Forging the Red Star;

An Examination of Soviet Armaments Factories and Their Production

© Jason Long

Tube Artillery

Some of these guns were either derived from Western guns or license-built. The secret Russo-German cooperation from the late twenties to Hitler's seizure of power allowed the Soviets to copy the German 37mm anti-tank gun as the M-1930 and later to scale it up to 45mm as the M-1932. Examples of the 75mm Flak R AA gun which had been rejected by the Reichswehr and the 75mm leIG 18 and 150mm sIG 33 infantry guns were sold to the Soviets by Rheinmetall. The leIG 18 was not produced as the 76mm M1927 regimental gun was preferred, but the other two were placed into production. The sIG 33 was adapted in small numbers as the 152mm mortar M1931. The Flak R was produced in large numbers as the 76mm M1931 and was also adapted for naval service.

The Soviets also acquired a number of designs from the Skoda Works. A license to build the SB light bomber was exchanged for a license for the Czech 75mm C5 mountain gun. Many other weapons were evaluated, but only a 210mm cannon and a 305mm howitzer were selected for production. Only blueprints and prototypes were delivered before the German occupation of the rump of Czechoslovakia in March 1939. The Germans promised that the contract would be completed, but procrastinated until Barbarossa made it immaterial.

The German invasion caught a number of Soviet artillery factories in transition between models as Stalin had ordered cessation of 45mm anti-tank and 76mm regimental gun production in January 1941 on the recommendation of his imbecilic chief of artillery, Marshall Kulik. Kulik had convinced himself, based on sketchy intelligence reports, that they were incapable of penetrating the armor on the mythical new generation of German heavy tanks! They were to be replaced with 107mm guns that were capable of penetrating any known tank.

This was exceedingly premature as the Tiger I and Panther had not yet even been ordered. Stalin was rather fixated on 107mm guns at the time and must have believed that the Germans were duplicating the recent developments in Soviet heavy tanks, a clear example of mirror-imaging. There is a story that Soviet officials inspecting a German tank plant repeatedly asked to see the heaviest tank in production as they refused to believe that the Pz IV was indeed the heaviest given that it weighed some 5 tons less than the T-34, the new Soviet medium tank.

At any rate, a number of factories were idled or producing at low rates as they awaited new machinery from Germany or to begin production of designs that weren¼t quite ready. Three factories were to produce the 57mm ZiS-2 AT gun in 1941, but the gun was very inaccurate as the initial calculations of the gun's rifling were botched. A few were manufactured at Zavod (factory) Nr. 92 after new barrels were machined, but production was suspended in favor of the 76mm field guns as they had an adequate AT performance and fired a much more effective HE round.

The Leningrad plants were the first to be effected by the invasion as they switched to producing guns and equipment needed by the isolated forces in the city. They were refurbished after the siege was lifted and were producing 100mm BS-3 field guns in 1944.

Zavod Nr. 13 in Bryansk was evacuated to Ust-Katav under German fire and began producing 82mm mortars and heavy AA gun mounts. Later it made 76 and 85mm tank guns.

The Arsenal plant at Kiev began evacuation in late June, but the last train left on 9 September, narrowly evading the German encirclement. It went to Votkinsk where it was combined with Zavod Nr. 235.

The Kolomna factory was evacuated to Krasnoyarsk where it was combined with a factory from Kaluga to form Zavod Nr. 4 and continued to produce 37mm AA guns. It later produced 120mm mortars.

The other Moscow-area plant, in the suburb of Kaliningrad, was only partially evacuated to Sverdlovsk in late 1941. Some of its equipment and most of its personnel returned after the threat diminished.

The Novocherkassk plant was able to produce some 107mm guns in the fall before being evacuated to Votkinsk as the Germans neared the Rostov area.

Zavod Barrikady in Stalingrad was scheduled to begin production of the Czech siege artillery weapons, but the invasion rendered that plan moot as it commenced production of the 76mm USV field gun instead. It continued production until put out of action by German shelling in August 1942. Only small amounts of equipment were evacuated to Votkinsk before it was overrun by the Germans in September. It had been the scene of heavy fighting during the Stalingrad battle and had to be completely rebuilt before production could resume, but it was turning out 122mm tank guns by 1945.

