Red Army Map Symbols

[Michael Dorosh]

Just googled and posted to russianbattlefield.ru but thought I might try here too - is there an online source for WW II era Soviet map symbols - unit designations, I mean, not topographical.

I've seen some online maps and diagrams in Russian, and they seem to just use flags and abbreviations, no real symbols for the different units such as, say, the Germans did, or the current NATO standard which developed from the German. Did the Soviets bother with a system of unit symbology?

[Fionn]

Not really.

Reasons:

1.It wasn't all that necessary once the designation of a unit was known. "2nd Guards Mortar Regiment" could mean only one thing to a Soviet commander whereas the "2nd Mortar Regiment" would mean conventional mortars whereas "2nd Mortar Battalion" would mean a different type of mortar ( since mortar regiments and Bns often received different mortar types in keeping with their ( often) different roles) etc etc. It all gets quite confusing and would be even more so if they had tried to come up with an all-encompassing symbology instead of the rather cyphered nomenclature they used.

2. Mucho staff officers died 38-40 so there were very few around in the early 40s to get all hot under the collar about the inadequacy of their symbology.

The key with the Soviets is to learn to decipher their unit nomenclatures.

Independent means far more than that the unit in question takes its orders directly from the Division or Army commander. It also speaks directly to the expected ( doctrinal) role of the unit and its likely equipment.

Guards often doesn't mean that a given unit was a Guards unit. Often it just designates an unusual weapons unit ( e.g. automatic flamethrower units at Kursk, Katyusha units etc).

Anti-tank often refers to ATRs while artillery refers to everything from 45mm ATGs all the way up to the heaviest breech-loading mortars and field pieces known to mankind.

Mobile Engineer units often weren't very mobile or engineery but could be motorised tank hunter teams who carried some AT mines ( hence the engineer title).

etc etc...

The key is to learn to interpret the nomenclature. Once you do that it all becomes very, very clear and you get a sense of how strong or weak a given Army or Front was ( in terms of its ability to achieve certain missions).

P.s. I'm sure some people will find some Soviet symbology which was sometimes used etc etc but if you look at their own maps from the time they used very generic symbology and made up for it by coming up with a very precise and clear nomenclature which was included on their maps.

[Grisha]

Michael,

If you mean the basic symbology, like for instance, a set of diamonds connected by a line and ending in an arrow at one point, I have a legend for that. The example used is a tank column, by the way. Let me know if that's what you want. By and large, though, Fionn is right, it's pretty self explanatory.

[Grisha]

Fionn, regarding 'Guards' designations on maps, I think I'm a bit confused by your statement. Guards units were Guards units. They all wore the one badge on their uniform with the red flag that said, "Gvardiya." Or, are you referring to their effectiveness in combat?

[Michael Dorosh]

I wasn't expecting such a detailed response, thanks Fionn and Grisha. My purpose in asking is that I am doing a page for my site - a sketch history of the general course of the campaigns. I though it would be convenient to use standard German symbology to differentiate the text dealing with actions in the various Army Group areas. See image:

I thought it would be convenient to do the same for the Soviets, where and when appropriate, but didn't want to just use the German symbol for Army Group when discussing their Fronts, nor use the convention Dupuy did of using the NATO symbology (ie a box with five XXXXX across the top) but wanted something a bit more historic.

I see some Russian units use a flag unfurled and flapping in the breeze with a unit number on it...I take it these designate Armies or Corps?

And I understand from my research that Soviet nomenclature (especially WRT armour) often differed by one level from western armies - ie a Soviet Tank Division was only in Regimental strength, a Tank Corps was really only a Division by western standards, etc.

So how would I designate a FRONT - or is there anything special that can be done?

[ August 23, 2002, 09:02 PM: Message edited by: Michael Dorosh ]

[Fionn]

Grisha,

Ah I was unclear. By that statement I mean that it would be a fallacy for a Westerner to assume that "Guards" meant the same thing at all times.

Guards units had a slightly different TO&E ( when the Soviets could afford it) and a greater compliment of supporting and mobile weapons etc. They also got a higher proportion of the better raw materiel ( men and women in this case).

OTOH a Guards Mortar Regiment wasn't an ordinary mortar regiment with slightly more ordinary mortars etc. It was the name given to a Katyusha unit.

