NKVD troops in the front line, By Skorzeny of the 1JMA forum.

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part 2 of the article can be found here

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Much has been said and written regarding the role that was played by NKVD in the politically motivated purges that decimated Red Army in the late 30s, as well as much talk arose around NKVD activities in the World War II—anti-guerrilla operations, behind-the enemy-lines terror squads, blocking detachments that executed on spot the retreating regular troops and so on, but too little information appeared concerning the NKVD troops actually fighting as combat units on the front. Partly this is due to the fact that the main bulk of NKVD archives is kept secret even now, eleven years after the collapse of the USSR. We hope that this essay might shed some light on the subject.

The origin of NKVD troops can be traced back to October 1925, when the first two divisions of Escort Troops were formed to ensure the necessary security regime for gigantic Soviet prison and concentration camp system. With the emergence of NKVD these two divisions grew and changed both in size and in strength—as the political repressions, collectivisation, purges and forced labour industrialisation projects had been carried out. In course of 1939-1940, in the Winter War with Finland, NKVD troops alongside with the NKVD Border Guards assisted Red Army to breach the enemy defences. In order to assure rapid advance of main forces and make captured Finnish ground in Soviet rear areas a secure place, a joint order of the People’s Commissariats of Defence and Internal Affairs ordered to raise 7 NKVD operative regiments and 1 reserve regiment, 1500 men in each, giving birth to the frontline NKVD troops as such.

It is evident that an intensive project of raising and enlarging NKVD divisions was well underway before the “Great Patriotic War” started on June 22, 1941, with 21st, 22nd and 23rd NKVD Motorised Rifle divisions being raised in Baltic, Western and Kiev Special Military Districts. There was a total of 6 NKVD divisions formed and being in combat-redy shape, with 9 divisions being raised. Basically, these divisions were created with the same TO&E as regular Red Army divisions, apart from strong armoured fists and motorization that enabled their impressive performance in the early days of the war. We also encounter queer formations like NKVD Railway Guarding Troops divisions, whose primary goal was to establish a firm control of the railway network during the mobilisation period, secure effective shipment of military materials to the frontline troops and eventually provide the maintenance of the railways on the occupied territories; their TO&E included four Rifle regiments, as a rule each possessing an armoured train for mobile artillery and anti-aircraft support. As of June 22, 1941, they were deployed as follows:

2nd NKVD Railway Guarding Troops division: Karelia and Estonia
3rd NKVD Railway Guarding Troops division: Byelorussia
4th NKVD Railway Guarding Troops division: Kiev-Chernihiv-Zhitomyr-Vinnytsia-Odessa railway
5th NKVD Railway Guarding Troops division: Eastern Ukraine
9th NKVD Railway Guarding Troops division: Brest-Vilnius railway
10th NKVD Railway Guarding Troops division: Western Ukraine
13th NKVD Railway Guarding Troops division: Bielcy-Bendery-Uman railway
24th NKVD Railway Guarding Troops division: Minsk-Smolensk railway
27th NKVD Railway Guarding Troops division: Far East
28th NKVD Railway Guarding Troops division: Far East
29th NKVD Railway Guarding Troops division: Transbaikal railway

Therefore, it is obvious that the main bulk of these NKVD troops was engaged in the activities concerned with the future war, a war that was relentlessly approaching, either as a planned Soviet scheme, or an imminent German invasion prospect.
Curiously, in many cases it were exactly NKVD troops subunits that first came under devastating German fire in the early hours of “Barbarossa”, as in case with the 132nd Separate Escort Troops NKVD battalion stationed in the notorious Brest citadel. All in all, there were also 53 units of NKVD border guards, 9 NKVD border commands, 30 engineer NKVD battalions working on construction sites in the border Military Districts and entering combat almost instantly.
But we must remember that while certain NKVD units fought staunchly during the first days of the war, other committed mass atrocities and warcrimes. For instance, it is known that the 5th Motorised Rifle regiment of the 22nd NKVD division was attacked by Luftwaffe aircraft at 10.00 in the morning of June 22, in the vicinity of Shauljaj, while marching along the Baranovichi-Riga line, coming back from the operation in Byelorussia, whose primary goal was to ensure the forced deportation of the civilians from the areas close to the borders. The scale of the similar operations before June 22 is still obscure, and yet it is known that in many cases massacres took place, often following the news of the German attack. It should be also stressed that the elements of the 22nd NKVD Motorised Rifle division participated in the defence of Riga, suppressing the rebellion instigated by Latvian nationalists on June 28, followed by massacres of Latvian civilians by NKVD troopers after the nest of resistance were destroyed on the following day. Similar actions were undertaken in Ukrainian SSR by the notorious 13th Escort Troops NKVD division(with headquarters in Kiev, later in Brovary and Kharkiv), consisting of the 233rd Regiment(Lviv), 227th Regiment(Kiev), 249th Regiment(Odessa), 228th Regiment(Kharkiv), 229th Regiment(Lviv, responsible for the maintenance of Polish POWs since 1939), 237th Regiment(Kishinev) and 154th separate battalion(Chernivtsi). Aware of the imminent advance of the German spearheads in the Western Ukraine, the units of Ukrainian nationalist paramilitaries began to concentrate in the vicinity of the major cities, to prevent the massacres of the prisoners guarded by the 13th Escort Troops NKVD division. However, NKVD assassins were supported by the regular Red Army units in their endeavours to avoid the liberation of the prisoners, who were considered “the fifth column” and “counter-revolutionary scum”—for instance, in Lviv the Red Army command was forced to designate the units of the 4th Mechanised Corp(32nd Motorised Rifle regiment of the 32nd Tank division, 202nd Motorised Rifle regiment of the 81st Motorised division) to withstand the pressure of paramilitary units trying to break to the city prisons. The butchers of the 13th Escort Troops NKVD division massacred up to 20,000 of imprisoned civilians in the prisons of Lviv, Ternopil, Lutsk, Peremyshl, Volodymyr-Volynskyj, Rivne, Dubno, Kolomyja and Stanislav. However, in some cases(for instance, the city of Sarny) the units of Ukrainian nationalists managed to demolish NKVD garrisons and hold the towns up to the arrival of German vanguards.

