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Formations "S" of the 12th Main
Directorate of the USSR Ministry of Defense solved strategic issues and had
a special position. But, as elsewhere in the Soviet army, the competence and
responsibility of some sometimes coexisted with the carelessness of others.
From today's advanced perspective, we can say: it’s good that because of the
total Soviet secrecy, the troops could not know about this. The armies going
on the offensive had to be confident in their nuclear power, and the “mute”
troops had to perform a task that was unique in its significance.
The basis of the country's
military power
It's no exaggeration to say that the
basis of Soviet military power was nuclear weapons and, accordingly, the
nuclear technical supports formations (formations "S"). Everything else was
built around them both in the strategic nuclear forces and in the
operational-level troop formations. For example, the most important
components of the front-line operation plan were the plan for the first
nuclear strike and the plan for the nuclear-technical support of the front.
Accordingly, increased requirements were put forward for the personnel of
the formations "S", and they had a special status. Since this topic has an
increased "sensitivity", we especially note that the information provided in
this article has already been declassified.
Formations "S" were autonomous in
their activities and were subordinate only to the 12th Main Directorate of
the USSR Ministry of Defense. The report of the Chief of Staff of the Kyiv
Military District, Colonel-General V.M. Kramar in response to directive
No.OMU /1/7421 of September 8, 1964, in which he informed the Chief of Staff
of the Logistics of the USSR Armed Forces about this:
"The headquarters of the district
with parts of the 12th Main Directorate does not conduct correspondence,
does not carry out organizational measures for them, does not have accurate
data on their real names and locations, but only takes them into account by
conditional names as extremely sensitive formations of the Central
Subordination".
Image 1. Storage of nuclear
munitions of the aviation nomenclature at the facility "S" of the nuclear
technical service (Kyiv Military District). The photo was provided by Major
General N.M. Filatov
These few numbers show how big the
volume of tasks was. The number of nuclear warheads in service with the 43rd
Rocket Army of the Strategic Missile Forces (mainly on the territory of the
Ukrainian SSR and the Belorussian SSR) increased from about 200 units in
1962 to 1875 units in 1985.
The limit of the use of nuclear
weapons in the first operation of the front, formed on the basis of the
troops of the Odessa Military District (OdMD), was supposed to be up to 600
units! In peacetime, there were no such quantities of nuclear weapons at
facilities "S" in the operational territory of the OdMD, so their delivery
from the Centers arsenals was constantly practiced. It was also assumed that
they would be further transported abroad to Soviet groups of troops and
allies. For example, the presence at the 341st facility "S" of its own
railway base with 22 special wheelsets to the European standard railway
tracks made it possible to transport cargo to Bulgaria, Romania and Hungary.
And then you can imagine what the facility "S" of Central Subordination was, we will give here the
composition of the military unit 12474 (the 332nd facility "S", also known
as "Makarov-1" in the Kyiv Military District). Here they stored and
maintained special warheads for intercontinental and medium-range ballistic
missiles of the Strategic Missile Forces (RVSN), operational-tactical
missiles of the Ground Forces and anti-aircraft missiles of the Air Defense
Forces of the country, as well as nuclear ammunition of the aviation
nomenclature. The total area of the facility was 1800 hectares. Of these,
1150 hectares were occupied by a technical position, and 650 hectares were
occupied by administrative and residential areas. The total guarded
perimeter along the fence of the facility was 17 km.
At the technical position there were
4 special deepened, bunded and protected constructions, designed for the
pressure of the shock wave front of at least 20 kg per 1 sq. cm. The total
area of buildings - more than 12 thousand square meters, the useful area of
buildings is about 5 thousand square meters. All special facilities were
equipped with autonomous sources of water and electricity, as well as life
support systems with autonomy in terms of reserves of 60 days.
The facility had its own railway
base with a total length of access roads of 11 km and rolling stock: 2
diesel locomotives TEM2, 32 special railway carriages (26 V-60 and 6
VG-124), 2 laboratory carriages for checking instrumentation LKIP-Zh and 1
railroad snow plow.
The car base of the facility had 480
car spaces in heated storages, 16 parking lots under sheds and 80 in open
storage areas. 263 vehicles included: 172 units of equipment of the
combatant group, 85 units of the transport group and 6 units of training
equipment. Railway and automobile bases made it possible to transport goods
over any distance.
