Lend-Lease Armoured Vehicles in Operation Bagration (June 23 – August 29, 1944)

Abstract

This article dwells on the role of armoured vehicles obtained under the Lend-Lease agreement in the Byelorussian offensive operation (Bagration) in the summer of 1944. The author examines the use of foreign armoured vehicles in combat operations as part of tank, mechanized, and cavalry units of the Red Army and evaluates their quantity and quality. The Lend-Lease armoured vehicles participated in combat operations on all four fronts involved in Operation Bagration. Primarily, these were British Valentine Mk III and American M4A2 Sherman tanks. However, a significant contribution was also made by the SU-57 and M10 self-propelled artillery, as well as by the M3A1 Scout Car. In addition, the troops continued to use a certain number of M3 Medium and M3 Light tanks left over from the previous periods of the war. In 1944, they were no longer supplied. Foreign vehicles showed a good performance both in terms of reliability and combat qualities, in particular manoeuvrability, armour protection and firepower. Importantly, it was in the units advancing in the main direction that the number of Lend-Lease tanks was the largest (in the 1st Mechanized (100 %) and 3rd Guards Mechanized (91 %), in the 3rd Guards Cavalry (82.5 %) and in the 8th Guards Tank (59 %) Corps). In smaller numbers, foreign tanks were also available in the line units of all fronts involved in the operation (1st, 2nd and 3rd Byelorussian and 1st Baltic Fronts). In total, foreign tanks accounted for about 1/3 of the entire Soviet tank fleet in the Byelorussian offensive operation.