possibility of quickly establishing communication between them remained very doubtful. For reconnaissance and to ensure the landing at 4 pm on January 27, that is, an hour and a half before the main forces were dropped, 7 sabotage groups of 20-30 paratroopers were landed in the landing areas. In addition, several groups were thrown out to establish contact with the Soldatov group (201st airborne brigade and 250th joint venture) and the 11th cavalry corps.

Due to the small number of transport aircraft, the landing of the corps formations was carried out in turn. The 2nd battalion of the 8th brigade was the first to land, having the task of preparing a snowy airfield for receiving the rest of the brigade. However, due to pilot error, it was not thrown out near Ozerechnya, but 15 km to the south, near the village of Taborye. The release was carried out in one go, from a great height, so the paratroopers were scattered over a very large area (up to 20-30 km). By the morning of January 28, only 476 out of 638 people dropped into the assembly area.

On the same night, taking advantage of the weakness of the Soviet air defense in the Kaluga region, enemy aircraft with 24 Ju-88 and Me-110 aircraft raided one of the landing airfields.

Specifications Ju 88A-5

• Crew: 4 people
• Maximum takeoff weight: 13000 kg
• Dimensions length x height x wingspan: 14.36 x 4.85 x 20.08 m
• Power plant, number of engines x power: 2 x 1200 hp with.
• Maximum flight speed at an altitude of 5500 m: 440 km / h
• Rate of climb: 9.2 m/s
• Practical ceiling:. 8230 m
• Flight range: 2730 km
• Armament: 4 x 7.92 mm MG-15 machine guns

Specifications Bf 110C-4

• Crew: 2 people
• Maximum takeoff weight: 6750 kg
• Dimensions: length x height x wingspan: 12.65 x 3.50 x 16.27 m
• Power plant, number of engines x power: 2 x 1100 hp. with.
• Maximum flight speed at an altitude of 7000 m: 560 km/h
• Rate of climb: 11 m/s
• Practical ceiling: 10,000 m
• Flight range: 775 km
• Armament: 4 x 7.92 mm MG 17 machine guns, 2 x 20 mm MC 151/20 cannons, 1 x 7.92 mm MC 15 machine gun or MG 81Z coaxial machine gun

7 TB-3 aircraft, one fighter and a fuel depot were destroyed. In the following nights, all the airfields from which the 4th Airborne Corps was supposed to land were subjected to a raid. Previously, these airfields were used by German aviation, and the Germans were well aware of their location, approaches and defense features.

In such conditions, until February 2, only 2323 paratroopers from the 8th airborne brigade and 34,400 kg of cargo were parachuted. The paratroopers were dropped over a large area, so only 1320 people went to the assembly areas, and 1003 people (43% of those who landed) did not come to the brigade.

Not receiving reports from the brigade command, the corps headquarters was forced to establish contact with it by sending Pe-3 reconnaissance aircraft and communications officers in light U-2 vehicles equipped with a ski chassis. Often, with the help of such aircraft, communication was established between the headquarters of the brigade (for some time it was located in the village of Androsovo, 12 km south of the village of Alferovo) with other units of the brigade.

U-2 (PO-2)

With the 8th airborne brigade and the Soldatov group of the 1st Guards Cavalry Corps entering the area of ​​operations, the paratroopers were transferred to the command of General Belov. On February 2, the corps of General Belov approached Vyazma, where the advanced units of the 33rd Army, advancing from the east, had left the day before. The Yukhnov grouping of the enemy, that is, the core of the forces of the 4th German Army, whose commander, on January 21, instead of General Kübler, infantry general Heinrici was appointed, lost contact only with the left wing of the army, but also with its rear and was actually surrounded.

Gotthard Heinrici

However, the Soviet strike units no longer had the strength to hold the ring - out of the 28,000 people who were in Belov's corps on January 10, by February 7, he had no more than 6,000 fighters left. Since January 26, continuous battles have been going on in the area of ​​\u200b\u200bthe Shansky plant - units of the 4th German army of General Heinrici tried to break through to the north and connect with the 4th tank army of General Ruof. In the end, on February 3, they succeeded - three divisions of the 33rd Army (113th, 160th and 138th) were cut off from the main forces of the front and took up a circular defense southeast of Vyazma. In the following days, the German troops managed to restore the defense line along the Warsaw highway and Belov's corps was also surrounded.

Under these conditions, the command of the Western Front decided to resume the deployment of the remaining forces of the 4th Airborne Corps to help units of the 1st Guards Cavalry Corps and the Soldatov group to support the 50th Army in breaking through the enemy front along Varshavskoye Highway and the final encirclement of the Yukhnov group. The landing force was to include the remaining two brigades of the corps - the 9th and 214th, as well as the last battalion of the 8th brigade. The landing site was the area east of the Ugra station - the site of the Soldatov group and the partisan detachment of Colonel M.G. Kirillov (by this time numbering about 1200 people).

After the landing, the landing force was to advance to the southeast, reach the area of ​​​​the village of Pesochnya, occupying the lines of Kurakino-Borodino-Podsosonki and Klyuchi-Tynovka-Leonova. In the future, he was ordered to strike at the enemy from the rear, go to the Warsaw highway and connect with the advancing units of the 50th Army.

The leadership of the landing was entrusted to the commander of the Airborne Forces of the Red Army - V.A. Glazunov.

