Map of fortified areas of the third line. Pillboxes of the Rzhev fortified area (village

Back on July 18, 1941, the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command gave the order to build defensive lines to cover the approaches to Moscow in the Volokolamsk, Mozhaisk and Maloyaroslavl directions. By the end of September, the system of lines included the Vyazemskaya and Mozhaisk defense lines and the Moscow defense zone.
The Vyazemskaya line ran 250-300 km west of Moscow along the line Ostashkov, Selizharovo, Olenine, Dorogobuzh, Yelnya, Zhukovka, Bryansk. It included a forefield 30-50 km deep and three defensive lines with cut-off positions between them.

Allow the NKVD on the Bryansk - Vyazma - Rzhev - Selizharovo line, as the defensive work is completed, and on the Valdai - Borovichi line immediately, to transfer construction departments and construction trusts with all property, administrative and technical personnel and permanent employees to new frontiers.

Like previous centuries, the Zhiryatinsk land became the main outpost for the enemy on the approaches to Bryansk and Moscow. On June 30, 1941, the State Defense Council decided to build defense lines for the armies of the second echelon of the Western Front along the Rzhev-Vyazma-Kirov-Bryansk-Trubchevsk line (along the Desna River with its tributaries).

The first line of defense from Burns to Vysokoe, Bolshiye Koski, Stolby, Bykovichi and part of the second line of defense through Slepyn, Strashevichi, then to Gosoma, Seltso, etc. passed through our area. There were also third and fourth lines.

The defense system was an anti-tank ditch measuring 5-5.5 meters at the top and 2-2.5 meters deep; firing structures, pillboxes, bunkers, reinforced concrete and metal caps, shelters from enemy fire for people and equipment, observation and command posts for combat control, anti-tank obstacles.

At a defense depth of 1.5-2 km, it was necessary to build 8-12 fortifications for gun and machine gun points, 36 for light machine guns, 9 for anti-tank rifles, 36 rifle trenches.

A chain of 4 missile defenses stretched exactly along the line of the Rzhev-Vyazemsky defensive line. The fact is that until now it was believed that this line began to be built (and designed) only after the start of the Great Patriotic War, but here is a ready-made map, with the location of the missile defense systems, their constituent defense nodes and strongholds. In the lower right corner is a sign with a breakdown of how many and what structures should be built and how much it will cost. Judging by the table, the first stage of construction was supposed to be completed by June 1, 1942, with an intermediate stage by January 1, 1942.

Rzhevsky UR.
The width along the front is 140 km. There is a large forefield in front of the UR. It must be said that in 1941, the front line of defense passed along the front edge of the forefield. You can also pay attention to the fact that the defense nodes are located along the Volga in such a way as to protect the flank from an attack from the north. In 1941 it was necessary to hold the opposite bank of the Volga. Noteworthy is the line near the city of Bely, which covers the junction between the missile defenses.

Vyazemsky UR.
The width along the front is 120 km. It goes along the Dnieper. The highway and railway are covered by one defense center in the Izdeshkovo area.

Spas-Demensky UR
130 km along the front, at the front border of the Urals the city of Yelnya.

The other day, while searching for information on the Rzhev-Vyazemsky defensive line, on the “Feat of the People” website, I unexpectedly came across a map that was dated May 1941 and entitled “Scheme of fortified areas of the third line along the line: Ostashkov, Rzhev, Vyazma, Spas-Demensk" (fond 208 inventory 2511 file 309).

At first, I thought that the date was put in error, but on the map itself the date of its compilation was discovered - May 17, 1941, and at the top, where Tymoshenko’s signature should have been, it was written “” May 1941. At the bottom there was space left for Zhukov’s signature, but hers too no, but the signature of the head of the fortified areas department of the spacecraft, Major General Shiryaev, is available.

General view of the map of fortified areas.
A chain of 4 regional districts stretched exactly along the line of the Rzhev-Vyazemsky defensive line. The fact is that until now it was believed that this line began to be designed only after the start of the Great Patriotic War, but here is a ready-made map, with the location of fortified areas, their constituent defense centers and strongholds. In the bottom corner is a table with a breakdown of what needs to be built and what their cost is. Based on the table, the first stage should have been completed by June 1, 1942, with an intermediate stage by January 1, 1942.

