On June 1, 1941, the Soviet Army had 67,335 guns and mortars, plus 24,158 50mm mortars on hand. That's a lot of guns, and the 122mm, 152mm, and 203mm pieces were not inferior in range, weight of shell, or accuracy to their German counterparts. From the beginning of the campaign the Soviet artillery made itself felt, and in the first Soviet counterattacks at Rostov, Tikhvin, and Moscow the arlillery formed the bulk of the attacking power. Representing this artillery in game terms called for some compromises, however.

First, except for 10 recently organized antitank brigades, there were NO artillery brigades in the Soviet army on 22 June 1941. The non-divisional artillery was almost all in regiments, at Corps, Army, or STAVKA reserve level. FITE groups these in roughly the following manner:

4-2-8 and 3-2-8 Art X = RVGK (High Command Reserve) artillery regiments, each of 48 122mm or 152mm cannon or 24 203mm howitzers. Each brigade represents about 2 regiments. There were 73 RVGK regiments total, of which the Japanese identified 14 in the Far East.

2-3-6 and 2-6 Art X = Army and Corps artillery regiments. The Army artillery was mostly 122mm and 152mm howitzers, 36 to a regiment. The 2-6 Art X represent the Corps artillery: each rifle or mechanized corps was supposed to have 2 regiments, each with 36 107mm or 122mm cannon. In fact, since the number of Corp HO had increased from 25 in 1939 to 93 in June 1941, the artillery had not kept pace. Most armies had only about 1 regiment per Corps.

The 10 RVGK anti-tank brigades (2-3-8 AT X) had just been organized starting in April 1941. Each brigade was supposed to have 2 regiments with a total of 48 76mm, 24 107mm, 48 85mm guns, 16 37mm AA and 72 AAMG.

In fact, the 107mm guns hadn't even been built, and the 85mm were antiaircraft guns that the air defense didn't have enough of, yet! With a total of 120 guns plus AA when full strength, these "brigades" were actually closer in strength to the later Artillery Divisions (168 guns).

Of course, none were at full strength. The 1st in the Kiev District, and the 8th and 9th in the Western and Baltic Military Districts respectively, all were somewhat complete and provided good support to the infantry. Moskalenko's 1 st AT Bdgade, in fact, gave 1 st Panzer Group a bloody nose in the Ukraine. The rest of the brigades, though, are barely mentioned in the Soviet accounts, and it is hard to avoid the conclusion that they were skeleton units, still lacking most of the men and equipment they were supposed to have.

In one respect the Soviet artillery in June 1941 was ahead of all other armies in the world except the British: all non- divisional artillery was motorized. In fact, outside of the cavalry divisions and corps, there was no horse-drawn artillery in the Soviet army except the light artillery regiments in the rifle divisions. The howitzer regiments of those same divisions were motorized using civilian farm tractors or little "Komsomolets" tractors. All of these had top speeds of 8- 12 mph, and had serious problems towing heavy guns over bad roads. Consequently, the actual motorized capability of that artillery was nil. Even the artillery of the mechanized Corps and their divisions were left behind when the tank or motorized infantry moved out.

As the scope of the initial disaster became apparent to the Soviets, they took immediate steps to reorganize the artillery. Still no brigades, but the howitzer regiments were stripped from the rifle divisions in July-August 1941 and formed separate army arlillery regiments.

More importantly in the long run, antitank regiments were organized, each with 4-5 batteries of 76mm or 45mm guns. While the 45mm was the "official" antitank weapon of the Red Army, the usefulness of the 76mm divisional cannon in that role was already recognized. In the last half of 1941, production of 76mm guns jumped from 1700 to over 4000, and less than 10% of those were infantry support howitzers.

The first antitank "fighter" brigades, combining three regiments of 45mm and 76mm guns plus mine-laying engineers and antitank rifles, were not organized until the spring of 1942, but equivalent concentrations of antitank regiments were already used in front of Moscow in October 1941.

Now for the more "unusual" units in the Soviet artillery OB:

Siege artillery (2-0-6 Art X, 1-0-6 Art III) These units actually represent the separate battalions and batteries of "super-heavy" artillery in the RVGK before the war. There were the equivalent of about 28 battalions in various organizations.

2-3-5 Art X AKU The only "militia" artillery unit in the Soviet army, this counter represents the assets of the various High Command Artillery Schools around Leningrad, which were rushed to the front at the beginning of July. It includes the Artillery regiment of the Leningrad Artillery Command School, battalions from the 2d and 3d Leningrad Artillery Schools, and an AA battalion from the Leningrad Artillery Technical School.

2-0-R RR Art X 101st Nvl. This is also a "collective" unit. It represents all the coastal artillery of the Red Banner Baltic Fleet around Leningrad, but for once, the HO did not have to be made up for the counter: all the various heavy railroad- mounted coastal guns were grouped under 101st Naval Artillery Brigade headquarters, which devoted itself to counterbattery fire for most of the siege of Leningrad. The guns included everything up to 16" naval rifles, and by 1944 the Naval artillery around Leningrad was in 3 brigades, almost the strength of an artillery division.

1-0-8 Rkt Art II (Flerov) The ONLY artillery battalion in the Soviet order of battle. This unit really should be withdrawn by I September 1941, as it was included (in the "Scorched Earth" OB) purely to get the Soviet rocket artillery into action as historically early as it actually appeared. The first BM-13 rocket mounts had been demonstrated just before the war started in early June 1941. In desperation, a battery was thrown together from these demonstration units and the first launchers off the assembly lines and sent forward by the 1st Moscow Red Banner Artillery School on 1 July 1941. It was supposed to have 7 launchers, but 2 didn't show up in time, so it went into action with 5 launchers and a 122mm howitzer as a ranging gun: there weren't any firing tables for the rockets yet! The commander, Guards Captain I.A. Flerov, lent his name to the counter, since this first battery had no other designation.

The 2d and 3d batteries were not organized and sent to the front until the end of July, so to justify the 1 3-1-8 Rkt Art III received in August 1941, you should remove Flerov - with a comment on the fleeting nature of fame!

There is one "artillery" unit which was omitted from both the FITE and SE Soviet OBs. The Podolsk (NE of Moscow) Infantry and Artillery Schools organized a brigade- sized unit in early October in response to the German breakthrough at Vyazma- Bryansk. The Podolsk Infantry School put together 3 rifle battalions, the Artillery School 3 artillery battalions with 45mm- 76mm guns, plus another battalion of artillery cadets without artillery as infantry. The unit fought tenaciously throughout OctoberNovember in front of Moscow. I suggest using a "spare" AKU counter (23- 5) entering as a conditional unit at Moscow: the Podolsk schools were short transport, but had more heavy weapons than the average rif le brigade.

Next time, we'll look at the Soviet God of War: the artillery of the middle and late war period.