Vasily Afanasyevich Glazunov

The Moscow airfield hub, well covered by air defense forces, was assigned as the starting point for the operation, the landing site was 300 km away from it. The operation involved 23 TB-3 aircraft and 41 PS-84 aircraft. Due to the small number of vehicles, the landing was again carried out in groups over several nights. At the same time, from the first group of 20 TB-3 aircraft that flew out on the night of February 17 with a battalion of the 214th airborne brigade, 19 aircraft did not find the landing area and returned back. One plane dropped a landing, but these paratroopers did not subsequently connect with the brigade and there was no more information about them. The next night, in the same area, 293 people and 32 bales of weapons were thrown out from 12 PS-84 vehicles.

Skydiver equipment

The equipment of the shooter-parachutist when making jumps in summer and winter conditions consisted of:

1. Shoulder straps. 2. Waist belt. 3. Waist cartridge two-slot bag.

4. Belt spare cartridge bag (for explosives - 400 g and gun accessories).

5. Flasks with a cover. 6. Grocery bags.

7. Two unified covers - for a small shovel (small ax) and for hand grenades.

8. Pouch for SVT magazines (for two magazines). 9. Cloak-tents (taken only in summer).

Over the next week, landing units of the 4th Airborne Corps were carried out every night. On the night of February 19, all PS-84 transport aircraft and TB-3 heavy bombers made 89 sorties, dropped 538 people and 96 bales of cargo. On the night of February 20, the landing was especially massive - 2551 people landed behind enemy lines. The next night, the landing was limited due to the deterioration of the weather (fog, cloud height 300-400 m). Despite this, 37 crews made sorties, 476 people and 73 bales of weapons were thrown out. On the night of February 22, the landing was again massive - 1676 people were landed. On February 23, 1367 people landed, on February 24, 38 sorties were made and 179 paratroopers were dropped. This completed the landing of the corps.

In total, from February 17 to February 24, 612 sorties were made for airborne assault, 443 of them were successful, 3 crews did not return from a combat mission. During this time, 7373 people and 1524 bales of ammunition, weapons, food and various property were landed and thrown out.

However, due to the dispersion over a large area, the gathering of the corps was slow. In the first days, only half of the personnel of the corps gathered, and 30% of the paratroopers did not connect with their units - some of them went missing, some acted as partisans. During the landing, enemy aircraft provided strong opposition. On February 23, when a German Me-110 fighter attacked a TB-3 aircraft with a corps headquarters, the commander of the 4th Airborne Corps, Major General A.F. Levashov. However, the pilot managed to land the heavily damaged car on the snow and save the rest of the paratroopers. The chief of staff, Colonel A.F., took command of the corps. Kazankin.

The situation in the Yukhnovsko-Vyazma direction by February 18, 1942and tasks of the 4th VDK

Only by February 24, the corps began to fulfill its task. However, the offensive was carried out slowly - the enemy managed to pull up his reserves to the landing site and equip defensive positions. Only on February 27 did the corps units manage to capture the village of Klyuchi, 10 km north of the Varshavskoye Highway, the next day they reached the line designated for a meeting with the 50th Army.

However, units of the 50th Army had practically no success and did not reach the Warsaw highway. The front line in this area stabilized until the spring of 1943, when the Germans left the Rzhev-Vyazemsky ledge. The 4th Airborne Corps, having united with the corps of General Belov and the remnants of the 33rd Army, continued to operate behind enemy lines until the summer along the Vyazma-Bryansk and Sukhinichi-Smolensk railways. On June 24, 1942, the remnants of the corps in the amount of 2800 people went to the location of the 10th Army of the Western Front.

A.F. Kazankin with paratroopers

O Simultaneously with the Vyazemsky landing, there was a private use of airborne units in the Rzhev area. During the breakthrough of the German grouping from the 9th Army surrounded near Olenino, in turn, part of the forces of the 29th Army of the Kalinin Front was surrounded. To assist them, it was decided to land an airborne assault in this area as part of one battalion of the 204th Airborne Brigade, consisting of 425 people under the command of Lieutenant P.N. Belotserkovsky. The landing point was one of the airfields of the Kalinin air hub, the landing site was the area of ​​​​the villages of Monchalovo and Okorokovo, where units of the 29th Army held the defense.

The release of paratroopers and cargo was carried out on the night of February 17 from TB-3 aircraft. However, due to the fact that the encirclement area did not exceed 4 km in diameter, a significant part of the paratroopers landed outside it. In total, 312 paratroopers were dropped in the indicated area, another 38 people landed by mistake in their rear (near Staritsa), and 75 fighters did not jump and were brought back. Of those who successfully landed at the location of the 29th Army, only 166 people made their way, while one of the groups of paratroopers managed to destroy an enemy artillery battery. A week later, on the night of February 24, units of the 29th Army broke through in a south-westerly direction and connected with units of the 39th Army.

monument at the landing headquarters

Airborne troops. The history of the Russian landing Alekhin Roman Viktorovich

KABUL AIRBOARD SPECIAL OPERATION

In December 1979, the Soviet armed forces carried out a unique operation that combined elements of an airborne operation, a special operation, and a military operation. This action entered the world history under the name "Kabul coup". Before the special units of the army, military intelligence and the KGB, the leadership of the USSR set the task of eliminating the leader of Afghanistan, Hafizullah Amin (in fact, to carry out contract killings) and to ensure reliable protection of the southern borders of the Soviet Union. Preparations for this large-scale operation began at the very beginning of 1979, even before Amin came to power - even then, under N.M. Taraki, the prerequisites for an anti-government rebellion were created, and a wave of local rebellions swept across the country, as a result of which there were victims among Soviet civilian and military specialists. The leadership of Afghanistan has embarked on a course of rapprochement with the United States and China. The Soviet leadership could not accept this state of affairs.

