Panzer Killers: Anti-tank Warfare on the Eastern Front by Artem Drabkin

Author:Artem Drabkin
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: HISTORY / Military / World War II
ISBN: 9781473822405
Publisher: Pen & Sword Military
Published: 2013-04-08T04:00:00+00:00

Before our departure for the front, we were given new officers’ blouses, leather boots, soldiers’ belts and greatcoats. The first to graduate and to be sent to the front were the platoons consisting of former front-line veterans.

In October 1943, they loaded us, the approximately 300 freshly baked junior lieutenants, into cattle cars and sent us into the acting army. We travelled by rail to the shattered city of Khar’kov. Here we joined the 38th Separate Battalion of the Officers’ Reserve under the command of Major Titov. This battalion was the source of replacements for officer losses in the artillery of the 38th Army. I spent one and a half months in reserve. We lived in this time according to the principle, ‘They will not send us anywhere worse than the front, and we will still command the platoon.’

I didn’t reach the front until December 1943. I was assigned to the 14th Separate Guards Airborne Destroyer Anti-tank Artillery Battalion of the 2nd Guards Airborne Division. Thus began my front-line service.

The battalion consisted of three batteries, each of which had two gun platoons. Only battalion headquarters had an operations platoon. Each battery had four 45-mm Model 1942 guns and approximately twenty-five to thirty men, including the drivers. The guns had mechanized transport; we had Willys jeeps to tow them. In the autumn of 1944, the 45-mm guns were replaced with 76-mm ZIS-3 guns, and instead of the Willys jeeps, we were given Dodge L-ton trucks. The batteries did not have their own signallers or scouts; they were all located with the battalion’s operations platoon. The battalion’s TO&E included an anti-tank rifle company of twelve anti-tank rifles, but in our battalion this company served primarily as a source of replacements for the anti-tank artillery crews, and they were rarely used for their designated purpose. There was also an ammunition supply platoon of approximately ten men with the battalion headquarters.

The battalion was commanded by Guards Major Fedor Kuznetsov. Since our battalion was separate, the commander had rights equivalent to those of a regiment commander. The battalion headquarters also had several more officers – ‘executives’ – deputy political officer Kudriavtsev, senior adjutant Makukhin and deputy commander Vishnevsky. There were also the chief of ammunition supply, the chief of finances (who was also the chief of general stores and of ration and forage supplies), the technical assistant, and the medical chief, who was a combat paramedic. Of course, there was also the staff ‘collective’ – clerks, a mail clerk, the chemical instructor, two female medical assistants, the Party organizer, procurement officers and other ‘lame-brains’. The battalion had two radios, but they never worked, and I can’t even recall whether we had any radio operators at all. In total, we had approximately 180 personnel.

As I’ve already mentioned, the battalion was equipped with the long-barrelled 45-mm Model 1942 anti-tank gun, designed by General Krupchatnikov. We called this gun the 45-mm/68 calibre. It was light, weighing only 570 kilograms. Two or three men could easily manhandle the 45-mm across a field.

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