In total, they planned to build 4,878 defensive structures, 1,296 of them in the first year of construction. The cost of the line was estimated at almost two billion rubles, in the second half of 1941 almost 440 million rubles were supposed to be “mastered”.
There are no signatures on this map, and it is unknown whether the order to begin its construction was given before June 22, but in any case, preparatory work was carried out to design the line and reconnaissance. Based on this estimate, which was calculated to the nearest thousand rubles, we can assume with a high degree of confidence that detailed projects were created along the entire SD line, and the volumes of concrete, earthen, and other work were determined.
It is not entirely clear with what forces they planned to build it - the work plan for the “Molotov Line” was not carried out, all forces were literally thrown into its construction (concrete was poured even at night on June 22), in addition, it was planned to reconstruct the “Stalin Line” and form new parts for her.

Based on all this, we can conclude that the USSR was preparing for defense and war on its territory.

Perhaps this map is part of a report presented to Stalin on May 24, 1941. It was written by hand in a single copy on May 15, 1941: “Considerations on the plan for the strategic deployment of the Armed Forces of the Soviet Union in the event of war with Germany and its allies.”
These “Considerations...” contained a note in Vatutin’s hand: “At the same time, it is necessary to speed up the construction of fortified areas in every possible way, begin construction of fortified areas on the rear line Ostashkov, Pochep and provide for the construction of new fortified areas in 1942 on the border with Hungary, as well as to continue the construction of fortified areas along the line of the old state border.”
Ostashkov is precisely the northern flank of the line, and Pochep is the southern flank.

It is probably possible to find some evidence of preparations for the construction of this line. Perhaps the funds were included in the budget of the Soviet Union for 1941, the plans of the factories included tasks for the production of equipment for bunkers and their weapons, maybe some builders had already moved to these areas, opened camps, etc.

Since the map itself is very large (17 megabytes), here are several parts of it with Fortified Areas for clarity.

Rzhevsky UR.
The width of the Rzhevsky fortified area along the front is 140 km. In front of the fortified area there is a large forefield. In 1941, the front line of defense ran along the front edge of the forefield. You can also pay attention to the fact that the defense nodes are located along the Volga River in such a way as to protect the flank from an attack from the north. In 1941 it was necessary to hold the opposite bank of the Volga. Noteworthy is the line near the town of Bely, which covers the junction of fortified areas.

Vyazemsky UR.
The width along the front is 120 km. It goes along the Dnieper. The highway and railway are covered by one defense center in the Izdeshkovo area.

Spas-Demensky UR
130 km along the front, at the front border of the Urals the city of Yelnya

Bryansk UR
95 km along the front. In 1941, the line of defense ran approximately the same, including the forefield.

You can download the entire map, large size and in good quality (the size of the entire map is 17 MB) here.

When we hear the word “battle”, we mentally imagine a battle on some field, where during the day it is decided which of the rivals will be the winner. This terminology is familiar and understandable. But the Battle of Rzhev was different. It covered a colossal period of time and was a series of battles over two years.

Rzhev-Vyazma operation

The generally accepted time frame occupied by the Battle of Rzhev (January 8, 1942-March 31, 1943). During these days there were many periods of calm or trench warfare, when the troops did not launch offensives.

At the beginning of 1942, it was possible to push the Wehrmacht forces back from Moscow. But the counteroffensive, which became one of the turning points of the war, continued. The bet required the highest possible result. The Center group was located in this region.

Soviet forces on the Western and Kalinin Fronts were to dismember, encircle and destroy this force. In the first days of the January counteroffensive, starting from the 8th, everything went according to plan. It was possible to liberate Vereya, Kirov, Mozhaisk, Medyn, Sukhinichi and Lyudinovo. The prerequisites appeared for dividing the “Center” into several isolated groups.