It was decided to play on internal party contradictions between the two leading political parties in Afghanistan. It was supposed to carry out the overthrow of the existing regime by the hands of the Afghans themselves, but for one reason or another, the goals set were not achieved. It became clear that the overthrow could be carried out only with the use of special forces of the USSR. From that moment, the huge mechanism of the Soviet Moloch began to unwind.

On May 2, 1979, by order of the head of the GRU, General of the Army P.I. Ivashutin, on the basis of the 15th Special Purpose Brigade under the direct supervision of Colonel V.V. formation of the 154th separate special forces detachment. By the summer of 1979, the detachment was formed.

This detachment had a special staff - it is planned to have armored personnel carriers BTR-60pb and infantry fighting vehicles BMP-1 in its composition. It was planned to have a total of 539 personnel in four companies of six platoons and four separate combat support platoons. The command clearly understood that the detachment would be used for its intended purpose in a neighboring country, and, apparently, the structure of the detachment was created under the influence of the combat training experience of the 20th and 25th separate reconnaissance brigades deployed in difficult conditions of mountainous desert terrain Mongolia, having so many similarities with Afghanistan.

The structure of the 154th Separate Special Forces Detachment was as follows:

Detachment headquarters;

1st special-purpose company on BMP-1 (6 groups);

2nd special-purpose company on the BTR-60pb (6 groups);

3rd special-purpose company on the BTR-60pb (6 groups);

The 4th company of heavy weapons consisted of an AGS-17 platoon, a platoon of RPO "Lynx" and a sapper platoon;

communications platoon;

Anti-aircraft artillery platoon (4 anti-aircraft self-propelled guns ZSU-23-4 "Shilka");

Automobile platoon;

Supply platoon.

Such a structure of the new detachment was dictated by the peculiarity of the combat mission assigned to it.

After the well-known events to eliminate the leader of the country Taraki in Afghanistan, Hafizullah Amin came to power, even more unable to satisfy the needs of his powerful northern neighbor. After repeated unsuccessful attempts to direct his deeds and political orientation in the right direction, the Central Committee of the CPSU made the final decision to overthrow Amin and establish a new regime with a leader who would be more loyal to the USSR. The idea of ​​the operation was to use special units of the KGB and the GRU to carry out the physical liquidation of Amin directly in Afghanistan itself, at his residence. It was for this task that a special detachment was formed as part of the GRU special forces.

For the purpose of conspiracy, as well as from the desire to have fighters well adapted for operations in the climatic conditions of the highlands, the detachment was formed mainly by people of Asian nationalities. Popular rumor quickly dubbed the detachment the "Muslim battalion", or "Musbat". The uniform of the Afghan army was sewn for the entire personnel of the "Muslim battalion", and legalization documents of the established form were prepared in the Afghan language.

Major Khabib Tazhabekovich Khalbaev was appointed commander of the detachment, who had previously served as deputy commander of the second detachment for airborne training in the 15th brigade.

For several months, the new detachment conducted enhanced combat training. Various options for performing the upcoming combat mission were worked out. The topics of combat training were as follows: "Defense of the building", "Capture of the building", "Fight in the city", etc. Combat training was carried out until August 1979, after which there was a break due to the fact that the country's leadership was working on another option to overthrow the regime Amin.

At the same time, a political game was going on with the leadership of Afghanistan, aimed at creating conditions conducive to the planned operation. Everything was staged in such a way that at first Taraki, and then Amin, asked the USSR for military assistance to fight the internal opposition (which the same USSR warmed up). The Afghans repeatedly asked Leonid Brezhnev to bring into the DRA: a Mi-24 helicopter squadron, two special-purpose battalions, and an airborne division. The USSR responded with a decisive refusal to every request, and only on June 28, 1979 did the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU No. P 156 / XI come out, according to which from the city of Osh for the protection and defense of the Soviet aviation detachment (squadron of the 280th separate helicopter regiment under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Belov and military transport detachment of 10 An-12 aircraft under the command of Colonel Ishmuratov), ​​located in Afghanistan, the 2nd paratrooper battalion of the 111th Guards Parachute Regiment (from the 105th Guards Airborne Division) is sent to the Bagram airfield ) under the command of Lieutenant Colonel V. I. Lomakin. The battalion was legendary for the aviation technical part and part of the military builders. The task of this battalion, in addition to that indicated in the decree, was also to ensure the reception of additional forces and means at the airfield - when needed. The paratroopers almost immediately took under protection some objects of the Bagram airfield. An automobile platoon, an anti-aircraft battery, a medical center, a Special Department of the KGB of the USSR and the chief of finance were additionally introduced into the staff of the battalion.

According to the official version, the paratroopers were engaged in the reconstruction of the Afghan air base, aircraft repair plant and the protection of the Soviet aviation detachment. In reality, the stay in the DRA of the airborne battalion of the USSR Airborne Forces turned the Bagram airfield into a stronghold of the Soviet Army long before the alleged invasion. True, in Afghanistan itself, few people understood this.

On September 14, 1979, a military coup took place in Kabul. Two days later, at a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the PDPA, Kh. Amin was elected General Secretary of the Central Committee. On the same day, he was appointed Chairman of the Revolutionary Council of the Republic of Afghanistan instead of N. Taraki. On October 2, by order of Amin Taraki, he was killed. Immediately after that, Amin began to actively exterminate all his political competitors - some were secretly taken out of Afghanistan to Moscow through the Soviet embassy.

On December 2, 1979, on behalf of his leadership, the USSR ambassador to Afghanistan informed Amin that the Soviet leadership found it possible to satisfy his request and send two battalions to Afghanistan to strengthen the protection of the residence of the head of state and the Bagram military airfield. Amin confirmed his readiness to accept these units.

