Hello Bajtársak and fellow forumdwellers,
Soviet naval infantry traces its roots back to the Russian naval infantry (Морская пехота России, literally Russian Sea Infantry) founded in 1705 by the founding father of the modern Russian state, Peter the Great.
The primary intent was to create an infantry branch under the navy, that is capable of boarding enemy vessels and conducting amphibious operations, however during the centuries of service, Naval Infantry had served in a wider array of roles.
In 1941 Naval Infantry saw a major revival by the Soviet Union, tens of thousands of sailors were transferred to one of the many freshly formed Naval Infantry brigades. Their primary task was to defend ports and naval bases.
In theory they were experienced service men with years of service and ready to defend the motherland. The truth however was that most had never been trained to serve as infantry and had to adapt to the harsh realities of eastern front meatgrinder warfare on their own.
In a way, they are surprisingly similar to Luftwaffe field divisions.
Today when discussing Operation Barbarossa, historians focus mostly on material and manpower loss, often overlooking officers.
But you can produce a new gun in hours, a new tank in weeks, train a new soldier in a few months, but officers need years in academy then practice to grow into their role.
The Soviet officer corps was already stretched out dangerously thin due to Stalin´s purges even before the invasion, severely hampering the Red Army´s flexibility and reaction time.
However, Naval Infantry had its officers transferred from the mostly intact navy and while navy officers lacked formal training for land warfare, they did keep the units well disciplined, morale high and reactive in combat.
Naval infantry fought with tenacity that had earned the fear and respect of Germans and the nickname: the black devils.
There are already Naval Infantry units in the game, such as the Parkirezed Ppsh41 squad and the Lewis LMG squad, thus navy uniforms already exist.
The weapon of the squad
The main inspiration for the post was the image above. I always thought that Soviet navy men with Thompson submachine guns looked cool.
The Soviet Union had received more than 130000 Thompson submachine guns from the United States and the British Empire. These numbers are significant enough to warrant some form of representation without ruining the uniqueness of US Thompson submachine guns.
M1928A1 with 20 rounds magazine
Thompson M1928A1s were produced in a number of different configurations.
The one we on the picture has cooling fins and a horizontal grip, its transitional var. between the 1928 and 1928A1 Thompsons.
The tech tree variant has no cooling fins and a horizontal grip.
The premium 1928 USMC has cooling fins and a vertical grip.
Most Thompson submachine guns received by the Soviet Union were M1928A1 submachine guns, the cool propaganda shots were actually taken with British supplied Tommy guns and the drum magazines were not the norm at all, Soviets used mostly the stick mag magazines, both 30 and 20 round ones.
A 20 round M1928A1 would fit in BR2 perfectly, giving Soviets a very unique and cool navy premium squad, a BR2 premium assaulter squad is something the Soviet faction doesnt have anyway.
- Yes
- No
sources
HyperWar: Lend-Lease Shipments, World War II
RUSSIA (BRITISH EMPIRE WAR ASSISTANCE) (Hansard, 16 April 1946)
https://figurementors.com/Theory%20Hubs/the-soviet-naval-infantry-and-their-battles
Differences between Thompson models? | 1919 A4 Forums
https://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/30033521