The 13th Light Tank Brigade () was an armored brigade of the Red Army that fought in the Winter War. It was formed as the 31st Uritsky Mechanized Brigade in 1932 at Stary Petergof near Leningrad, assigned to the 11th Mechanized Corps, one of the first armored units of the Red Army. Two years later, the brigade became part of the new 7th Mechanized Corps, and it sent crews to fight in the Spanish Civil War. When the corps was redesignated as the 10th Tank Corps, the brigade became the 13th Light Tank Brigade in 1938. In late 1939, it and the corps participated in the massing of forces on the Estonian and Latvian borders to force their governments to agree to Soviet demands.
After Finland refused Soviet demands to cede territory, the brigade and its parent corps were committed to the invasion that began the Winter War. An ambitious plan for the employment of the 10th Tank Corps to encircle Finnish troops in the Karelian Isthmus at the beginning of the war in December quickly failed due to the unexpected strength of Finnish anti-tank defenses, and instead it was tasked with exploiting an anticipated infantry breakthrough in the Battle of Summa. This did not materialize, although the brigade lost several tanks to Finnish artillery while waiting to go into action. It was withdrawn from combat and served as an independent unit from late December, training intensively for the breakthrough of the Mannerheim Line. When Soviet infantry assaults supported by other tank units accomplished the latter in mid-February 1940, the brigade was sent into the breach. However, unfavorable terrain and Finnish resistance limited its advance and it suffered heavy losses. In the final weeks of the war, the brigade participated in the steady Soviet advance on Vyborg (Viipuri). Awarded the Order of the Red Banner for its actions in the war, the brigade was used to form the 3rd Tank Division in mid-1940 after participating in the invasion of Estonia.
Prewar period
The 31st Mechanized Brigade was formed from the 11th Rifle Division's 32nd Volodarsky Rifle Regiment between May and September 1932 as part of the 11th Mechanized Corps in the Leningrad Military District at Stary Petergof near Leningrad. It was commanded by Alexey Skulachenko from its formation until early 1935. One of the two original mechanized corps of the Red Army, the 11th was formed as a result of a massive expansion in Soviet tank production. Equipped with T-26 light tanks, the brigade had an authorized strength of 220 tanks, 56 armored cars, and 27 guns among its three tank battalions (the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd), a tank training battalion, a rifle battalion, an artillery battalion, and support units. To perpetuate the traditions of the 11th Rifle Division, the brigades of the corps received the honorifics of the former's regiments on 16 January 1934, with the 31st becoming the 31st Uritsky Mechanized Brigade after the 31st Rifle Regiment despite actually having been formed from the 32nd Rifle Regiment. The brigade inherited the honorific of the 31st Regiment, named in honor of assassinated Bolshevik leader Moisei Uritsky. During that year, the headquarters of the 11th Mechanized Corps and another of its brigades were relocated to the Transbaikal Military District as a result of rising tensions with Japan. The 31st was left behind in the Leningrad Military District and became part of the new 7th Mechanized Corps.
Colonel Vladimir Gorev became brigade commander in February 1935 and after he was sent to assist the Spanish Republican Army in their civil war, Colonel Ivan Korchagin took command in November 1936. Korchagin was arrested in August 1937 during the Great Purge, which also claimed six other brigade officers, including the commissar and the chief of engineers. Three Red Army men were also among those imprisoned, one being sentenced to six years on charges of discrediting the government by "speaking hostilely about the forms and methods of Soviet art". Succeeding Korchagin, Kombrig (brigade commander) Pyotr Kotov commanded the brigade until early 1938, when Colonel Viktor Baranov took over. Baranov, the final brigade commander, was another of the Soviet tankers who had been sent to support the Spanish Republican Army, among them personnel from the 31st Brigade. When the Red Army armor doctrine shifted to concentrating tanks in tank corps, in June 1938 the 7th Mechanized Corps became the 10th Tank Corps, and shortly afterwards the 31st Mechanized Brigade became the 13th Light Tank Brigade. At this time, the brigade was also relocated to Porkhov in northwestern Russia.
The reorganization into a light tank brigade resulted in its battalions becoming individually numbered separate battalions. The reorganized brigade included the 6th, 9th, 13th, and 15th Tank Battalions, the 205th Reconnaissance Battalion, the 158th Motorized Machine Gun Battalion, the 254th Repair Battalion, the 566th Auto Transport Battalion, the 8th Combat Support Company, the 52nd Communications Company, and the 35th Sapper Company. As a light tank brigade, the brigade was almost entirely equipped with BT-7 light tanks, fielding 151 BT-7s of all types on 5 July 1938, slightly over half of its authorized peacetime strength of 270 BT-7s. In addition, the brigade included all of its authorized ten T-26 BKhM-3 flamethrower tanks.
To threaten Estonia into signing a treaty that allowed the establishment of Soviet bases on its territory, the brigade and its corps were assigned to the 8th Army of the Leningrad Military District in September and by 27 September was concentrated on the Estonian border in the vicinity of Pskov. The threat of an invasion by the 134,000 troops on their border forced the Estonian government into accepting the Soviet ultimatum, and on 2 October the corps moved south with the 8th Army to the vicinity of Ostrov in a repetition of the same tactic against Latvia. The Latvian government similarly gave in to the threat of the 255,000 troops on their border, and on 13 October the corps left the 8th Army to return to the Leningrad region.