Environment

However, already on the 19th, by order of Joseph Stalin, part of the attacking forces was transferred to other fronts. In particular, Kuznetsov's 1st Shock Army was sent to the Novgorod region near Demyansk, and Rokossovsky's 16th Army was redeployed to the south. This significantly reduced the silt of the Soviet troops. The remaining units simply did not have enough resources to complete the operation. The initiative was lost.

At the end of January, the 33rd Army under the command of Efremov was sent to Rzhev. These units again tried to break through the enemy’s defenses, but in the end they themselves found themselves surrounded. In April, the 33rd was destroyed, and Mikhail Efremov committed suicide.

The Soviet operation failed. According to official statistics, losses amounted to 776 thousand people, of which 272 thousand were irrecoverable. Only a few of the 33rd Army broke out of the encirclement, i.e. 889 soldiers.

Battles for Rzhev

In the summer of 1942, the Headquarters set the task of capturing cities in the Kalinin region. First of all, it was Rzhev. The armies of two fronts took up the matter again - Kalinin (General Konev) and Western (General Zhukov).

On July 30, another Soviet offensive began. It was extremely slow. Every piece of land passed and recaptured cost thousands of lives. Already in the first days of the operation, there were only 6 kilometers left to Rzhev. However, it took almost a month to recapture them.

We managed to approach the city only at the end of August. It seemed that the Battle of Rzhev had already been won. It was even allowed to allow official representatives of the American president to the front, who were supposed to look at the Soviet triumph. Rzhev was captured on September 27. However, the Red Army stayed there for a few days. German reinforcements were immediately brought up and occupied the city on October 1.

The next Soviet offensive ended in nothing. The losses of the Battle of Rzhev during this period amounted to about 300 thousand people, i.e. 60% of the Red Army personnel in this sector of the front.

Operation Mars

Already at the end of autumn and beginning of winter, another attempt was planned to break through the defenses of the Center group. This time it was decided that the offensive would take place in areas where it had not yet been undertaken. These were places between the Gzhat and Osuga rivers, as well as in the area of ​​the village of Molodoy Tud. Here was the lowest density of German divisions.

At the same time, the command tried to misinform the enemy in order to divert the Wehrmacht from Stalingrad, where the decisive days of battle were approaching these days.

The 39th Army managed to cross Molodoy Tud, and the 1st Mechanized Corps attacked enemy tank formations in the area of ​​the city of Bely. But this was a temporary success. Already at the beginning of December, the German counteroffensive stopped the Soviet soldiers and destroyed the same fate awaiting two corps: the 2nd Guards Cavalry and the 6th Tank.

Already on December 8, against the backdrop of these events, he insisted that Operation Mars (code name) be resumed with renewed vigor. But not a single attempt to break through the enemy’s defense line was successful. The troops under the command of General Khozin, Yushkevich and Zygin failed. Many found themselves surrounded again. According to various estimates, the number of dead Soviet soldiers during that period ranges between 70 and 100 thousand. The Battle of Rzhev in 1942 did not bring the long-awaited victory.

Operation Buffel

During previous battles, the so-called Rzhev ledge was formed, which was occupied by German troops. This was a vulnerable section of the front - it was the easiest to surround. This became especially acute after Soviet troops took the city of Velikiye Luki in January 1943.

Kurt Zeitzler and the rest of the Wehrmacht command began to strenuously ask Hitler for permission to withdraw troops. In the end, he agreed. The troops were to be withdrawn to a line near the city of Dorogobuzh. Colonel General Walter Model became responsible for this important operation. The plan was codenamed "Büffel", which translates from German as "buffalo".

Capture of Rzhev

A competent withdrawal of troops allowed the Germans to leave the ledge with virtually no losses. On March 30, the last Reich soldier left this area, which had been under attack for more than a year. The Wehrmacht left behind itself and the villages: Olenino, Gzhatsk, Bely, Vyazma. All of them were taken by the Soviet army in March 1943 without a fight.

The same fate awaited Rzhev. It was liberated. The 30th Army was the first to enter the city, which spent a long time on this section of the front and was staffed almost from scratch after bloody battles. This is how the Battle of Rzhev ended in 1942-1943. Strategic success led to the fact that in the Great Patriotic War the initiative again passed to the Soviet Union.