The remaining plants dropped production of large-caliber weapons in favor of the smaller caliber guns that were more useful in defensive actions. Production of 152mm weapons wasn't resumed until after Stalingrad. Surviving stocks sufficed until the tide had turned. No tube artillery weapons larger than 152mm were produced until after the end of the war.

Great efforts were made to reduce the amount of time and of materials required to produce the weapons. The 76mm USV divisional gun was redesigned to make it more suitable for anti-tank use and to simplify its manufacture. The new version was standardized in 1942 as the ZiS-3. The table below illustrates the Soviet accomplishment in the minimization of machine-hours and parts required for manufacture of a variety of 76mm field guns:

The decline in hours required for the ZiS-3 is a perfect example of the learning curve in manufacturing, though I suspect some of the steep decline in 1944 is attributable to sophisticated machine tools supplied through Lend-Lease.

Rather than add to the logistical burden of the field forces by deploying the 57mm AT gun, despite its excellent armor penetration capabilities, an improved version of the existing 45mm AT gun, the M-42, was designed and placed into production by early 1942 at Zavod Nr. 172. A new, longer barrel of 68 calibers was used and the propellant was improved so that it gained an additional 110 m/sec velocity for a weight penalty of only 65 kg.

The ZiS-2 was later modified by the use of the carriage of the ZiS-3 to minimize the logistical burden of an entirely new weapon and was deployed in 1943 to counter the heavier armor of the latest German tanks.

Production of the M-42 was curtailed after the introduction of the ZiS-2 and its carriage was used for a new 76mm regimental gun with a 19 caliber barrel.

Production of the 152mm howitzer itself was revived after Stalingrad with an entirely new barrel of the same dimensions as the M-10 howitzer with a muzzle-brake added and mounted on the carriage of the 122mm howitzer. It saved nearly a metric ton of weight and performed just as well. Proposals in 1941 to field a 85mm AA gun on the same carriage were rejected as production of both urgently needed weapons would have been disrupted.

The 100mm L/56 BS-3 field gun was adapted from a prewar naval gun and had a performance slightly superior to the German 88m L/56 tank and AA guns. Its adoption was forced by the appearance of large numbers of heavy German tanks and first appeared in large numbers in 1944.

German designs of hollow-charge and sub-caliber AT rounds were copied to improve the performance of the Soviet artillery as it often engaged German tanks over open sights. These copies weren't as effective as they could have been due to poor design and manufacturing limitations.

While detailed statistics are unavailable some figures are available and the available numbers for Soviet artillery production are shown in the table below, excluding mortars and some 100,000 vehicle guns.

Notes: Numbers in italics are interpolations. Bold figures are estimates and are less reliable than the interpolations. Anti-tank are guns less than 76mm; Field are guns 76mm and greater; Anti-aircraft is all AA guns between 25-85mm. 56,580 of these were ZiS-3 field guns and 9860 were ZiS-2 anti-tank guns.

Of the roughly 290,000 AA, AT, field and tank guns produced, the majority were in produced in 5 factories. Zavod Nr. 92 made 95,000 while the facilities in Votkinsk produced 52,000. Zavod Nr. 172 turned out 48,600 while Zavod Nr. 9 and Nr. 8 trailed with 30,000 and 20,000 manufactured respectively.

Despite the lack of definitive statistics for either nation it is possible to compare artillery production between Germany and the USSR. A few interesting facts emerge as Germany out-produced the USSR in 1944 in total production and out-produced it in AA guns every year. Two-thirds of German production between 1942 and 1944 was of AA guns while the Soviet figure was only one-sixth. If the Combined Bomber Offensive had no other effect, it diverted much in the way of German armaments production to counter it, constituting, in effect, an economic Second Front. As many of the Luftwaffe Home Defense flak units were manned by students and women, the lack of Allied air activity over the Reich would not have allowed the diversion of all those flak guns to combat theaters because of manpower limitations.

