Map from Game Kanev 1943

The assault force started combat operations in an extremely unfavorable setting. According to calculations, both brigades, under favorable circumstances, should have landed in an area measuring 14 X 10 kilometers within 25 kilometers of the frontline (the river Dnepr). In actual fact, the landing was between Rzhishchev and Cherkassy. The majority of paratroopers from either airborne brigade were dropped inside the Dnepr bend right upon the enemy force dispositions and in localities, where the enemy kept his reserves. A considerable portion landed outside of the designated area.

Given the disarray during the airdrop, paratroopers from different units and subunits got mixed on the ground and engaged the enemy as part of mixed teams under officers they did not know rather than as part of TO combat elements. That was the worst-case scenario for the assault force. A big number of many-colored flares, both friendly and enemy, that were fired from the ground, as well as fires in drop areas, confused the assembly signals. The enemy met descending paratroopers with heavy small arms and machinegun fire. Under these difficult circumstances, the 3rd and the 5th airborne brigades personnel displayed courage and dedication in combat. While still in the air, paratroopers fired at the enemy and pelted him with hand grenades. But the unfavorable situation disrupted the assembly of paratroopers and performance of their combat mission in a way envisaged by the plan. Scattered over a wide territory, the men had to fight, during the night and in the day of September 25, in small isolated groups without links with each other or control from their higher-ups. Like everyone else, brigade commanders and their staff officers were scattered over a wide area and for a long time operated in small fighting groups. Commander of the 5th brigade, for one, Lt. Col. P.M. Sidorchuk, landed in the Kanev wood area and two hours later ran into a serviceman from the 3rd brigade; by morning he had found five men and for the next eight days looked for and rallied small groups of paratroopers. He met officers and men, with whom he had jumped from the same plane, only on the ninth day after his landing.

As a result of nighttime and daytime assembly efforts that took place amid an exceptionally difficult ground situation 35 groups numbering a total of 2,300 officers and men from among those who had been dropped in the night of September 25 were assembled by the end of the day in different places of a wide territory in absolute isolation from each other and without signals equipment or heavy weapons. This number did not include the paratroopers, who had withdrawn far into the enemy rear territory in order to operate as an element of guerilla detachments or in the individual capacity, as well as 230 persons dropped above the friendly territory, who had reached the friendly force disposition shortly after landing.

The biggest groups of paratroopers were formed and operated independently: in the Kanev and Cherkassy woodland areas, about 600 persons; in the Chernyshi area, about 200 persons; in the Romashki area, four groups totaling nearly 300 persons.

All these groups and detachments launched combat operations over a wide area in the enemy rear, simultaneously continuing their attempts to find each other and merge. Their fast merger was impeded by the fact that neither brigade commanders nor their representatives could be found at the prearranged assembly points and command posts. The obtaining situation and the open terrain were factors that did not let paratroopers linger for long in those areas. As a rule, groups coming to an assembly point or command post left behind no one to establish links with other groups and detachments and headed elsewhere. This, of course, was not conducive to a rapid unification of the assault force.

The most difficult thing was picking up the NRSDC with weapons and cargoes and using them for combat mission performance. The enemy did all he could to capture the cargoes and paratroopers, detailing specialized teams and leaving ambushes in places where cargoes had been found, which later attempted to take paratroopers prisoner. Germans even offered the local population a prize worth 6,000 occupation marks or 10,000 karbovantsi for each captured paratrooper.

Operating in small groups, paratroopers on many occasions were unable to use the cargoes, ammunition and heavy weapons they had found. Thus, the munitions they had so much difficulty finding had to be destroyed or buried for them not to be left to the enemy. This did an irreparable harm to stronger groups and detachments, which felt an acute dearth of ammunition. The operational situation for separate groups and detachments of the airborne force was compounded by acute ammunition and food shortages resulting from their long stay in the enemy rear. Despite that, they went on with the fight, displaying courage and dedication in combat.