Image 2. Scheme of the 332nd
facility "S" ("Makarov-1")
The organizational and staffing
structure of military unit 12474 included the administration, assembly
teams, the power engineering unit, the calibration laboratory and support
units. In addition, the facility "S" included separate military units:
• a separate battalion of
electrified barriers and guards;
• a separate communication center;
• automobile base with 4 structural
subdivisions;
• railway base with 5 structural
subdivisions;
• military fire brigade and rescue
team;
• military hospital with 14
structural subdivisions and medical departments, including maternity,
pediatric and others;
• a separate engineering and
technical company;
• center of culture, education and
leisure.
The full strength of the facility
"S" was more than 100 officers, about 60 ensigns, about 700 conscripts and
430 workers and employees. The military town consisted of 27 houses (966
apartments), a school for 536 places, a kindergarten for 280 places, shops,
a household complex, a reinforced concrete structure plant, House Management
Committee, a military trade "Voentorg", departments of the KGB and the
Ministry of the Interior, a field bank and a communications department. The
population of the closed military town was 3,200 people, of which 937 were
children under 17 years old.
Image 3. hulls made of titanium
alloy with elements of combat training nuclear bombs RN40-Ya45 (without
tails-stabilizers) at facility "S". The photo was provided by Major General
N.M. Filatov
Of the 38 nuclear technical supports
facilities deployed on the territory of the Ukrainian SSR, there were both
the most modern in the Soviet Union and very primitive military "nuclear
cellars". Thus, the mobile rocket technical base of the 14th Guards Combined
Army of the OdMD, stationed 10 km from Belgorod-Dnestrovsky, was intended
for storage, maintenance and delivery of warheads and missiles to the 173rd
missile brigade (at the 9K72 "Elbrus" complexes) and missile divisions of
motorized rifle divisions (on the 9K52 "Luna" complexes).
Head of the Rocket and artillery
service of the 14th Guards Army, colonel A.P. Pavlov recalled:
"This warehouse is the holy of
holies of the entire technical area and is located on a separate,
additionally fenced off area. To my surprise, inside the warehouse I saw
ordinary barrels sealed on both sides – this is how warheads for
nuclear-armed missiles are stored."
The chief engineer of the base
replied that their main task is to maintain a strictly defined temperature
and humidity regime in the warehouse. Pavlov asked what they do when the
humidity in the storage is below normal? The chief engineer replied: “We put
open containers with water on the floor…” In the event of a cold snap, the
temperature regime in the storage directly depended on the correct operation
of the boiler house in the military unit.
Image 4. Scheme of the 341st
facility "S" ("Kirovograd-25")
Supply of special ammunition
to the troops
The assembly brigades supplied the
troops with nuclear munitions from storage. At this important stage, some
specific difficulties arose. According to the instructions, in peacetime,
special ammunition could be issued to the troops only by written order of
the Chief of the General Staff of the USSR Armed Forces. In this regard, at
the end of 1975, there was an incident in the 24th Missile Division of the
RVSN during a visit there by the Chief of the General Staff, General of the
Army V.G. Kulikov. At the command post of the missile regiment, Kulikov
verbally ordered 4 nuclear warheads to be delivered from the missile
technical base. He had little knowledge of the details of this process, so
he was surprised at the refusal to carry out the order. The head of the base
arrived at the command post and demanded that he be left alone with Kulikov,
since the topic of the conversation was top secret. Kulikov withdrew his
claims and admitted that the head of the base was right.
Such cases were quite common,
because due to the complete secrecy, even high-level commanders had a very
approximate idea of features of the formations "S". For example, in 1970,
Chief of the General Staff Marshal M.V. Zakharov canceled the order of the
commander of the Carpathian Military District, Colonel-General G.I. Obaturov
on the placement of anti-aircraft missiles in the storage of special
ammunition of the mobile rocket technical base. New secret missiles arrived
in the District, but there were no storage places for them. General Obaturov
thought that this was a logical decision, since the "nuclear cellar" met the
requirements for secrecy, and there was free place for missiles.
Sometimes, counting on the increased
secrecy of all aspects of nuclear technical support, they hid the unseemly
state of affairs at the facility. In 1976, the alert of a mobile rocket
technical base and a park division of the 28th Combined Army of the
Belorussian Military District ended poorly.
All visits to special ammunition
warehouse were recorded in special logs indicating who, when and how long
was in them. According to the instructions, only a few people from the
commanding staff of the combined army had access to the special zone of the
mobile rocket technical base: the army commander, a member of the military
council - the head of the political department, the army chief of staff and
the head of the Rocket and artillery weapons service. But in the 28th Army,
a whole delegation arrived for inspection with persons not agreed upon by
the head of the special department. Commander Lieutenant-General G.G.