The following tables illustrate the production of both countries:

Note: Includes tank guns.

Lend-Lease Artillery

Notes: Weapons sent for evaluation purposes are not shown. 88 2-pdr guns were lost during shipment by July 1942. 56 more were lost subsequently by 30 June 1943. The data is incomplete and contradictory; the numbers given above should be regarded as only approximate except for the British data. It comes from WO 202/909 courtesy of Alan Philson.
As you can see the AA guns were useful, but not vital and the AT guns rather less so.

Mortars

The 50mm mortar was quickly phased out after combat experience showed that it was ineffective because its bomb was too small to carry a decent amount of explosives in relation to the weight of the mortar. It was replaced by the 82mm mortar.

The 120mm mortar was an excellent design that was actually copied and placed into production by the Germans where it replaced the 150mm sIG 33 infantry gun in most units.

As previously mentioned the 120mm was produced at Zavod Nr. 4 and at the Barrikady Factory in Stalingrad before it was overrun by the Germans.

Aside from the ZiS-2 the only brand-new artillery piece placed into production during the entire war was the 160mm mortar. It fired a round containing more explosive than the 152mm howitzer though to less than half the distance, but weighed only a third as much. Its mobility was very handy to an army always short of prime movers. It was field-tested at Kursk and was in general service by early 1944 where it was deployed as part of artillery divisions and with independent heavy mortar brigades.

Rocket Artillery

The BM-13 launcher with 16 rails was adaptable to just about any chassis, to include the KV-1 tank. It was mounted on both Soviet and Lend-Lease trucks with a cargo capacity over a ton and a half .

A BM-8 launcher for the 82mm RS-82 aerial rocket was designed after the initial success of the BM-13 in August 1941. BM-8s were also mounted on a variety of smaller chassis, including T-40 and T-60 light tanks. 8 rail launchers were even mounted on the GAZ-67 jeep. Larger trucks could carry 48 rail launchers.

A version of the M-13 rocket was initially developed with a larger warhead as the M-20, but the warhead was later increased to 300mm and even 310mm. Initially these were fired from the ground on frames that also served as the packing crate, much like the German schweres Wurfger”t 40 and 41. Also like them a mobile version was developed as the BM-31-12 in 1944.

The only factory that I can confirm produced rockets was Zavod Nr. 13 at Ust-Katav. I suspect that production was extremely decentralized due to the ease that the launchers could be made. No data is available for the production of the frame-launched rockets as these were essentially rounds of ammunition rather than launchers.

Ammunition

Unlike the artillery factories, Soviet ammunition plants were concentrated in the Donbass Basin and in the Ukraine which were overrun by the Germans during the fall. Some 303 factories were lost with a capacity of over 100 million artillery shells, 32 million mortar shells and 24 million aerial bombs. This produced a huge disparity between artillery gun production, which was less affected, and ammunition production. The table below shows the increases in production between the second quarter of 1941 and the third quarter of 1942. Note how gun production increased by a factor of six, but ammunition only by a factor of three.

The situation was partially alleviated by the reduction of aerial bomb production and the diversion of the excess explosives to artillery ammunition. Bomb production peaked in 1941 at 16 million.
Powder production in early 1943 was still 9 percent below the 1941 level, while production of shell casings had tripled, but increased enough by the end of the year to meet demand.

Lend-Lease Ammunition and Explosives

Without Lend-Lease the Soviets would have had a serious ammo shortage amongst all their other problems. Allied deliveries of anti-tank and anti-aircraft guns were far less critical than the deliveries of explosives and other goods.

The ammunition shortage reinforced the Soviet predilection for direct fire as it was considerably more conservative of shells than indirect fire, albeit at considerable risk to the guns and crew. Another disadvantage was the frequent necessity of moving to engage new targets. The constant shortage of radios and the consequent reliance on field phones and their lack of flexibility exacerbated the situation. Compared to Western armies Soviet artillery fired fewer rounds per gun per day with up to one third of all field pieces using direct fire to engage their targets.