Winter War Finland was also faced with demands to cede territory and allow the establishment of Soviet bases, but refused and negotiations broke down. As a result, the Soviets opted for war and the Leningrad Military District concentrated its forces between 15 and 20 November. The corps was halted at Luga rather than returning to its bases and was relocated to the Finnish border as the tank corps assigned to support the 7th Army, tasked with the main Soviet attack on the Karelian Isthmus at the beginning of the Winter War. The plans of the 7th Army envisioned a role of deep penetration for the corps: it was to turn west after reaching Kiviniemi and crossing the Vuoksi River in order to surround the Finnish troops on the isthmus. When the invasion began on 30 November, the 13th Light Tank Brigade fielded 246 BT-7s and 10 T-26s. By the beginning of the Winter War, the personnel of the corps, which also included the 1st Light Tank Brigade and the 15th Motor Rifle and Machine Gun Brigade, were well trained, but their tanks were worn out by the long road marches to the Estonian and Latvian borders and then to the Finnish border, which covered a total distance of .
December battles and interlude
The brigade was reinforced by a rifle and machine gun battalion from the 15th Motor Rifle and Machine Gun Brigade for the advance. The corps began advancing towards Kiviniemi behind infantry units on 1 December, having to overcome the strong Finnish anti-tank defenses, which included seven anti-tank ditches and seventeen rows of dragon's teeth between the border and Kiviniemi. The 9th Tank Battalion and infantry captured Riikola on the next day after an artillery preparation and approached Suurporkku, where the infantry were stopped by machine gun fire and the tanks by dragon's teeth and a ditch. After making gaps in the defenses by the morning of 3 December, the 13th Tank Battalion, 205th Reconnaissance Battalion, and 158th Rifle and Machine Gun Battalion attacked Suurporkku, which they captured by the end of the day before moving to Rautu. The 15th Battalion reached the village of Suokas on 4 December, but lost one tank destroyed by a mine and two by anti-tank guns while trying to cross an anti-tank ditch. These obstacles slowed the advance of the corps so that they did not reach Kiviniemi until 5 December, and the planned decisive breakthrough of the corps failed as Finnish troops covering the border retreated to the fortified Mannerheim Line and blew up the bridges over the Vuoksi before the corps could capture them. The 1st and 13th Light Tank Brigades came under fire from the line before the corps was withdrawn to the army reserve on 6 December. As a result of these operations, the Red Army command concluded that independent massed tank operations were impossible in Karelia.
Instead, the corps was shifted to the western part of the isthmus to exploit the planned breakthrough of the 50th Rifle Corps along the Vyborg (Viipuri) road in the Battle of Summa. By 16 December, after a series of marches, the brigade concentrated in the village of Peinola, tasked with exploiting the breakthrough of the 123rd Rifle Division by advancing towards the railway stations of Lähde and Kämärä and capturing the Tali railway station. The brigade moved up to the frontline on 17 December, with the 205th Reconnaissance Battalion in the first echelon. A detachment from the battalion consisting of a tank company, three flamethrower tanks, a rifle platoon and two artillery tanks was tasked with capturing the Tali station. Behind the 205th, the 9th Tank Battalion with three flamethrower tanks attached was assigned to capture the Kämärä railway station, supported by the 13th Tank Battalion. The 6th Tank Battalion stood ready to exploit an anticipated breakthrough at Yläsäiniö. The Soviet forces making the initial attack on that day, a regiment of the 123rd Rifle Division and a battalion of the 20th Tank Brigade, were faced by one battalion of the Finnish 15th Infantry Regiment. The tanks from the 20th reached the Finnish rear, but the infantry refused to move farther than the first Finnish trench line, forcing the former to retreat at nightfall.Meanwhile, corps commander Komdiv (division commander) Prokofy Romanenko personally ordered the 9th Tank Battalion to attack at 13:00, claiming that the 123rd had broken through and the 1st Light Tank Brigade was already going into action. Two hours later, the battalion moved forward but the breakthrough had in fact not materialized and it was stopped by the first line of dragon's teeth, where a flamethrower tank from the 8th Combat Support Company was set on fire by a direct hit from an artillery shell, killing its driver. When the T-28 medium tanks of the 20th Tank Brigade returned from their attack, one of them ran over a BT-7 from the 205th, disabling it. The 13th Brigade remained on the frontline exposed to heavy shelling until they were ordered to pull back on 13:00 on 18 December, losing two tanks burned out and eight disabled with the loss of six tankers killed and twelve wounded. After this defeat, it was withdrawn to the rear in the area of Bobochino.
Interlude The corps headquarters was disbanded in late December and the brigade became an independent unit under direct 7th Army control. Near Bobochino, from 23 December, the brigade conducted intensive training, preparing for the breakthrough of the Mannerheim Line. Soviet tank tactics fundamentally changed: instead of racing ahead of the infantry and exposing themselves to being picked off at close range by grenades and Molotov cocktails while crossing trenches, tanks were now to be positioned in front of the Finnish trenches beyond small arms range and systematically demolish the defensive positions with their guns. They were only to cross trenches under the cover of other tanks to keep the heads of the defenders down.