The entire area, where the airborne force pursued combat operations, could be provisionally divided into a northern and a southern part. The northern area of combat operations, in the vicinity of Rzhishchev, was not particularly wooded: coppices, brushwood and ravines could afford temporary cover only for small groups, but it was ill suited for big detachments, particularly in daytime. In addition, the enemy possessed here a thick web of garrisons, which were directly included in the tactical defense zone of the Dnepr line, and therefore enjoyed favorable opportunities for fighting the airborne force. Despite that there were around 20 groups totaling over 1,100 members operating in the northern area. There were also four big detachments counting 100-150 fighters each.

The southern area was a rougher piece of terrain and had many major wooded covers: Kanev, Taganchansk, Mikhailov and Cherkassy woods. A big number of rivers, marshes and ravines and smaller population density created the most favorable conditions for actions by groups and detachments of the airborne force.

Combat operations pursued by the northern groups and detachments were fully influenced by the enemy superiority and the limited chances for a maneuver. For this reason, most of them, lacking communications with each other and unaware of the more or less favorable situation in the southern area, sought to leave the northern area and cross the frontline in order to join units of the 40th Army and the 3rd Guard Tank Army. Even though separate groups and detachments that operated in the northern area could not give much help to the Front and cope with the mission facing the entire assault force, their appearance in the enemy rear and active operations held in position big enemy forces and inflicted on the enemy considerable manpower and equipment losses.

The biggest successes were scored by groups and detachments that operated in the southern area. These numbered a total of 1,200 officers and men, the biggest of them being the detachments under Senior Lt. Tkachyov, Capt. Krotov, Maj. Fofanov, Senior Lt. Akhromovich, and others.

Military archives contain one very interesting document. Its perusal helps one feel the drama of the fight. In order No. 4969/43s dated October 7, 1943, the staff of the 8th Army (German) said this by way of evaluation of operations by the 3rd and the 5th brigades: “The ways and methods of the fight conducted by detachments of paratroopers, even after several days of deprivations, showed good training, which every now and then was intertwined with the enemy’s cunning and insidiousness. An inseparable trait of the paratroopers was the hunting dexterity of each particular fighter. Their behavior in most exceptional circumstances was exceptional. Wounded men showed themselves particularly hardy and dedicated in combat, going on with the fight despite their wounds. Wounded several times, they blew themselves up with grenades in order to escape captivity. It was particularly difficult to find places where detachments had found cover. It had been repeatedly established that the enemy was proficient at camouflaging himself in ravines … If our reconnaissance teams managed to find such a shelter, the enemy sought to get rid of the tiresome observers without a shot fired, hurray shouts or noise. As soon as alerted main forces of detachments were assembled, they put up a dogged, desperate resistance, using the smallest possible amounts of ammunition. But even when the enemy had no ammunition, he defended himself with savage fanaticism. Each paratrooper was armed with a dagger, of which he made a skillful use.”

Thus, in a most difficult situation the paratroopers demonstrated the capacity to find the best of combat solutions in almost hopeless situations, correcting, by their skill, courage and blood, the mistakes committed at the planning and airdrop stage.

While on the subject of the operation’s lessons, one cannot help recollecting the Vyazma airborne operation of the year 1942, when the Airborne Troops commander was charged to control the airdrop. * Considering the experience of the 8th airborne brigade, which had been dropped with an error running into 15-20 kilometers, the Airborne Troops command took relevant steps and strictly warned the pilots about their responsibility for the precise landing of each group of paratroopers. Therefore, when in doubt about correctness of their bearings, planes came back with the paratroopers on board and made new runs. Subsequent analysis showed that these runs added up to about 25%.

The situation was different during the Dnepr operation: the operation was being prepared in strict secrecy and transport planes arrived at the last moment; many pilots had no airdrop experience, a circumstance requiring that they be subjected to flying drills. But this never happened and the consequences were quick in coming. By the way, the airborne brigades never went through joint drills either, both for reason of time shortage and extreme secrecy, although, undoubtedly, an exercise was absolutely necessary for welding together the would-be assault force and its command and control elements.