A westerner quickly reading his books could easily miss the fact that while Guards units normally just had more men and more/better equipment sometimes the moniker was used to simply identify a special weapons unit.

[Fionn]

Mike,

thing about a Soviet Tank Division only equaling a Regiment is more about combat power than any correlation of numbers etc.

I would simply stick to using the following system:

1. Differentiate between tank, infantry and guards, non-guards units using standard NATO designations.

2. Use standard NATO designations for size of a unit up to Army size and label the fronts with their full name ( or some abbreviation thereof). Don't bother with Strategic Directions. None of the books really deal with them and they were relatively ad hoc creations at the time so they'd just confuse more people than they'd help. People who have read enough to know about them can easily discern which fronts were involved in which strategic directions based on a map showing only the fronts.

Re: your Army comment...

Remember that a Soviet Army was a unit in a way that a German Korps ( German equivalent of the Soviet Army until such time as the Soviets began re-introducing Corps in 43-44) wasn't. The Army was a unit of operational decision which acted as a unit and in concert with the Front's 2 ( or 3) other Rifle Armies to create a breach which would be exploited by the Front's Tank Army and Mechanised/Tank Corps ( Tank Army heading for operational objectives deep in the rear while the Corps sought to destabilise the enemy line ahead of the Rifle Armies).

So, whereas a German Korps might be doing a whole variety of things depending on its constituent units a normal Soviet Rifle Army could only be doing a very limited number of things ( as delineated by its doctrinal role).

So, all of this boils down to saying that the Soviets viewed a Division as a unit of TACTICAL decision ( not operational). The Army and Front were units of Operational decision.

If you are going to fully honour that then you should consider showing the German OOB one level BELOW the level at which the Soviets stop.

It all gets quite complicated at this level though since so much of what I am saying is rooted deep in the different doctrines of the two sides and is pretty weird if you don't know those differences.

[Michael Dorosh]

Hmm, it would seem I've once again bitten off more than I can chew - thanks for the detailed discussion.

[Grisha]

Okay, Fionn, I'm following you.

Michael, I pretty much agree with Fionn on the points about unit sizes & missions. The Soviets saw war on a larger scale than most other countries. Not because of their numbers, but because of the growth in the scale of war after the Napoleonic era. Hence, the development of operational art.

[Fionn]

Mike,

Probably the best way to handle this would be with specific questions about specific issues. Trying to bring anyone up to speed on the Soviet Army takes time since one often can't simply say " x in the Soviet Army is the equivalent of y in the US or German Army". They did things quite differently and it shows.

However if you ask specific questions specific, correct answers can be given without requiring any huge exposition of the underpinning doctrinal reasons for these facts.

Up to you of course but IMO it would be the best way to proceed. As time passes and a whole host of specific answers builds up you'll begin to get the gist and can explore the underpinnings urself.

[Michael Emrys]

Just a footnote on what has been said above:

One reason that the early war Soviets organized their divisions into armies, skipping over the intermediate echelon of corps, is that after Stalin's purge of the officer corps of the late '30s, there simply weren't enough generals to fill all of the leadership slots. Once enough officers had gained the necessary experience to be promoted up to those levels, the Army was sometimes able to institute a slightly more flexible command structure.

Michael

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

Hmm, it would seem I've once again bitten off more than I can chew...

I think that is going to be a continuing problem, and I don't mean just for you, Michael.

One reason I've shied away a little from the War in the East, is that it is simply so huge as to be almost incomprehensible unless one takes a very carefully organized approach. Even then, I believe that it is more than a single person can absorb in a single lifetime.

One reason I have spent a great deal of time studying the War in the Desert is that while its significance to the overall course of the war is small, it is also correspondingly more comprehensible. One can almost "get" that one.

Michael

[Grisha]

Michael Dorosh,

Don't give up. Carry on and study! If there's one area of WWII that simply demands further deep study, it's the Soviet-German War. Given that the Soviets' story has only just begun to open up in the last decade, there's a whole side of the war that needs to be studied, compared with German archival data, then reassessed. I encourage you to continue One thing I've realized about anything worth studying: the more you learn, the more you realize how much more there is to know

[ August 25, 2002, 02:28 AM: Message edited by: Grisha ]