Conducting a fighting withdrawal, NKVD troops were subordinated to the Red Army formations and formed their operative reserves, owing this role to their mobility, political reliability, ruthless leadership and armament. The afore-mentioned 22nd NKVD Motorised Rifle division defended Riga, then, being pressed by the German troops, withdrew to Estonia, secured the retreat of regular Red Army formations, got encircled and was evacuated to Leningrad by sea—to be disbanded due to heavy losses. In order to raise more reserves for the frontline service, achieve better performance of NKVD troops and to widen the sphere of their employment, the Soviet Stavka of High Command issued the following order.

Concerning the formation of Rifle and Motorised divisions of the NKVD troops personnel
00100
29th of June 1941
Immediately proceed to the formation of 15 divisions, of which 10 Rifle and 5 Motorised. For the formation of these divisions a proportion of NKVD border guards and internal security troops personnel should be employed, including privates, NCOs and commissioned officers. The remaining strength should be drafter from reserve.
The People’s Commissar of Internal Affairs L.P. Berija should be charged with the responsibility of raising these divisions; Red Army Chief of Staff should provide the divisions being raised with the necessary personnel, material resources and weapons according to the application of NKVD.

Stavka of High Command
Timoshenko
Stalin
Zhukov

In a short period of time, with fierce fighting raging in full swing on all fronts, 15 divisions were formed and reinforced the Soviet defences—10 of them were sent to the Western direction(243rd, 244th, 246th, 247th, 249th, 250th, 251st, 252nd, 254th, 256th), and 5 to the North-West(257th, 259th, 262nd, 265th, 268th ). A contemporary Russian publication dedicated to the research of internal security troops, refers to the matter as follows:

“An important part of the activities conducted by the home security troops during the years of Great Patriotic War was the raising of units and formations for the Red Army Field Force from the personnel of NKVD troops. The week after the war started—on the 29th of June 1941—the government ordered NKVD to raise 15 Rifle divisions for the needs of Fronts. For each of these division NKVD allocated 1000 of personnel to fill the positions of commanders and NCOs. The remaining personnel was drafted from reserve. All these divisions were raised within 15-20 days and were transferred to the 29th, 30th, 31st, 34th and some other Armies of the first line that were sent to the Western direction in July 1941. Also a number of NKVD officers and generals were appointed on the commanding and political positions in the troops of the Field Force. For instance, the commander of the 29th Army was Lieutenant General I.I. Maslennikov(Deputy of People’s Commissar of Internal Affairs responsible for the NKVD troops), who was to command a number of Armies and Fronts in the coming years. Lieutenant General S.A Artemjev(Chief of NKVD operative troops Department) was appointed the Commander of Moscow Military District(bearing tremendous political importance), while Divisional Commissar of NKVD troops K.F. Telegin was appointed the head of Political Board of this same Moscow MD, and later was to become the member of the Military Council of the Front, and so on. ”2

To this interesting reference we might add the following information: 30th Army in July 1941 was headed by NKVD Major General V.A. Khomenko(previously the commander of NKVD border guards in the Ukrainian Border District), and the 31st Army was headed by NKVD Major General K.I. Rakutin(previously the commander of NKVD Baltic Border District), who was succeeded by NKVD Major General V.N. Dolmatov(previously the commander of NKVD Karelian-Finnish Border District). But Major General K.I. Rakutin was not sent back to guard the USSR state border elsewhere, to the Far East or Iran, instead he was given quite responsible task on the Reserve Front.