It should be recognized that the combat assignment was handed down to the assault force without consideration for the emerging operational situation. The combat assignment, or, to be more precise, the operation’s aim, was defined at the very start of the planning stage and consisted in giving assistance to a forced crossing of the river by capturing a beachhead and in interdicting the arrival of enemy reserves. But the beachhead had been captured before the operation started and this assignment became irrelevant. In all evidence, the assault force should have been dropped (if the operation could not be canceled) directly in localities occupied by the friendly forces, thereby reinforcing the friendly units there. But organizers of the Dnepr airborne operation lacked flexibility and fore-sight in matters of planning and this was not to happen.

The main flaws of the Vyazma operation were allowed to occur again with even graver consequences for the paratroopers. The nighttime airdrop near Vyazma (though spread over several days) was on the whole a successful one owing to the great depth of the drop, considerable snow cover and a wooded terrain, all of which made it difficult for the Germans to combat the assault force. In all evidence, this circumstance was mostly behind the decision to undertake a nighttime airdrop on the Dnepr. But conditions were different this time, with the enemy starting to oppose the assault force right within the first few hours of the airdrop, the more so that in a number of cases paratroops were dropped directly above German dispositions or in their vicinity. And yet, despite the unfavorable circumstances, the assault force was not destroyed in full. Fighting for survival, separate groups of paratroopers led by enterprising and strong-willed officers managed to hold out and find a way to merge into bigger groups and subsequently into a single detachment. The detachment later formed, in the enemy rear, a brigade, which, led by the commander of the 5th abn brig, Lt. Col. P.M. Sidorchuk, proved its worth and accomplished a new mission assisting the Dnepr’s crossing by 2nd Ukrainian Front units in the Cherkassy sector. The combat situation confirmed that the decisive factors for the assault force were its moral and psychological preparation, its unquestioning obedience to its commanders, and faith in their skills and experience. Where the prevalent feelings in mixed groups were wavering and fear of revealing their presence, the paratroopers looked for ways leading to the Dnepr and the friendly forces rather than how to merge with other groups.

The 60-year-old Dnepr operation was the last major airborne operation that occurred during the Great Patriotic War. It confirmed that the multi-run dropping of big units by single planes held out no prospects for the future. But the results of the Dnepr airdrop were not useless. In the postwar period the USSR launched development and construction of huge military transport planes, something that made it possible to create military transport aviation. In turn, this afforded an opportunity to equip airborne units with heavier modern weapons.

* During preparations for the Dnepr operation the airborne brigades were formally merged to form a corps, whose staff was hastily formed from Airborne Troops staff officers shortly before the airdrop. The whole of the staff (actually, a task force) was not dropped; specifically, Maj. Gen. I.I. Zatevakhin, who had been appointed airborne corps commander, stayed back in the forming-up area. The brigades were left without centralized control. It proved impossible to create a firm, unified command for the aircraft fleet, which was due to perform the airdrop and provide air cover for the brigades.

Lt. Gen. N.V. STASKOV

Chief of Staff of Airborne Troops

Candidate of Military Sciences

Nikolai Viktorovich STASKOV was born in the village of Buda, Krasninsky District, Smolensk Region, on August 28, 1951. Graduated from Ryazan Higher Airborne Troops Command School (1973), M.V. Frunze Military Academy (1983), and RF General Staff Academy (1993). Held the whole range of positions from airborne platoon commander to airborne division commander; was also commander of a training airborne division and head of the Airborne Troops training center.

From September 1998, Deputy Commander of the Airborne Troops (for the Peacekeeping Forces); from October, Chief of Staff–First Deputy Commander of the Airborne Troops. Took part in combat operations in Ethiopia and Chechnya.