This is a list of infantry divisions of the Soviet Union 1917–1957. It lists infantry divisions in the Soviet Union from the Russian Revolution to the reorganization of the Soviet Army in the aftermath of the Stalinist era. Mechanized Divisions were formed during 1945–46, and then all remaining Rifle Divisions were converted to Motor Rifle Divisions in 1957. During World War II more than 700 Rifle Divisions were raised.
Divisions of the Russian Civil War Many infantry (pekhotniye in Russian), literally 'movement', and rifle (strelkoviye in Russian), literally 'sharpshooter', divisions were inherited by the Workers-Peasants Army from the former Imperial Russian Army, but were renamed in the spirit of the Revolutionary times, often with names including words such as "Proletariat", "workers and peasants", or other titles that differentiated them from the past. They employed some of the 48,000 former Tsarist officers and 214,000 Tsarist NCOs along with over 10,000 administrative personnel. Initially the new 'Bolshevik' rifle divisions were composed of rifle brigades, and included:
Division Headquarters (HQ) two or three infantry brigades of a brigade HQ and two infantry regiments artillery brigade of three regiments cavalry regiment a communications battalion a reconnaissance company independent tank battalion or company (from 1919 onward) a combat engineer battalion an air (balloon) detachment (otryad) an aviation group (aircraft) rear services companies/battalions, including: Medical Chemical defense Ordnance Transport
The division was to have an establishment of 26,972, with 14,220 combat troops, and depended on 10,048 horses to manoeuvre. Due to difficulties with recruiting volunteers into the armed forces early in the Russian Civil War, conscription was introduced on 29 May 1918, and all infantry divisions were renamed into rifle divisions on 11 October 1918.
The first six of the 11 formed divisions were those formed in the Petrograd, Moscow, Orel, Yaroslav, Privolzhsk and Ural okrugs. However, the divisions were initially only numbered, eventually 1st through to 47th by 1919. Five of these divisions were also named.
The Russian Civil War divisions were allocated to the various Fronts, including: Internal districts (reserve) – 1st to 11th divisions Northern Front – 18th and 19th divisions Eastern Front – 20th to 22nd, and 24th to 31st divisions Caspian-Caucasus Front – 32nd to 36th divisions Southern Front – 12th to 16th, 23rd, and 37th to 42nd divisions Western Front – 17th, 'Lithuanian', and 'Western' Rifle Divisions In Petrograd headquarters command – 1st and 2nd 'Latvian' divisions In reserve of the Kyiv headquarters command – 'Ukrainian' division
Other Civil War rifle divisions 1st Don Rifle Division — formed and disbanded in 1920 in the Penza-Saratov area of the Southern Front. 1st Communist Rifle division — formed in Tsaritsyn in 1918 and disbanded in 1919, its troops absorbed into the 4th Rifle Division as a brigade. 1st Red-Urals Rifle Division — formed in 1919 by the Eastern Front, and reformed as the Special Brigade of the 1st Revolutionary Army of Labour. 1st Novgorod Infantry Division — former Novgorod Infantry Division, was formed in April and disbanded in September 1918. 1st Orel Infantry Division — formed in the Orel area in April 1918 and disbanded by absorption into Novouzensk and Ural Infantry Divisions during Roslavl operations. 1st Ryazansk Infantry Division — formed in April 1918 from an armed detachment, and transferred to the Moscow okrug commissariat, but disbanded in September 1918 by transfer of its personnel into the 2nd Rifle Division. 1st Siberian Rifle Division — Formed on 22 October 1920 as the 28th Rifle Division VNUS for railway protection and defense in Siberia. Became 28th Rifle Division on 25 December 1920, then 1st Siberian Rifle Division on 19 February 1921. Disbanded on 13 June 1921 with units transferred to 26th Rifle Division and the 35th Rifle Division as replacements. 1st "Simbirsk" Rifle Division — formed in 1918, redesignated as the 24th Rifle Division in 1922. 1st Petrograd Infantry Division — Formed at Petrograd in May 1918. Elements of the division were sent to the Eastern Front 1st Rifle Division (1918–1920) — Formed at the lakes region around Petrograd. Fought around Olonets with the 6th and 7th Armies from November 1918 to 1920. Defended the Aleksandrovsk-Melitopol railroad line on the Southern Front in August 1920. Awarded the Order of the Red Banner in October 1920. Reorganized as a brigade of the 15th Inzensk Rifle Division in November 1920. 1st Vitebsk Rifle Division — Consolidated into the 17th Rifle Division on 23 October 1918. 2nd Rifle Division — Formed at Moscow, in September 1918. Fought at Ufa on the Eastern Front, April–July 1919. Fought against Yudenich with the 7th Army, October–December 1919. Fought in the Polish-Soviet War in the Western Front, May–August 1920, and against Stanisław Bułak-Bałachowicz's forces in October 1920. 2nd Smolensk Rifle Division — Consolidated into the 17th Rifle Division on 23 October 1918. 2nd Tula Rifle Division — Formed in August 1918 in Tula. Disbanded October 1918. Personnel and equipment transferred to the 8th Rifle Division. 5th Vitebsk Rifle Division (1918–1926) — Formed in 1918 as 2nd Penza Infantry Division in Penza. Renamed 5th Rifle Division in October 1918. It was awarded the honorific "Saratov" in 1920. The division received the honorific "Vitebsk" in 1921, which replaced the "Saratov" designation. 6th 'Orlovski' Rifle Division (1918–1927) — former Gatchina division, and 3rd Petrograd Infantry division; formed at Oryol area, which was to become part of the Moscow Military District. 16th Rifle Division — The division was formed in May 1918 in the Tambov region from Ukrainian detachments of the Red Guards. 