Note: Excludes ammunition for aircraft guns.
Tonnage figures would be far more useful, but the above figures provide a rough guide.

Armor

A new generation of armored vehicles was just being fielded by the Soviets based on their experiences in Spain, Finland and the Far East as well as German successes when the Germans attacked. The primary conclusions were the needs to increase armor thicknesses, to prevent engine fires and the ability to operate in extremely low temperatures. A number of new designs were prepared incorporating these features. These were the T-40 amphibious scout tank, T-50 light infantry tank, T-60 scout tank, KV heavy tanks, and the T-34 in the medium and cavalry tank roles.

The T-34 was designed to withstand 76mm shells at ranges over a kilometer and 37mm shells at any range. A new diesel engine was adopted since diesel fuel has a far higher flash point than ordinary gasoline and is thus much less likely to explode. Its sloping armor was adopted to maximize effective armor thickness for a given weight. Due to the international situation it entered production in 1940 before all the bugs were worked out. The Kharkov and Stalingrad Tractor Factories were forced to use components from older tanks to meet their production quotas in the early part of their production runs and the new engine and transmissions that were used still had to have the bugs worked out. More T-34s may have been lost to mechanical failure than to enemy action in 1941. A total of 35,120 T-34/76s were built during the war.

An up-armored T-34M version was designed to satisfy critics of the standard T-34's poor turret layout and lack of adequate vision for the tank commander as well as substituting a more efficient torsion bar suspension, like that used on the KV and T-50 tanks, for the bulky Christie suspension. Some 500 of these T-34Ms were scheduled for production in 1941 until the Germans rendered the plan obsolete. But these problems were not corrected in full until the T-34/85 entered production in December '43 because the existing production lines could not be disrupted after the German invasion.

The appearance of the Tiger and Panther in quantity forced the Soviets to acknowledge the need to upgun the T-34. A 85mm gun had been under design for some time and the favorable strategic situation after Kursk allowed the production lines to be disrupted, but they were only initially built by the Gorkiy factory.

Zavod Nr. 112 began production in July 1941 of the T-34 and was able to make up the shortfall resulting from the evacuation of Zavod Nr. 183 to Nizhni Tagil that began in September 1941. A portion of Zavod Nr. 174 was also evacuated to Nizhni Tagil where they both combined with the Ural Locomotive Factory to form Zavod Nr. 183 Ural Tank Works. Zavod Nr. 9 in Sverdlovsk began production of T-34 components in 1942 and began assembly later in the year. In August of that year Tankograd began production of the T-34 to make up for the loss of production from Stalingrad which had accounted for approximately 42% of all T-34 production up to that point. It continued production until the IS-2 heavy tank and ISU series heavy assault guns were introduced in April '44. 18,480 T-34/85s were built through the end of May '45, though production continued into the '50s.

The KV series tanks were designed to replace the T-35 multi-turreted heavy tanks. Initial designs were also multi-turreted, but Stalin was persuaded to approve a prototype of a single-turreted version and to enter it in the trials. Unsurprisingly, the KV was selected over its multi-turreted competitors. An improved version of the KV-1 was designed with a more powerful engine, an improved turret layout and an 85 or 107mm gun as the KV-3, but the German invasion made its production impracticable as further disruptions of the production lines could not be tolerated. 4749 KVs of all types were built. Of these some 334 were KV-2s armed with a 152mm gun, 1370 were KV-1S models with thinner armor to improve automotive performance and 130 were KV-85s with a new turret armed with an 85mm gun on modified KV-1S hulls as a stopgap until the factories began production of the IS-2.

The Kirovskiy and Izhorskiy Works were evacuated from Leningrad to Chelyabinsk along with a portion of the Kharkov Diesel Factory to centralize KV production where they formed Zavod Nr. 100 with the Chelyabinsk Tractor Factory. The combination was also known as Tankograd (Tank City).

The T-40 was in low-rate production, but its minimal armor and poor armament rendered it an expensive luxury after war broke out and it was canceled after 230 were completed by Zavod Nr. 37 in Moscow. In fact the last batch was completed with launchers for M-8 rockets mounted in place of the turret.