As early as December 1, 1979, the 1st Airborne Battalion of the 345th Guards Airborne Regiment was transferred to Bagram. The battalion under the command of Major O. T. Pustovit did not have standard equipment and was armed only with small arms - apparently, it was legitimized as a replacement for the 2nd infantry regiment of the 111th regiment located in Bagram. There is evidence that a part of the 2nd air assault brigade was returned to the USSR during this period and transferred to the 35th separate air assault brigade formed on the basis of the 111th regiment in Germany. In any case, the combat effectiveness of the Soviet grouping in Bagram was increased by fresh forces.

In accordance with the agreements reached, on December 5, an advance group of the 154th separate special forces detachment of the 15th special forces brigade of the TurkVO arrived in Bagram. The first twenty people who arrived began to set up tents and set up a field camp. By the evening of December 8, 1979, the entire personnel of the 154th detachment (the so-called Muslim battalion) with all standard equipment arrived in Bagram by An-22 aircraft. The battalion, prepared for the coup d'état, arrived in the country of destination. Apparently, X. Amin did not imagine what kind of "Trojan horse" settled near him.

On December 11, the 103rd Guards Airborne Division was alerted in the USSR. The division boarded the echelons and departed for the Seshcha airfield. There, military equipment and cargo were moored, the personnel were distributed among the ships and were in full combat readiness for departure. At any moment, the division could be parachuted onto landing sites in Afghanistan. But the wait for the flight was delayed.

In the meantime, the final decision to conduct an operation to eliminate Amin and send troops to Afghanistan was issued at a meeting of the Politburo of the CPSU Central Committee on December 12, 1979. Further delay could only further complicate the situation, and therefore the decision was made to send in troops.

On December 11, the main political enemies of Amin were brought to Bagram from the USSR, who, in accordance with the plans of the Soviet leadership, were to take power into their own hands after the overthrow of Amin: B. Karmal, A. Sarvari, Sh. Mazduryar, S. Gulyabza and A. Vatanjar. These people lived in the location of the 2nd bdb together with the KGB special forces assigned to protect them.

KGB officers organized “excursions” around Kabul for the officers of the 154th detachment, showing the objects planned for capture: Amin’s residence, the buildings of the General Staff, the headquarters of the Central Army Corps, the headquarters of the Air Force, the Ministry of Internal Affairs (Tsarandoy), military counterintelligence (KAM), state security ( KhAD), prison, television and radio center, post office, telegraph and a number of other facilities. The capture and retention of these objects were to be carried out by the "Muslim battalion" and three groups of KGB special forces: "Thunder", "Zenith" and "Torch" - a total of about six hundred people.

On the evening of December 13, the “Muslim battalion” was brought to full readiness to advance to Kabul to capture the designated objects. But Amin left Kabul that day (there is information that an assassination attempt was organized on him and he was slightly wounded, after which he took refuge in the well-defended Taj Beck Palace), and the coup did not take place. The exit of the 154th detachment to Kabul that day was canceled. The Afghan army was put on full alert. It was decided to evacuate B. Karmal and his associates back to the Union.

On December 14, 1979, the 2nd Airborne Battalion of the 345th Separate Guards Airborne Regiment under the command of Major A. Tsyganov and a reconnaissance company of the same regiment under the command of Senior Lieutenant A. Popov arrived in Bagram on An-22 Antey aircraft in Bagram . The battalion had about 30 BMD-1 airborne combat vehicles and BTRD armored personnel carriers, as well as several GAZ-66 trucks. The arrived battalion covered the evacuation from Bagram of the special forces of the KGB and Babrak Karmal with his assistants.

Bagram airfield was completely blocked by Afghan troops. The next few days passed in anticipation of new orders, and only on December 22 did the USSR ambassador notify X. Amin that the Soviet leadership had decided to fully satisfy his request to send troops to Afghanistan and on December 25 was ready to begin their entry. Amin expressed his gratitude for this decision and ordered his General Staff to assist in every possible way in the implementation of the planned measures. It is still not completely clear what goals Amin pursued by insisting on the entry of Soviet troops into Afghanistan.

On December 23, the blocking of the airfield was lifted, and on the same day, the 154th Special Forces Detachment was relocated to Kabul, directly to the Taj Beck Palace. The battalion was located in the barracks, three hundred meters from the palace itself, and proceeded to guard the outer line of defense. Officially, the battalion was subordinated to the commander of the Afghan security brigade, brigade commander Jandad.

On the same day, the KGB special forces groups Grom, Zenit and Fakel returned to Bagram from Tashkent, with whom Babrak Karmal and his assistants again arrived in Afghanistan.

Also on this day, an airborne task force headed by the deputy commander of the airborne forces, Lieutenant General N. N. Guskov, arrived in Afghanistan. The officers visited Kabul, made a reconnaissance of the area, clarified the tasks.

On December 24, the 2nd Airborne Battalion of the 345th Regiment, during a short battle, destroyed all three anti-aircraft artillery batteries of the airfield, on which there were Afghan calculations. 100-mm, 76-mm guns and anti-aircraft machine gun installations were put out of action. As a result of this operation, the airfield completely passed into the hands of the Soviet paratroopers and was ready to receive aircraft with landing troops on board.

At that time, preparations were in full swing in the USSR for the landing of units of the 103rd Guards Airborne Division and the units of the 345th Guards Separate Parachute Regiment remaining in the Union in Afghanistan. The training took place under the guise of exercises and began with bringing the units on high alert.

Due to the circumstances, it was decided to land the bulk of the landing by landing, and only the units assigned to capture airfields and ensure the landing were to be parachuted. In this regard, landing equipment was dismantled from military equipment, and parachute platforms with airborne ammunition and other cargo were unmoored.

