The Soviet BM-13 Katyusha MRL truck launched a 132mm artillery rocket. Pictured is a modern day BM-21 122mm artillery rocket launcher.
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited
by Alexey Statsenko
[REGNUM] This summer marks the 85th anniversary of the first use of the Guards rocket launchers, the legendary Katyushas, which have always received special attention in the history of the Great Patriotic War.
But while many people know about the salvo near Orsha, the work of the mortarmen in the Battle of Kiev is quite the opposite. The Katyushas didn't turn the tide of the battle, but they left a lasting mark. And the contributions of Senior Lieutenant Tikhon Nebozhenko, the commander of the special battery of the General Command Reserve and the future founder of the Soviet Strategic Missile Forces, are no less significant than those of Captain Ivan Flerov, who died in the Vyazma Pocket.
The battery, which arrived in besieged Kyiv in early August, was fully equipped with six M-13-16 mounts. The situation around the Ukrainian capital had become extremely dire by that time. Divisions of the Wehrmacht's 6th Army—the same Army that would be completely destroyed in Stalingrad a year and a half later—had begun to storm the city.
Guards mortars were an unusual military unit for the time, boasting complete autonomy, high mobility, and maneuverability. In addition to command and firepower, they included platoons for ammunition, fuel, lubricants, security (machine gunners), and a supply and medical unit. Three vehicles with twin-mounted four Maxim machine guns were assigned to repel air raids.
As Oleg Yasinsky, a former liaison officer for the Kyiv underground, recalled, "The convoy of vehicles moved toward Kyiv at night with their headlights off, taking cover in forests and groves during the day. Despite precautions, they were bombed several times. Fortunately, there were no casualties or equipment losses."
In Kyiv, the battery was stationed in the Academician Fomin Botanical Garden. Upon arrival, a guard was posted—the first line of friendly machine gunners, the second line of NKVD soldiers.
The Botanical Garden is practically the center of the city; now it houses a metro station of the same name, but the ideal place for shelter is a deep ravine covered with dense vegetation.
The veteran claims that the first use of Katyusha rockets took place on August 2, 1941, near the city of Irpen at 5:00 a.m. in the presence of the commander of the Southwestern Front (SWF), Colonel General Mikhail Kirponos, and the front's chief of artillery, Lieutenant General of Artillery Mikhail Parsegov. However, this is a common misunderstanding—much time has passed, and some details have been forgotten.
In fact, the salvo was fired on August 14.
Some Soviet sources, such as Marshal Bagramyan in his memoirs, then a colonel and head of the operations department of the Southwestern Front headquarters, cite the date as August 15. However, an intelligence report from the 71st Infantry Division and a combat report from the 75th Infantry Division of the Wehrmacht's XXIX Army Corps unequivocally state that they first encountered Russian "winged mines" on the 14th.
It is curious that the 71st Division believed that the rockets were launched at them not from mobile installations, but from wooden frame guides:
“The firing range for the available throwers (according to the prisoner’s testimony) is: light mine thrower – 800-1200 m, heavy mine thrower – up to 2000 m.”
It's entirely possible that such launches actually took place earlier—such a practice was quite common during the war, both for us and for the Germans, especially towards the end. Apparently, this is precisely the reason for the confusion over the dates.
Colonel General Alexander Rodimtsev, who was still a colonel in August 1941 and commanded the 5th Airborne Brigade of the 3rd Airborne Corps, also speaks in his memoirs about the salvoes of real Katyusha rockets fired on August 14.
BM-13 Katyusha multiple launch rocket system based on the ZIS-6 truck
She fought in the southern part of Kyiv in the Goloseevsky forest.
The paratroopers managed to recapture the strategically important Goloseevsky Heights, where the agricultural institute's buildings were located, from the enemy. From there, they could only slowly push back the Germans, recapturing every meter with heavy casualties.