Pursuit of the enemy

The Soviet army left Rzhev behind and began an accelerated offensive against the abandoned German positions. As a result, in March we managed to move the front line to the west by another 150 kilometers. Communications of the Soviet troops were stretched. The vanguard moved away from the rear and support. Progress was slowed by the onset of a thaw and poor road conditions.

When the Germans gained a foothold in the Dorogobuzh area, it became clear that an army of such density could not be defeated, and the Red Army stopped. The next significant breakthrough will occur in the summer, when the Battle of Kursk ends.

The fate of Rzhev. Reflection in culture

The day before, 56 thousand people lived in the city. The city spent 17 months under occupation, during which it was completely destroyed. The local population either fled the day before or did not survive German rule. When the Soviet army liberated the city on March 3, 1943, 150 civilians remained there.

As for estimates of the total losses of the Red Army for more than a year of battles, Marshal Viktor Kulikov called the figure more than 1 million people.

The Battle of Rzhev left about 300 surviving households in the city, when before the battles there were 5.5 thousand of them. After the war it was literally rebuilt from scratch.

Bloody battles and huge losses are reflected in folk memory and many works of art. The most famous is the poem by Alexander Tvardovsky “I was killed near Rzhev.” The Tver region has many monuments. The Battle of Rzhev, the panorama museum of this event - all this still attracts a large audience of visitors. In the city of the same name there is also a memorial obelisk.

The Rzhev defensive line was planned in May 1941. Despite all the incredible successes of Industrialization, the Soviet Army is far inferior to the Wehrmacht, an army of a fundamentally different type, the strongest army on the planet. The Red Army, as Soviet experts rightly believed, would be defeated in border battles and would retreat deeper into the country. In mid-May 1941, at the request of the USSR leadership, the General Staff analyzed the situation and concluded that the German army was completely mobilized, with its rear deployed. In the event of the outbreak of hostilities, the Red Army is capable of mobilizing and fully deploying on the Western Front within 35 days. Estimates of the Soviet General Staff showed that it would take 7 days for a potential enemy to enter the operational space.

The other day, while searching for information on the Rzhev-Vyazemsky defensive line, on the “Feat of the People” website, I unexpectedly came across a map that was dated May 1941 and entitled “Scheme of fortified areas of the third line along the line: Ostashkov, Rzhev, Vyazma, Spas-Demensk" (fond 208 inventory 2511 file 309).

At first, I thought that the date was put in error, but on the map itself the date of its compilation was discovered - May 17, 1941, and at the top, where Tymoshenko’s signature should have been, it was written “” May 1941. At the bottom there was space left for Zhukov’s signature, but hers too no, but the signature of the head of the fortified areas department of the spacecraft, Major General Shiryaev, is available.

A chain of 4 missile defenses stretched exactly along the line of the Rzhev-Vyazemsky defensive line. The fact is that until now it was believed that this line began to be built (and designed) only after the start of the Great Patriotic War, but here is a ready-made map, with the location of the missile defense systems, their constituent defense nodes and strongholds. In the lower right corner is a sign with a breakdown of how many and what structures should be built and how much it will cost. Judging by the table, the first stage of construction was supposed to be completed by June 1, 1942, with an intermediate stage by January 1, 1942.

In 1940 and 1941, the first line was actively built - the so-called "Molotov Line", along the new border, which emerged in September 1939.
The second line - the "Stalin Line", in some places abandoned by troops (who moved to the west), and in some places being reconstructed, ran along the old border. And it turns out that a third line was also planned, some 300 km from Moscow. A total of 4,878 defensive structures were to be built, of which 1,296 were to be built in the first year of construction. The total cost of the line was estimated at almost two billion rubles, while in the second half of 1941 almost 440 million rubles were supposed to be “mastered”.
There are no signatures on the map, and it is unknown whether the order to begin its construction was given before June 22, 1941, but in any case, a lot of preparatory work was carried out on reconnaissance and design of the line. Based on the fact that the estimate was calculated (accurate to thousands of rubles), it can be assumed with a high degree of confidence that by this time detailed designs for the entire line had been created, the volumes of earthen, concrete and other work had been determined.
It is not very clear with what forces it was planned to build it - the plan for the “Molotov Line” was not carried out, literally all efforts were thrown into its construction (concrete was poured even at night on June 22), in addition, the reconstruction of the “Stalin Line” and the formation of new parts for her.