To ensure the secrecy of subsequent actions, the commanders of units and subunits were given the task of landing, without disclosing the landing airfields and the nature of the upcoming combat missions. The personnel received the task of preparing for the landing method and entry into battle immediately after landing.

The units and subunits assigned to the landing were at the airfields for several days, weapons and equipment were loaded onto aircraft at most airfields, and were also in field parks formed by aircraft groups in the immediate vicinity of the airfields. At the same time, the senior ship groups knew the tail number of their aircraft and the name of the crew commander, which subsequently helped to quickly load and board aircraft.

Combat training was organized with units in the immediate vicinity of the airfields, at night the personnel were located near the airfields in clubs, gyms and in field tents.

The technical and logistical support of the landing units in the initial area was carried out at the expense of the forces and means of the airfield technical units of the Air Force, which contributed to the preservation of the supplies of the landing forces. At all airfields, personnel were provided with hot food.

Three types of aircraft were allocated for the landing of troops: An-12, An-22 and Il-76. Aviation was on high alert - VTA regiments could start taking off 40–50 minutes after receiving the appropriate order.

On December 24, 1979, a meeting was held under the chairmanship of the Minister of Defense of the USSR D.F. Ustinov, which was attended by his deputies, commanders-in-chief of the ground forces, air force and air defense forces, commander of the airborne troops. At this meeting, the Minister of Defense announced the decision of the country's leadership to send troops to Afghanistan.

The landing of units began on December 25, 1979. At 15.00 the first columns of forward ship groups crossed the air border of Afghanistan. The landing of units of the 103rd Guards Division and the 345th Separate Regiment was carried out by landing method at the airfields of Kabul and Bagram. Landing and takeoff conditions at these two airfields determined the need for landing in groups of 6-12 aircraft. No more than one hour was allotted for landing, unloading and takeoff of the ship group. To solve unforeseen tasks and drop, if necessary, directly to designated airfields in two parachute regiments, one paratrooper battalion was prepared for parachute landing (without military equipment), however, the situation did not require their use.

At the Kabul airfield, the landing units blocked the security units, air defense anti-aircraft batteries of the airfields, and also prevented the take-off of Afghan planes and helicopters, creating favorable conditions for receiving the main landing force. At the same time, the paratroopers threw grenades at the position of one of the anti-aircraft batteries, after which the surviving Afghans, shocked by the treachery of the Soviet landing, said that they would have surrendered anyway, without resistance.

Unloading equipment and cargo from aircraft was carried out as they landed within 15-30 minutes. Combat vehicles and vehicles were unloaded under their own power and concentrated at the points indicated by him. Materiel and stocks were unloaded from the aircraft onto the ground, concentrated 40-50 meters from the taxiways and then transported to storage sites in the designated locations of the units. All this was done quickly, smoothly, skillfully.

In total, military transport aviation during this airborne operation carried out 343 sorties, transported 7,700 people, 894 units of military and other equipment, as well as 1,062 tons of various cargoes. The landing lasted 47 hours. BTA aircraft performed: An-22 - 66 flights, An-12 - 200 flights and Il-76 - 77 flights.

The main landing forces (the 317th and 350th airborne regiments of the 103rd division, the division commander, Major General I.F. Ryabchenko) were landed at the Kabul airfield, and part of the forces (345th separate airborne regiment and the 357th Airborne Regiment of the 103rd Division) - to the Bagram airfield. During the transfer of troops, one aviation accident occurred - on December 25 at 19.33 Moscow time, one Il-76 crashed in the mountains, in which 37 paratroopers of the commandant's company of the 350th regiment and 7 crew members were killed (crew commander - Captain V. V. Golovchin).

However, on the whole, the operation went at the proper level - a Soviet airborne division arrived in Afghanistan, which immediately began preparing for the fulfillment of the assigned combat missions - columns of paratrooper battalions advanced to the capital of Afghanistan.

Also on December 25, the introduction of ground forces into the territory of Afghanistan began: Soviet motorized rifle regiments crossed the border along the pontoon bridge built across the Amu Darya.

Having concentrated significant forces in Kabul, the leaders of the grandiose operation proceeded to the implementation of the second stage - the actual elimination of Hafizullah Amin and the overthrow of his regime.

Sensing something was wrong, Amin brought the guard brigade of his palace on alert. The guardsmen occupied the floors of the palace, the guard posts of the inner perimeter were strengthened. There were about two hundred guardsmen directly in the palace. By this time, Colonel of the GRU V.V. Kolesnik (the developer of the operation to storm the palace), Lieutenant Colonel of the GRU 0. U. Shvets (one of the creators of the Musbat) and the head of Directorate "C" appeared in the Musbat under the guise of deputy battalion commanders ( illegal intelligence) PGU KGB Major General Yu. I. Drozdov. In addition to them, KGB special forces arrived at the location of the battalion, who, according to the developed plan, were supposed to clean up the palace and destroy Amin. The “musbat” itself was supposed to ensure the entry of “Zenith” and “Thunder” into the premises of the palace and prohibit anyone from breaking out of the palace until the end of the operation. On the evening of December 24, V. V. Kolesnik was appointed responsible for the assault on the palace. The operation was codenamed "Storm-333".

By the evening of December 27, the Musbat units received ammunition, split into groups, and the KGB special forces took their places in combat vehicles.

At the same time, the paratroopers of the 103rd division and the 345th separate regiment, who had posted posts throughout Kabul, also prepared in anticipation of the start of the operation.

The signal for the start of the operation was the explosion of a communication well right in the center of Kabul on Pashtunistan Square. This was done so that the Afghans could not coordinate their actions to repel the attacks of the Soviet special forces, as well as report the coup to other countries.