The T-50 and T-60 were not placed into production until after the German invasion. As the T-50 required a unique engine and transmission, it was also an expensive luxury. Production had been initiated in Omsk by Zavod Nr. 174, but was canceled in early February 1942 after only 48 were completed, despite its excellence as a light tank.

The T-60 had few of the combat virtues of the T-50, but was kept in production because it was economical to build. It used a number of readily available truck components and could be built in facilities too small for the T-34. It was built at Zavod Nr. 38 after the factory was evacuated from Kolomna to Kirov. A portion of Zavod Nr. 37 was also evacuated to Kirov. Zavod Nr. 1 at Gorkiy also began production. The Podolskiy Machine Factory in Podolsk built T-60 hulls for the other plants. As tanks were in short supply it was produced to satisfy the demand for any sort of tank at all until replaced by the T-70 after September 1942 after 6022 were built.

The T-70 also used readily available components, but carried a 45mm gun, unlike the 20mm of the T-60 and much thicker armor. 8226 were produced at the same plants that had built the T-60 until production was canceled in October '43.

A successor was designed with a two-man turret and placed into production as the T-80, presumably at the same factories that built the earlier light tanks. Only 120 were built as it was inferior to the SU-76 in fighting power, but used most of the same components.

The Soviets decided to introduce assault guns for many of the same reasons as the Germans. It was cheaper to produce and allowed the use of a heavier gun on a given chassis than the turreted version. One curious feature of all Soviet assault guns was that none had a machine gun for the suppression of infantry. This was a drawback as they could not overrun infantry positions, but had to stand off and shell them while the infantry closed and did the dirty work.

The smallest was the SU-76 which mated the chassis of the T-70 with the ZiS-3 field gun. Initially it was produced at was Gorkiy and Kirov, but Zavod Nr. 40 at M¼tishchi near Moscow was brought into the program. Production began at the end of 1942, but the first batches were severely flawed and had to be rebuilt as the SU-76M. It was unpopular with its users who called it the „Suka¾ which was the Russian word for bitch as well as the diminutive of the acronym SU.

The SU-76i was produced by the conversion of captured Pz III and StuG III chassis to take the 76.2mm ZiS-5 gun used in the KV-1. About 200 were converted by Zavod Nr. 38 in 1943 from vehicles captured mostly at Stalingrad.

The SU-122 was result of the mating of a T-34 chassis and a M-30 122mm howitzer. It entered production December '42 at Zavod Nr. 9. It was more popular than the SU-76, but was much more expensive than its smaller cousin. 1100 were built before it was superceded by the ISU-122.

The SU-85 swapped a D-5 85mm gun for the M-30, but didn¼t enter production until August '43. 2050 were produced before it was superceded by the SU-100.

The SU-100 was developed to replace the SU-85 during the summer of 1944 as there was little sense in mounting an 85mm gun on the tank destroyer and medium tank both. The 100mm BS-3 gun was mounted on an improved SU-85 hull. Production began in September '44 in Sverdlovsk and 1200 were delivered by mid-1945.

The SU-152 mounted a ML-20 howitzer on a modified KV-1S chassis. Production began in March '43, but only a single regiment saw service at Kursk. It was nicknamed the Zvierboi (Animal Killer) for its ability to deal with the vehicles of the German armored zoo. Only 704 were built before production switched to vehicles based on the IS tank chassis.

The KV-1 could not be upgraded to carry a gun larger than 85mm without thorough redesign and only the necessity to avoid disruption of the production lines forced the Soviets to accept a heavy tank armed with the same gun as the medium tank. Time could be taken after Kursk to completely redesign the KV. After a few false steps the IS-2 made its appearance in April 1944. Tankograd was ordered to expand its facilities after the introduction of the IS-2 due to the demand from the field.

It was armed with an A-19 122mm gun despite the better armor penetration ability of the BS-3 100mm gun because surplus capacity existed to manufacture the A-19 and its ammunition. That was not the case with the BS-3 which was just entering large-scale production. 3854 were built before switching to the IS-3.