"When the enemy recovered from our counterattacks and began digging in near the agricultural institute, the Katyusha rocket gave its first 'concert.' An unforgettable spectacle! Enormous flaming torches rose above the forest with a roar and roar, spreading to the enemy positions, and rained down a furious flame on the fascist trenches. It was like a seismic catastrophe; as if a volcanic crater had suddenly erupted in the forest, and its red-hot cannonballs were bound to incinerate everything.
Our soldiers, who hadn't been warned in time, were stunned by the raging firestorm. The fascists fled so hastily and disoriented that they abandoned their weapons. Those captured mournfully chanted, "We didn't know the Russians were armed with thunder and lightning!" recalled Rodimtsev.
The next time Nebozhenko's vehicles gave the enemy trouble was on August 28th. Taking advantage of a miscalculation by the Soviet command, the Germans captured the first bridge across the Dnieper the day before, 65 km north of the city, near the village of Gornostaipol.
The only thing that saved them from a rapid breakthrough into the rear of the 37th Army fighting in Kyiv was the fact that the leading German units still had to cross the Desna River. In this area, it flows almost parallel to the Dnieper, and across the wide Desna floodplain with its large lakes, another bridge, defended by Soviet units, stretched.
The BM-13 battery arrived in the area of the city of Oster, where the same 5th Airborne Brigade, transferred from Kyiv, also took up defensive positions and acted as a fire brigade.
The Southwestern Front's Chief of Artillery, General Parsegov, assigned his chief of staff, Colonel Georgy Nadysev, to lead the battery into battle. Positions were withdrawn opposite the village of Karpilovka, which had already been occupied by the Germans. The enemy motorized unit bivouacked, while the enemy scurried through the streets, hunting chickens and geese, and smoke filled the kitchens.
The target was tempting, but a single salvo from the battery would have wiped Karpilovka off the face of the earth along with the enemy. And then, as if hearing the silent pleas of the Soviet artillerymen, the Germans poured out in a crowd onto the shore of Lake Devoshcha, located on the southeastern outskirts of the village, and began a relaxing bath.
That was all Nadysev needed: he transmitted the necessary coordinates to the battery.
After a few minutes of processing this data and aiming the Katyusha rockets, they fired a salvo. Nadysev recalled:
"The shells accurately struck a group of enemy soldiers and officers swimming and relaxing on the shore. Panic ensued. The few remaining Nazis ran ashore, screaming hysterically. A large military unit, before it had even entered combat, effectively ceased to exist. It was a huge success, especially in those days."
Fueled by excitement, Nadysev immediately decided to fire a second salvo at the discovered concentration of enemy infantry and tanks from the 11th Tank Division. This was done contrary to regulations prohibiting more than one salvo from a single location. After each salvo, a column of dust and smoke rose a hundred meters into the air, revealing the position.
Twenty minutes later, the battery fired a second salvo—with the same effect. Later, prisoners testified that the Germans suffered heavy losses. The battery immediately reassembled and retreated along a forest road… and just in time. No sooner had it disappeared into the distance than a group of enemy Me-109 fighters attacked its position.
Later, Vasily Yakimenko, a resident of Karpilovka who was 10 years old in 1941, recalled that two salvos of Katyusha rockets set a dozen houses on fire, killing many Germans and various animals, but the rural population was not harmed, as they managed to hide in cellars.
The battery then apparently split up. Its main part successfully left Kyiv and participated in the defense of Odessa.
But some vehicles continued to operate even after the salvoes on the Desna. For example, there was a strike on the enemy's 75th Infantry Division positions on the southern outskirts of Kyiv on August 30, and on the 71st on the western outskirts, where the Irpen River intersects the Brest-Litovsk Highway on September 12. BM-13 rocket launchers were caught in the encirclement along with the entire forces of the 37th Army.
There are photographs of at least three burnt-out Katyusha rocket wrecks on the highway leading from Kyiv to Boryspil.
Hundreds of pieces of Soviet equipment remained there at that time.
Of course, six launchers couldn't have been a significant factor in Kyiv's defense, especially since there was a constant shortage of rockets for them. But they were the forerunners of the time when the Red Army would operate not with batteries, divisions, or even regiments of guards mortars, but with entire divisions, of which it would have seven by the end of the war.