At 19.00, in three columns, the 154th special forces detachment, together with the Grom and Zenit special forces groups of the KGB, began advancing from their location to Amin's palace. At the same moment, two 23-mm Shilka anti-aircraft guns and a platoon of AGS-17 automatic grenade launchers opened fire on the palace. The 154th detachment, with its equipment and fire support, provided the "committees" with the entrance to the building itself, and also, contrary to the original plans, together with the KGB groups, worked inside the palace itself.

As a result of a 45-minute battle, the palace was taken, Amin was killed. Musbat's losses were 6 dead and 35 wounded. The KGB special forces lost 4 people killed, most of the employees were wounded. Already occupied by special forces, the palace was attacked by the 9th company of the 345th regiment under the leadership of Captain V. A. Vostrotin. The attack of the paratroopers was supported by a regimental ATGM platoon. In the confusion, the special forces killed four paratroopers, but still figured out what was what. The command of the Airborne Forces made sure - if the special forces of the GRU and the KGB had been killed on the outskirts of the palace, the 9th company of the 345th regiment would have carried out the liquidation of Amin. If Amin's guards had succeeded in repelling the attack of the paratroopers, the palace would have been attacked by the Grad multiple launch rocket systems, which had already been deployed at the Kabul airfield, as well as the front-line bombing and assault strike. After that, the paratroopers of the 103rd division would have entered into action. But it didn't come to that. The SWAT did their job.

The Taj Beck Palace is the residence of Hafizullah Amin.

In Kabul itself, the Fakel KGB special forces group (Major V. Rozin), with the support of the 7th Airborne Company of the 350th Regiment (Senior Lieutenant A. Kozyukov), captured the General Staff of the Afghan Army.

The operation to seize the radio and television building was carried out by the Zenit KGB special forces group (Major A. T. Ryabinin and A. Vatanjar) with the support of the reconnaissance company of the 345th Guards Opdp under the command of Senior Lieutenant A. V. Popov. 20 minutes before the start of the attack, the company secretly advanced to the building and prepared for the assault. At the signal of the attack, the paratroopers with RPG-18 “Fly” rocket-propelled grenades hit the duty tanks located near the building, and then went inside. In the battle for the television center building, one paratrooper was seriously wounded.

The capture of the prison in Puli-Charkhi was carried out by the paratrooper battalion and the 62nd self-propelled artillery division. Since two tank brigades loyal to Amin were located near the prison, an operation was carried out to block the personnel of these brigades in their own barracks - machine guns and automatic grenade launchers cut off their approaches to equipment. After that, the ASU-85 self-propelled unit broke through the gates of the prison and disarmed all the guards in half an hour.

The complex of military counterintelligence buildings (KAM) was captured by the KGB special forces group "Zenith" (6 people) and the parachute platoon of the 317th regiment under the command of Lieutenant S. Korchmin.

The headquarters of the Central Army Corps was captured by the KGB special forces group "Zenith" (6 people) with the support of the parachute company of the 317th regiment under the command of Captain V. Samokhvalov.

The 5th company of Captain A.N. Shevtsov of the 2nd infantry brigade of the 345th regiment blocked the location of the 444th commando brigade in Kabul, which greatly facilitated the capture and retention of other objects in Kabul.

The paratroopers also participated in the capture and retention of other objects in Kabul. During the fighting in Kabul on December 27, 1979, the Airborne Forces lost 10 people killed and 20 wounded - four of them died due to inconsistency in actions near Amin's palace.

On December 28, after establishing control over Kabul, from Bagram, Babrak Karmal was delivered to the BMD-1 with tail number "524" of the commander of the 2nd platoon of the 5th parachute company, Lieutenant V. I. Vovk (later, in July 1980, namely this car was the first in the 345th regiment to be blown up by a landmine).

In addition to the Kabul airborne operation, at the initial stage of the Afghan war, the Armed Forces of the USSR tested in real practice the use of airborne assault units. Back in the summer of 1979, the reorganization of the regiments of the 105th Guards Airborne Division into airborne assault brigades and separate battalions began. The 56th airborne assault brigade was left in the southern direction, which was formed battalion-by-battalion in several settlements of the Uzbek and Turkmen SSR. In addition to the brigade, the 1048th separate air assault battalion was formed as part of a set of units of the 40th Army, which in 1980 was transferred to the 66th separate motorized rifle brigade formed in the Limited Contingent of Soviet Forces in Afghanistan. Also in 1980, a battalion was detached from the 56th airborne assault brigade, which in the spring was transferred to the 70th separate motorized rifle (combined arms) brigade being formed in Afghanistan.

On December 25, 1979, the 4th Battalion (commander - Captain L. Khabarov) of the 56th Airborne Assault Brigade entered Afghanistan as an advance detachment along the pontoon bridge built across the Amu Darya, which had the combat mission of capturing and holding the Salang Pass until the approach of the main forces. The battalion brilliantly coped with the task.

However, the forces of the 56th brigade also carried out real airborne assault operations. As early as December 7, 1979, the 280th Separate Helicopter Regiment of the Central Asian Military District, located at the Kagan airfield, was alerted and redeployed to Chirchik. There, troops loaded into helicopters, and the regiment was transferred to Sandykachi, where rotorcraft landed on a blocked road. It was possible to reach Afghanistan from Sandykachi with one throw, but such an order was followed only on January 1, 1980. The commander of the 280th separate helicopter regiment, Colonel B. G. Budnikov, raised his crews, and the helicopters with the troops on board flew to Shindand. There paratroopers of the 2nd battalion of the 56th brigade captured the airfield, and the next day the 2nd battalion captured the airfield in Kandahar in the same way. These were the very first truly combat air assault operations, which clearly confirmed the theoretical developments of the General Staff. Operations to capture the airfields of Shindand and Kandahar were more than successful.

