If to speak about tests of foreign vehicles in general, they were also tested on Gorokhovetsky ANIOP (Gorokhovetsky artillery scientifically test practice ground – editor's note). I have no statistics, but just from Kazan in the spring of 1944 to the 1st Ukrainian front there arrived Tigers and Panthers.ĭid they work with foreign vehicles in other cities of the USSR? Were there many repaired German Tigers and Panthers? In 1943, it was transferred back to Kubinka. In short, Kazan had all the conditions for the organization of the work of NIBT Polygon, which was evacuated from the town of Kubinka, Moscow Oblast, during the German offensive (38th military Scientific-Research and testing Institute (NIII BTVT) decorated by the October Revolution Order, the Red Banner Order and named after the Armored Forces Marshal Fedorenko - editor's note).Īctually, the specialists of the Polygon supervised the tests of captured vehicles in Kazan.
In Kazan by that time there had already been one of the largest tank schools in the country. Also, in Kazan there was organized a maintenance plant, which later became the main repair plant of captured armoured vehicles, including Tigers I and Panthers. First of all, it was British Valentine and Matilda. Besides, in the autumn of 1941 it was in Kazan where the training centre of tankers on foreign technology was organized.
Why Kazan was chosen as a test site for ally's and captured materiel?
The most suitable place for evacuation of the tank range from Kubinka Military equipment historian and consultant to World of Tanks Yury Pasholok drew attention to this story and answered to the questions of Realnoe Vremya. Here the Soviet tankmen were taught to fight on tanks that were supplied by the allies of the anti-Hitler coalition, and here they conducted tests of captured German tanks. During the initial period of the war, Kazan was the main platform for work with foreign military equipment. The other fact is much less often mentioned. In fact, after the Nazis came to power, joint projects were folded, and the material resources left by the Germans helped to create the Kazan tank school. From this fact, they often made loud conclusions that ''the Nazi sword was forged in the USSR''.
In 1932, even German tank genius Heinz Guderian visited Kazan as part of the inspection commission. Due to the revelations of the Perestroika period, the story that in 1929-1933 in Kazan there was a tank centre ''Kama'' where officers of the Reichswehr, as the German armed forces were called that time, were trained is widely known.
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