Armenopolov acted "in a military way":
"Having visited a storage facility
with nuclear warheads and a park of transport-loading vehicles (TZM), I came
to a very sad conclusion – neither the park nor the division are
combat-ready: 90 percent of the TZM are with the flat tires, some are
without batteries, the carts are dismantled. I was assured that there was
nothing to worry about. I decided to show scary or not this state of
technical equipment. I announced a combat alert and ordered 6 nuclear
warheads to be delivered to the army missile brigade in 4 hours. I ordered
that the respective heads of the military branches be sent to the
facilities".
There were several serious
violations in the actions of the commander, which he justified with the
words "the commander is responsible for everything". The head of the special
department pointed out the abuse of official authority and threatened to
report to the leadership of counterintelligence, but Armenopolov prevented
this:
"I put the Chief of the Signal Corps
near the console to forbid any person to report to the command of the
military district or to Moscow ... I thought it would be better if they
could report when my experiment was over. They won't dare report when they
see the results of this experiment".
Commander Armenopolov acted on the
principle of "winners are not judged" and achieved his goal. For 14 hours,
not a single car was able to leave the park. Of course, It is impossible to
imagine a potential situation in which an army missile brigade in Belarus
would have to urgently launch a nuclear strike.
The problem lies elsewhere: the
assembly brigades were not able to leave the facility at the appointed time
and get out from under a possible surprise attack by the enemy. This means
that the army risked being left without its main strike force –
operational-tactical missiles with nuclear weapons. The military council of
the army decided to dismiss the commander of the mobile rocket technical
base and the commander of the park division from their posts, although they
had patronage in Moscow and there were obvious violations during the check.
After the warheads leave the
"nuclear cellar", new difficulties could arise. The assembly brigade was an
automobile convoy, consisting of vehicles that maintained the necessary
conditions for the transport of special ammunition (storage vehicles and
transport vehicles), as well as cranes, radio stations and guards. These
convoys made 500-kilometer marches. Of course, in such cases there were
incidents characteristic of any long marches. For example, in July 1984,
during such a march of military unit 52228 (the mobile rocket technical base
of the 8th Tank Army of the Carpathian Military District), the command
vehicle R-125MT2 of the assembly brigade had an accident due to the fact
that the conscript driver fell asleep behind the wheel. An analysis of this
situation with the punishment of the perpetrators was made in order No. 154
of November 25, 1986, the commander of military unit 57949 (Headquarters of
the 8th Tank Army).
Image 5. Storage vehicles 9F223
with special ammunition of formations "S".
In 1986, the order of the commander
of military unit 57949 summed up another scandalous incident that occurred
in military unit 52228 in February 1982. Due to the negligence of the
assembly and the regulations group of the assembly team, during a
demonstration lesson, the 9F223 nuclear ammunition storage vehicle was lost
in a fire. The "nuclear" officers kept gas canisters in a special capsule
for nuclear weapons. This compartment is equipped to maintain the set
temperature. During a demonstration in front of the personnel of the
operation of the capsule, gasoline vapors from canisters ignited. The
special compartment of the 9F223 machine fell into disrepair and could not
be restored. At the same time, the “nuclear scientists” hid the incident and
wanted to repair the car using the “no contracted method” in order to
stretch out the few years remaining until it was decommissioned in the
prescribed manner. Therefore, this story came to the attention of the
command only in 1986.
Sometimes secrecy even had a
negative impact on the possible use of nuclear weapons. For example, for
many years, the Bulgarian allies have been practicing the acceptance of
nuclear warheads from the Soviet assembly brigade and their further
conditional transportation to the positions of the missile forces on their
Mi-4 helicopters during exercises.
Due to secrecy, the Bulgarians were
not familiarized with the weight and size characteristics of the warheads.
Almost by accident, they learned that the Mi-4 could not actually carry a
warhead. The process of combat training has changed. Mi-8 helicopters were
allocated to deliver nuclear warheads to missile systems. It is easy to
imagine the cost of this mistake in planning nuclear technical support in a
real combat situation. This would lead to the disruption of the first
nuclear strike of the front and the failure to fulfill the tasks assigned to
it. The High Command of the United Armed Forces in the theater of operations
would be forced to turn to the Supreme High Command in order to replace the
temporarily incapacitated nuclear missile forces of the front with the means
of the Strategic Missile Forces.