In January 1980, the concentration of the Airborne Forces group as part of the Limited Contingent of Soviet Troops in Afghanistan was completed. It included: the 103rd airborne division (division commander - Major General I.F. Ryabchenko) as part of the 317th (lieutenant colonel N.V. Batyukov), 350th (colonel G.I. Shpak) and 357 1st (lieutenant colonel K. G. Litovchik) guards parachute regiments and 1179th (lieutenant colonel V. I. Korotkov) artillery regiment; 345th separate airborne regiment (lieutenant colonel N. I. Serdyukov); 56th separate airborne assault brigade (lieutenant colonel A.P. Bad).

From the book Airborne Forces. History of the Russian landing author Alekhin Roman Viktorovich

Air-rocket engine The air-rocket engine is a combined air-jet and rocket engine. When creating a combined engine, we were guided by the ability to combine the characteristics of both types of ramjet engines

From the book Special Services and Special Forces author Kochetkova Polina Vladimirovna

AIRBOARDING EQUIPMENT IN 1930-1931 In 1930, the Red Army Air Force was armed with American Irvin parachutes purchased directly from the USA. In the spring of 1930, M. A. Savitsky visited the United States, who had the task of comparing our technical projects

From the book Basic Special Forces Training [Extreme Survival] author Ardashev Alexey Nikolaevich

TRANSPORT AND ARRANGING AVIATION IN 1930-1931 By this period of time, transport aviation as such had not yet taken shape. The removal of paratroopers was carried out by aircraft that were not adapted to this: reconnaissance aircraft, bomb carriers, training vehicles and passenger aircraft.

From the author's book

TRANSPORT AND AIRBOARDING AVIATION AND AIRBOARDING EQUIPMENT IN 1936-1941 Heavy bomber TB-3In 1930, the new heavy four-engine aircraft ANT-6 made its first flight, and already in April 1932 its mass production began under the name TB-3-4M -17, or

From the author's book

VYAZEMSKAYA AIRLANDING OPERATION After the defeat of the enemy grouping near Moscow, the Red Army forced the enemy to retreat with decisive blows. In order to assist the advancing troops, the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command organized several airborne assaults,

From the author's book

DNEPROVSK AIRLANDING OPERATION Throughout the summer of 1943, airborne divisions were involved in land operations of the Red Army. The 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 8th and 9th Guards Airborne Divisions were introduced into the Steppe Front, many of these divisions

From the author's book

TRANSPORT AVIATION AND AIRBOARDING EQUIPMENT, 1945–1967 The Il-32 airborne cargo glider was designed by the Air Force at the Design Bureau of S. V. Ilyushin and built in 1948. In terms of carrying capacity and dimensions of the cargo compartment, it significantly exceeded all gliders created by

From the author's book

PARACHUTE EQUIPMENT OF THE VDV IN 1968–1991 The parachute platform PP-128-5000 is a metal structure on removable wheels designed for landing cargoes with a flight weight of 3750 to 8500 kg only from the An-12B aircraft.

From the author's book

THE CAPTURE OF CRETE (THE MOST BRIGHT GERMAN AIRBOARDING OPERATION IN THE SECOND WORLD WAR) Crete was an important stronghold of England in the Mediterranean. From the air bases of Crete, British aviation could bomb the Romanian oil fields and keep enemy naval forces under attack.

On January 18, 1942, the Vyazemskaya airborne operation began - one of the largest during World War II. The 201st Airborne Brigade and the 250th Infantry Regiment were landed in the rear of the German Army Group Center south of Vyazma. The landing was carried out at night, in severe frost. However, the Soviet fighters managed to intercept enemy communications. By February 1, three more battalions with a total number of 2,497 people were landed in the Ozerechny area. A few days later, the paratroopers managed to disable sections of the railway and highways, capture a number of settlements and destroy the headquarters of the German units.

At the end of February 1942, the main forces of the 4th Airborne Corps landed near the village of Zhelane. On the morning of February 26, the head battalion of the captain Plotnikova immediately moved to attack the village of Borodino. In less than an hour, the village was cleared of the Nazis. Then the battalion also captured the village of Gorbachi, destroying up to a hundred German soldiers and officers. 2nd Battalion Captain Smirnova captured the village of Tynovka with a sudden attack, the 4th battalion of captain Bibikov captured the village of Kurakino. February 28, after three days of stubborn fighting, the 9th Airborne Brigade of Colonel Kurysheva took possession of the village of Klyuchi. As a result of the fighting, two battalions and the headquarters of the 12th Nazi infantry regiment were defeated. The Germans only lost up to 600 soldiers and officers killed.

We have made a selection of the most famous feats of paratroopers in the Great Patriotic War.

Maykop landing

On the night of October 24, 1942, a Soviet airborne assault force of 38 sailors was thrown into the Maykop airfield to destroy Luftwaffe aircraft. They prepared for the operation according to a special plan: the sailors practiced parachute jumps, shooting and hand-to-hand combat skills, studied captured weapons, and learned to shoot guards. The paratroopers studied from photographs the locations of gas tanks on the Messerschmits and Junkers, and the most effective ways to undermine them.

The operation began on October 23, 1942 at 21:19. On the eve of air reconnaissance, it was not possible to open the entire defense system of the enemy airfield. Therefore, one of the aircraft, TB-3, came under fire and caught fire. Its pilot, senior lieutenant Gavrilov, despite burns to his face and hands, continued to fly the plane to ensure the drop of the paratroopers. Many of the paratroopers jumped, having received severe burns and knocking down the flames.