The IS-2 was redesigned to improve the armor protection as the IS-3. It used the same automotive components as the IS-2, but had a new hull and turret of far greater thickness. Some 350 were produced before war¼s end, but none saw combat in the final weeks of the war as they were plagued with teething problems, although one regiment was rushed to Germany in April '45.

An improved version of the SU-152 was adapted from the IS-1 chassis after the KV series went out of production in October '43. The ISU-152 was easily adapted to the A-19 122mm gun and the ISU-122 entered production before the end of 1943 at Chelyabinsk. Both types were kept in production because of the availability of 122mm tubes and ammunition despite the preference of the troops for the ISU-152. 35 ISU-152 and ISU-122 were completed by the factory complex at Chelyabinsk by the end of the year, but total wartime production was approximately 4075.

Lend-Lease Armored Fighting Vehicles

Another point often ignored by the Soviets is the proportion of Allied production represented by the Lend-Lease tanks. Britain sent some 14% of its total tank production to the USSR, much of it in 1941 and 1942, when its own forces in the Middle East desperately needed tanks. Virtually all of Canada's AFV production ended up in the Soviet Union. Many of these vehicles arrived in the first year and a half of the war when they were sorely needed to supplement Soviet production which was still gearing up.

One characteristic of Western AFVs that is little discussed by the Soviets was that the reliability of Western tanks allowed them to drive on long past the time that Soviet tanks had to be returned to the factory for a total mechanical rebuild. Soviet vehicles were purposely designed with short mechanical lifetimes. In combat this mattered little when the life expectancy of a tank was measured in days. But in training units the reliability of Western tanks was a godsend since they needed far less maintenance than Soviet tanks. Even in combat units this characteristic was useful; why else would 1st Guards Mechanized Corps convert from the T-34-85 to the Sherman, a tank with a smaller gun and thinner armor?

Many of the lighter Western tanks, such as Valentines and Stuarts, equipped units in lieu of the Soviet's own light tanks. This allowed them to discontinue production of light tanks in the autumn of 1943.

Abbreviations: GMC, Gun Motor Carriage (tank destroyers), MGMC, Multiple Gun Motor Carriage (AA guns mounted on half-track chassis).
Notes: 417 US medium tanks and 54 half-tracks were lost en route, but a detailed breakdown is not available. British data on Matildas and Tetrarchs comes from WO 202/909 courtesy of Alan Philson and is valid through 30 June 1943.

Even more important than the AFVs were the jeeps and trucks supplied by the West. Soviet trucks were copies of U.S. 1930-era designs and lacked the cross-country abilities of the modern vehicles given by the Americans. The U.S. alone gave some 151,000 1 1/2 ton and 201,000 2 1/2 ton trucks. The table below compares Soviet production of trucks with Lend-Lease deliveries, in thousands:

Note: Figures for 1941 are for the second half of the year only.

On May 1, 1945 Lend-Lease vehicles comprised 32.8% of the Red Army's vehicle park. 9.1% were captured vehicles and 58.1% were domestically built. I can only explain the disparity between the Lend-Lease deliveries and the figures for May 1945 by suggesting that most of the Allied trucks were sent to the front where they were lost to enemy action while the Soviet trucks spent their time relatively safe in the rear because of their poor cross-country abilities.

These trucks enabled the Soviets to mount the offensives that evicted the Nazis from their territory and took Berlin. Without them they would have had to divert tank production to the manufacture of trucks. Undoubtedly this would have prolonged the war in the East, but not changed the outcome.

Leningrad and Gorkiy were probably the most important armaments centers that the Germans could possibly reach. The isolation of Leningrad minimized that city's production. The loss of Gorkiy would have been catastrophic as it was a also a center of truck production at the Gorkiy Automotive Factory, commonly referred to by its Russian acronym GAZ. Fortunately Gorkiy was beyond the reach of the Germans, barring serious Soviet mistakes and incompetence beyond historical levels, no matter what R.H.S. Stolfi may believe.

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