Such mistakes happened in the OdMD.
In February 1979, a special exercise of the 14th Guards Combined Army, which
was the main striking force of the district (front), was held here. The army
and the district had good marks, but such a plot cannot
be thought up on purpose. For the delivery of missiles and warheads,
they selected and agreed in advance the meeting point of the transports.
Secrecy required to do it somewhere in an inconspicuous place. But the
representatives of the missile brigade and the transport of the assembly
brigade got lost and could not meet for a long time. The extreme shortage of
radio facilities among the "mute" did not allow to maintain normal
communication. In addition, both the rocket men and the assembly team did
not hear in time the radio signal about the start of the transfer of nuclear
weapons. This disrupted the implementation of the training task of
transferring warheads to missilemen and all the bad consequences for the
front.
From these maneuvers conclusions
were drawn. The meeting points of transports were chosen at clearly
identifiable places (for example, at crossroads). Now no further explanation
was needed. They wanted to increase the number of radio stations, since the
existing 15 regular radio equipment in the mobile rocket technical base was
not enough to create their own radio network and control the six transports
it created. At the same time, it was decided to upgrade the obsolete
vehicles of the assembly teams and to allocate earth-moving equipment for
the engineering equipment of spare areas of concentration. This was
especially important in the event of a sudden outbreak of nuclear war. When
analyzing the exercise "West-72", the Minister of Defense demanded that
large-scale engineering work be done in advance to shelter personnel,
military equipment and supplies of materiel in the spare areas of
concentration. Due to the lack of earth-moving equipment, the army's mobile
rocket technical base was unable to fulfill this order for 7 years.
The exercise "Uranium-6"
The verification of the results of
the efforts undertaken took place in 1981, when, simultaneously with the
front command and staff exercise of the OdMD, a special exercise "Uran-6"
was conducted on nuclear support. Operational groups from the district
headquarters, the 14th Guards Army, the 32nd Army Corps, the 106th Missile
Brigade, the 6th Department and 6 groups of military branches participated
in the exercise. The head of the 12th Main Directorate of the Ministry of
Defense led the exercise. This was to work out the interaction of the front
headquarters with the formations "S", which actually delivered nuclear
ammunition by rail, road and air. The following tasks were also completed:
• Transfer of nuclear munitions to
missile and technical units and combat support units;
• Suspension and docking of nuclear
warheads with carriers and their final preparation by the crews of the
formations "S";
• Operational reassignment of the
army's mobile rocket technical base of the formation "S" to the commander of
the army.
Based on the results of the exercise
"Uranium-6", it was concluded that the nuclear technical support service as
a whole is capable of fulfilling the tasks. But due to the increase in the
number of targets in the first nuclear strike of the front, the volume of
tasks also increased. Now the mobile base in the OdMD was supposed to create
up to 11 automobile transports for the delivery of nuclear weapons, and
formations "S" (until the moment they received a signal to issue special
ammunition to the troops of the front) experienced a large shortage of
storage vehicles when unloading special ammunition from railway carriages
arriving in the district from Center. From the "Report on the front command
and staff exercise conducted in the Odessa military district, June 10 - June
17, 1981" No. 3 / 00387, submitted to the Chief of the General Staff on July
14, 1981, it follows that for the decision tasks of receiving nuclear
weapons delivered by rail, it is necessary:
• to form additionally skeleton
mobile rocket technical bases (two per district), the mobilization of which
should be carried out on combat readiness "Increased". Each of them should
have 36 storage vehicles, 3-4 radio R-125MT2 and one transport security
company;
• in mobile rocket technical bases
transfer units for transporting special ammunition from park batteries to
the assembly teams of operational-tactical and tactical missiles;
• for the period of delivery of
special ammunition, provide transport with additional means of
communication, since it was impossible to provide communication with road
transport using only four radio R-125MT2 available in the mobile rocket
technical base.
In addition to radio equipment, the
assembly brigades lacked camouflage nets, so they were also supposed to be
removed from the troops.
The difficulties of serving "mute"
troops were not only in the potential health hazards of direct work with
nuclear weapons. Their special status meant special requirements and high
responsibility. Otherwise, the formations "S" had the same problems as the
usual linear formations of the armed forces: a shortage of material
resources, a gradual backlog of the technical base from the requirements of
the time, and difficulties with domestic arrangements. Unlike the rest of
the troops, the "mute" were silent and justified their unofficial nickname.