As a result of the operation at the airfield, 13 enemy aircraft were destroyed and 10 were damaged. During the fighting at the airfield and during the retreat of the paratroopers to the mountains, more than 40 Nazis, about 15 traitor Cossacks, 4 machine guns were destroyed, 11 telephone lines and one cable were cut. Our losses amounted to 22 dead and a downed TB-3.

By December 25, 1941, the troops Manstein were literally a stone's throw from Sevastopol. In order to draw off the enemy forces, it was decided to carry out an amphibious landing on the Kerch Peninsula and in the port of Feodosia.

On December 26-27, landing units were landed on several bridgeheads north and south of Kerch. Our troops suffered significant losses. The situation worsened in the next two days, when a severe storm and the freezing of the Sea of ​​\u200b\u200bAzov disrupted the delivery of reinforcements to the bridgeheads.

On the night of December 28-29, the landing in Feodosia began. The first to break into the water area of ​​the port were our two “sea hunter” boats, which measured the depths. They were followed by the destroyers Shaumyan, Nezamozhnik and Zheleznyakov, as well as the cruisers Krasny Kavkaz and Krasny Krym. The artillery of the cruisers - the 180-mm main caliber - suppressed the enemy's batteries, destroyed several tanks, scattered a convoy of vehicles with infantry approaching the city. At 7.20 am, the Kuban transport moored in the captured port, from which 627 fighters were landed, 9 guns, 6 mortars, 15 vehicles and about 112 tons were unloaded.

Street fighting began, and by evening the city was taken. Konstantin Simonov, who arrived in Feodosia on January 1, 1942, found the following picture: “At the low port wall, which I remembered from childhood, the twisted corpses of Germans were lying around ... The corpses lying on the streets were sometimes half-naked: the Germans, taken by surprise, often jumped out of their houses in what horrible, and many were killed right in the houses.

The landing in Feodosia forced the Germans to immediately withdraw troops from Kerch. Thus, Kerch was taken with minimal effort, essentially bloodless.

In November 1943, the Kerch Peninsula was defended by the 5th German Army Corps, reinforced with artillery, tanks and aircraft - a total of 85 thousand soldiers and officers. The Kerch Strait and approaches to it were mined. The enemy built three lines of defense with a total depth of up to 80 km. Our guards and destroyers could not enter the Kerch Strait due to shallow depths and mine danger.

The landing was scheduled for the night of November 1st. However, on October 31, it became very stormy. General Petrov at first he ordered the operation to continue, and after a while he was forced to cancel the landing of the main assault force. At this time, the landing in Eltigen was already halfway to the target, and it was too late to cancel the operation.

The paratroopers landed on the shore, sometimes swimming in the icy water. By the end of November 1, the sailors had captured a bridgehead up to five kilometers wide and up to two kilometers deep. With the onset of darkness, the landing of subsequent echelons of troops began. In total, by the end of November 3, 9418 people with guns, mortars and ammunition were delivered to the Eltigen area.

For 26 days, boats managed to break through to the bridgehead only 16 times. The landing party experienced an acute shortage of ammunition and food, and could not evacuate the wounded. At the same time, he completed his task, greatly facilitating the landing of the main landing forces north of Kerch.

At the beginning of 1942, the Germans came close to Sevastopol. In order to pull the enemy forces away from the main base of the Black Sea Fleet, the command decided to land several tactical landings on the Crimean coast, including in Evpatoria. 533 sailors, three groups of reconnaissance officers from the headquarters of the Black Sea Fleet, and a combined detachment of border guards and policemen went to the landing.

On January 5, a detachment of ships consisting of the high-speed minesweeper "Vzryvatel", seven patrol boats and a tugboat reached Evpatoria Bay. Having landed and taken the first wounded, the ships left for Sevastopol. The minesweeper and sea hunter "081" remained in the roadstead.

The ships continued to maneuver in the bay until the evening, supporting the attackers with fire and fighting off attacks from enemy aircraft. By evening, less than a third of the crew remained alive on the minesweeper. The damaged ship lost its course and was thrown aground. On the morning of January 6, German tanks began shooting at the ship point-blank. The minesweeper team decided to blow up the ship. But it was not possible to die all together, there was not enough ammunition. Minesweeper Commander Lieutenant Commander Viktor Tryastsin, having said goodbye to the sailors, he threw a grenade at his feet so as not to be captured. When all the cartridges ran out, the last five surviving sailors of the crew rushed into the sea.

On the Passenger pier, the landing took place in the conditions of the most fierce resistance of the Nazis. Part of the decking of the pier was blown up. To speed up the throw to the shore, a group of fighters, led by a commissar, rushed to the water, reached the shore and, having dismantled the kiosk on the shore, built a temporary flooring. The paratroopers, standing in the icy water, propped up the flooring with their own shoulders, and tankettes and anti-tank guns walked ashore on their shoulders.

A fierce battle ensued on the shore. To fight the landing, the Nazis urgently sent the 105th infantry regiment, the 22nd reconnaissance and 70th engineer battalions, several artillery batteries, tanks, self-propelled guns and aircraft to Evpatoria. By 10 o'clock in the morning, the Germans already had more than 5-fold superiority in manpower and an overwhelming advantage in technology.

The landing battalion, pinned to the sea, furiously repulsed the attacks of the enemy. Day and night in the city did not stop shooting. On the evening of January 6, the paratroopers decided to break out of the encirclement. Only four, led by a lieutenant commander Ivan Litovchuk managed to reach Sevastopol and bring news of the defeat of the landing.