I don’t want to make quick conclusions, although they suggest themselves - the Soviet Union was preparing for defense and war on its territory.

It is possible that this map is part of a report that was presented to Stalin on May 24, 1941. It was written in a single copy by hand on May 15, 1941: “Considerations on the plan for the strategic deployment of the Armed Forces of the Soviet Union in the event of war with Germany and its allies.”
“Considerations...” contained the following note in Vatutin’s hand:

At the same time, it is necessary to speed up the construction of fortified areas in every possible way, to begin the construction of fortified areas on the rear line of Ostashkov, Pochep and to provide for the construction of new fortified areas in 1942 on the border with Hungary, as well as to continue the construction of fortified areas along the line of the old state border.

Judging by polls on specialized forums, no one had ever seen such a map or even suspected its existence. No mention of these 4 URs has ever been found before.

This is such mysticism. It is curious that the search menu on the “Feat of the People” website begins with 06.1941, for May this is the only map on the site. The only explanation for its appearance is that it was in the same inventory with the September maps of the Western Front, along the Rzhev-Vyazemskaya line. Perhaps it was used for verification or as a sample, and then at the same time put into the archives.
During declassification and digitization, no attention was paid to the date and it slipped into the public domain.

It is likely that some evidence of the beginning of preparations for the construction of this line can be found. Perhaps the funds were included in the USSR budget for 1941, tasks for the production of equipment for bunkers and their weapons were included in the plans of the factories, perhaps some builders were already moving to this area, camp points were opened, etc.

Since the map is very large (you can find it either on the website or on torrents - it’s strange that they didn’t pay attention to it earlier), I’ll give several of its parts with URs for greater clarity.

Rzhevsky UR.
The width along the front is 140 km. There is a large forefield in front of the UR. It must be said that in 1941, the front line of defense passed along the front edge of the forefield. You can also pay attention to the fact that the defense nodes are located along the Volga in such a way as to protect the flank from an attack from the north. In 1941 it was necessary to hold the opposite bank of the Volga. Noteworthy is the line near the city of Bely, which covers the junction between the missile defenses.


Vyazemsky UR.
The width along the front is 120 km. It goes along the Dnieper. The highway and railway are covered by one defense center in the Izdeshkovo area.


Spas-Demensky UR
130 km along the front, at the front border of the Urals the city of Yelnya


Bryansk UR
95 km along the front. In 1941, the defense line ran approximately the same, including the forefield

To be continued (hopefully) to come

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- the story of the camouflage of Moscow in 1941 and the continuation of this story. Unique images and their analysis by German transcribers

"Echo of War" although rather an echo of the explosion of artillery depots in 1920

Rzhevsko-Vyazemskaya defense line, which was built in the summer and autumn of 1941 to protect Moscow, but did not play its role.
The result of some of the research carried out was the publication of the book “Oleninsky Frontier”. The book can now be downloaded from Yandex.Disk https://yadi.sk/i/FTA_sBii3PuiCn or Google Drive https://drive.google.com/file/d/14OMhXltuvozlr4g8bo_1EfNt1GyuAyfU/view

You can help us find out and tell us even more about Rzhevsky Ur. . All this will improve the efficiency of searches. Contacts at the end of the post.

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If you have questions, write in a personal message or at [email protected]

I am looking for relatives of those who built defensive ones in the Moscow direction, as well as any information related to this. Memories, photographs, newspaper clippings, everything that can tell about the events of the summer-autumn of 1941. A significant proportion of the builders were Muscovites, but they worked together with them...

A. Milyutin

Preface

These chapters of the manuscript were selected for review because in them the author describes episodes relating to his service in the 297th Machine Gun Battalion.
Before “Vanka Kotny” I read many books about the war and this book undoubtedly stood out from them. The author described the terrain in the combat areas in such detail that I had a desire to compare the description with reality. ()