Soviet Divisions Defecting to NATO

[Mahatatain]

I'm currently putting together the background for a T2k campaign starting in the Ukraine in Spring 2001 and utilising information from the "Bear's Den" supplement.

My thought is to make PCs NATO soldiers who have been captured by the Soviet 27th Tank Division and then freed to join the 27th when the division has switched allegiance and defected to NATO. (In the Bear's Den module one element of the 27th is the "1st Armoured Brigade" which is made up of 100 ex-POW NATO troops).

When discussing this with a couple of friends however one of them pointed out that an entire Soviet division switching to NATO was unrealistic. His point was that the Soviet authorities ensured that the soldiers in a division were from a mixture of ethnic groups from throughout the Soviet Union and that a division would not contain any soldiers (ideally) from the Military District in which is was based (during peacetime). This was designed to make it hard for an entire division to rebel against the Soviet leadership and also meant that should unrest start in a particular region the troops there would be able to quell it without conflicting loyalties to the local population (as they wouldn't be from the local area at all).

Now there are numerous cases in the T2k official history where entire Soviet divisions have changed side and I wondered what other people's opinions were on this. Is it unrealistic to have an entire Soviet division change sides? In the case of the 27th in Bear's Den it has a current strength of 3,400 troops and only lost 300 when it defected to NATO.

Opinions please!

[Raellus]

I think that a mutiny where the division joins other Ukranian separatists is more likely. Defecting to NATO makes it sound like the division is actually following NATO directives. With a common enemy in the Soviet Union, this would put the mutinous division on the same side as NATO due to the prinicple, the "enemy of my enemy is my friend". With this in mind, Ukranian separatists and NATO soldiers may have some of the same broad strategic aims. This would give NATO ex-POWs and the Ukranian defectors reason to work together on some ops. At the same time, there could be some tension between the two because their objectives may not always line up. I hope I'm making sense.

[Adm.Lee]

I think the mixing nationalities element probably went by the board a year or so after the nukes started crashing down. The Soviet transportation net can't be in any great shape, much less the communications necessary. On top of that, it would take a lot of effort to draft in the farther-away republics, in order to split them up and ship them hither and yon. I'd bet by late 2000, the Soviet divisions on the western front are mostly "western" Russians, Belorussians, and Ukrainians.

Even if they were still mixed on paper, I'd bet a lot of soldiers would desert to nearby units, in order to stay nearer their kinfolk. Say, if 20 or so Uzbeks leave the 589th Regiment, the 589th's commander has a problem. If those same 20 Uzbeks show up in the camp of the 343rd (which already has a lot of Uzbeks), the 343rd's adjutant probably won't make a big fuss.

To my mind, however, if the CIA somehow convinced a division's leadership to defect, convincing them to march to Yugoslavia seems pretty tall. Keeping them together without desertion is a REALLY tall order for the leadership, unless they are holding out a desirable ideal, like going home. I'd think the division would run down to about one-quarter of its previous strength really quickly, shedding deserters as it went. Most of the leaders might stick to the division cadre.

Either way, starting them off as ex-PWs, picked up by the division on its march, sounds like a good idea.

[headquarters]

When the USSR in T2K mobilizes , I too would expect that the idealized set up of mixed nationalities ( or making men from Sibir serve in the west and vice versa ) would not be as feasible -and more homogenous ethnic units would be more practical considering the cost of shipping people from one end of the country to the other -its a wast place.

Nationalists defecting would definently be a major risk , and whole divisions crossing over could happen given the right circumstances.

imho.

[Mahatatain]

Thanks for your comments. I think that you're right - the ideal ethnic diversity of a Soviet division would change the moment a unit needed to find replacements as those replacements would have to be recruited locally.

[HorseSoldier]

I seem to recall there was some scandal in present day Russia concerning the fact that "multinational" recruiting was kind of a fiction, and what actually happened was a majority of one ethnicity would end up dominating a scattering of troops from elsewhere. If I remember right, the situation was bad enough that there were some suicides that attracted media attention.

So, I don't think it's unreasonable to think that by 2000, when 70-80% attrition has probably been more costly to "outsiders" than the core ethnic group, to think that the troops in a Ukrainian division (or other non-Russians) would mutiny against the Soviet government.

I'm not sure on the officer side of the house, where divide and conquer might have been more effective.

All that said, I do agree that going over to NATO is less likely than going over to a nationalist sentiment (unless, maybe, there are NATO forces close enough to march out to). That would not prevent them recruiting freed NATO POWs and such.

Rather than have the PCs be prisoners of the 27th TD, perhaps it would make more sense to be have them in a POW camp liberated by the 27th TD. Given the choice between throwing in their lot with the 27th, or making their own way with no weapons, equipment, or vehicles in the middle of the USSR, I'd think that there's only one good answer for that "choice."