17th Rifle Division — Formed on 23 October 1918 from the 1st Vitebsk Rifle Division and 2nd Smolensk Rifle Divisions by the Military council of Smolensk. 26th Rifle Division — Formed on 3 November 1918 on the Eastern Front, ended the Civil War on the Chinese border. 33rd Kuban Rifle Division — Formed on 20 March 1919 with the 12th Army as the 33rd Rifle Division. Became 33rd Kuban Rifle Division 2 December 1919, used to form the Kuban Cavalry Division on 4 September 1920. 33rd Rifle Division (10th Terek-Dagestan Army) — Formed on 8 December 1920 and then absorbed into the 14th Rifle Division on 9 May 1921. 44th Rifle Division — Formed on 22 September 1918 as the 1st Insurgent Division. 51st Rifle Division — Formed in July 1919 from the elements of the Special Northern Detachment, the Special Brigade, and the Vyzama Fortress Brigade. 57th Rifle Division — Formed in July 1919 from elements of the Group of Forces on the Poltava direction. Disbanded in November 1920 after the end of the Polish–Soviet War. Trans-Dnepr Rifle Division — Formed from partisan units of the Ukrainian Front in February 1919. Fought at Mariupol, Odesa, and Sevastopol, March–April 1919. Divided into the Crimean Red Army, 6th Ukrainian Rifle Division and 7th Insurgent Rifle Division, May 1919. 7th Insurgent Rifle Division — Formed from the 3rd Brigade of the Trans-Dnepr Rifle Division in May 1919. Fought in the Donbas in May 1919. Left the RKKA and became the core of the Revolutionary Insurrectionary Army of Ukraine (RIAU) in August 1919.
The structure of the divisions (N 220/34) had changed by the end of 1918 to increase the number of regiments in brigades to three, while eliminating the artillery brigade headquarters, leaving the nine artillery divizions (battalions) and one horse artillery battery to be allocated to rifle brigades. An armoured automobile detachment (otryad) was also added.
By 1921 the establishment of the rifle division had changed substantially in accordance with TO&E N 1400/246 for peace-time, with two brigades and only 15,876 personnel, and the reduction of artillery to two battalions and one battery, and the cavalry from four to three squadron regiment.
From 10 June 1922 the organization of rifle divisions war changed from brigade to regiment structure, with three regiments in each. The establishment of divisions stationed in the border areas was reduced to 8,705 personnel, and those in the interior regions to 6,725, including the reduction to a single cavalry squadron. The number of divisions was increased to 49.
Divisions of the interwar years Due to increasing economic difficulties in the post-war USSR, the armed forces were substantially reduced, and from 8 August 1923 transferred to the territorial system of organisation. All divisions were reduced to an establishment of 1,437 permanent cadre and 8,084 conscripted personnel. These new divisions were initially called militia-rifle divisions (), and later were renamed territorial-militia divisions (). However, despite reduction in number of service personnel, the number of territorial-militia divisions quadrupled by summer 1928.
The territorial principle of manning the Red Army was introduced in the mid-1920s. In each region able-bodied men were called up for a limited period of active duty in territorial unit, which comprised about half the Army's strength, each year, for five years. The first call-up period was for three months, with one month a year thereafter. A regular cadre provided a stable nucleus. By 1925 this system provided 46 of the 77 infantry divisions and one of the eleven cavalry divisions. The remainder consisted of regular officers and enlisted personnel serving two-year stints.
Most of the divisions that participated in the Russian Civil War were disbanded by 1927, however, Leon Trotsky initiated a formation of the new armed force with a professional cadre which was supported in its evolution even after his departure from Soviet Union. The reform in the rifle forces that begun in 1924 did create some notable changes, including commencement of adding names to the regular and newly formed territorial divisions, and creation of national divisions, notably one Belarusian, four Ukrainian, two Georgian, one Armenian, and one Azerbaijanian divisions. In 1928 1st and 3rd Turkestan, and in 1929 an Azerbaijanian divisions were reorganized as mountain-rifle divisions. Of the 70 rifle division, 41 were now territorial in their establishment.
During the 1930s the RKKA infantry forces were not only expanded, but also substantially reorganized, in part due to substantial input of military theorists into their doctrinal development, such as that of Mikhail Tukhachevsky whose 1934 report to the Defence Committee included 13 categories for divisional organization of the infantry. On 31 January 1935 the Committee decreed adoption of a single 13 thousand personnel peace-time establishment for a rifle division with the following organization:
Division HQ three rifle regiments one artillery regiment one tank battalion (mixed) separate reconnaissance battalion (light tank company, cavalry squadron and SP artillery battery) communications battalion separate anti-aircraft machine-gun company sapper company aviation flight rear services/logistics and sustainment units
This structure more than double the number of combat personnel in the division from the 1929 establishment of 20.2% to 41.7%. In May 1937 the military commissars were added to the establishment of all RKKA military forces.
On 29 November 1937 four types of structures for rifle forces were established: Far Eastern District divisions – 10,000 establishment Cadre divisions – 7,000 (6950) establishment Cadre mountain divisions – 4,000 establishment Cadre territorial divisions – 6,000 (5,220) establishment. These divisions lacked the communications, reconnaissance and sapper battalions.