When reading Marshal G.K. Zhukov’s memoirs, we might encounter yet another indication of employing NKVD troops personnel at the Army level, namely in the well-known Yelnia counterstrike of the Soviet Reserve Front in August 1941: “We arrived at the headquarters of the 24th Army late in the evening. The Army commander K.I. Rakutin and the commanders of Army’s branches of forces were expecting us already. I have never met K.I. Rakutin before; his report on the situation and the deployment of his troops made a good impression, but it was obvious that he did not possess the necessary operative and tactical education—in fact, K.I. Rakutin had the same deficiency as many officers and generals, which previously served in the NKVD border troops, because they almost did not have a possibility to improve their operative skills.”
During the desperate Soviet efforts to thwart Fieldmarschal von Leeb’s armoured spearheads on the approaches to Leningrad, 1st, 20th, 21st, 22nd and 23rd NKVD divisions were staunchly repelling massive German attacks. Curiously, before the war started, the 20th NKVD Rifle division was deployed in the vicinity of strategic Belomor Canal, built with the assistance of forced labour employment. It should be stressed that later in the war some of these divisions were transferred to regular Red Army and instantly renamed which probably makes the task of researching their fates more difficult: 1st NKVD division (commander colonel S.I. Donskov) turned into 46th Rifle division, 20th NKVD division was designated a 92nd Rifle division, and 21st NKVD division was renamed as 109th Rifle division. These formations won high appraisal in course of the war and were decorated with many orders, moreover, after the war was over, a monument to the soldiers of the 1st NKVD division was erected in Leningrad—the division was virtually wiped off by a massive Luftwaffe airstrike on the 6th of September 1941.
The defence of Kharkiv in autumn 1941 by the troops of Soviet 38th Army was also considerably strengthened by the presence of 47th NKVD Rifle brigade that mounted several successful counterattacks in October.

Evidently, the construction of deep Soviet defensive lines initiated in autumn 1941 required massive human resources, the exploitation of which was impossible without forced labour management, hence the need to use seasoned NKVD personnel with good GULAG system records. Thus Yakov Davydovich Rapoport, bearing the NKVD rank of Senior Major of State Security, who was responsible for starving thousands of GULAG camp prisoners on various “building projects”(Baltic Sea—White Sea canal, hydroelectric power stations, etc.) before the war, was appointed the Commander of the 3rd Engineer Army in November 1941; while Commissar of the State Security of the 3rd rank Sergej Kruglov(People’s Commissar of Internal Affairs Deputy) led the 4th Engineer Army since October 1941, previously participating in the court-martial sessions within the Reserve Front, where he served as a Military Council member(July-October 1941). For his endeavours in mobilising thousands of civilians for the erection of gigantic defence lines in the vicinity of major Soviet cities with a 12-hour working day and meagre food rations, Kruglov was awarded a rank of Colonel General later in the war.

A sophisticated task of creating and leading a large-scale partisan movement in the occupied Soviet areas was partly solved by Soviet High Command after employing NKVD personnel, parachuted in German rear; it is quite apparent that without NKVD cadres the partisan movement would have never been able to achieve serious successes. In Ukraine it was co-ordinated by notorious T. Strokach, People’s Commissar of Internal Affairs Deputy (28.3.1941—16.1.1946), who was in charge of the so-called Ukrainian Partisan Movement High Command in 1942-1945.

After the major Soviet counter-offensive in winter of 1941-1942 dozens of cities, towns and villages were recaptured, and, according to the State Committee of Defence Decree dated January 4, 1942, strong garrisons of fresh NKVD troops were to be deployed in the liberated areas, with a possibility of future participation in combat. Therefore 6 NKVD Rifle divisions and 3 NKVD Motorised Rifle divisions were raised, consisting of 5-6 regiments with 3 battalions in each regiment, with the engagement of 92,000 NKVD troops (Railway Guarding troops, Escort troops) and 2,000 of Border-Guards. In the city of Tihvin the 5th NKVD Rifle division was raised, in Kalinin the 6th NKVD Rifle division, in Tula the 7th NKVD Motorised Rifle division, in Voronezh the 8th NKVD Motorised Rifle division, in Rostov the 9th NKVD Motorised Rifle division, in Stalingrad the 10th NKVD Rifle division, in Krasnodar the 11th NKVD Rifle division and in Saratov the 12th NKVD Rifle division. However, soon the situation on the fronts demanded that the 8th NKVD Motorised Rifle division, 9th NKVD Motorised Rifle division, 10th and 11th NKVD Rifle divisions were moved to the Red Army, so additional 8 NKVD Rifle brigades, one Rifle regiment and 3 separate NKVD battalions, all in all 44,000 strong were raised in April 1942. Even so, as the German army has inflicted heavy defeat to the RKKA during the Operation Blau in the southern sector of the East Front in summer 1942, a further increase in need of NKVD reserves emerged.

Appendix to the State Committee of Defence Decree

¹ 2100cc
of 26 July 1942
Top Secret

List of NKVD units being transferred to the Red Army in the strength of 75, 000 servicemen

Branch of NKVD troops Strength
1. NKVD home security troops

9th motorised Rifle division(full strength) 8, 700

13th motorised Rifle division (including 4th, 266th, 274th and 289th regiments and technical services) 6, 580

Separate Rifle brigade of border guards (full strength) 4, 000

1st division
20th division total of 23, 766
21st division

other home security troops 8, 547

2. Border guards 7, 000
3. Troops guarding important industrial objects 5, 414
4. Railway guarding troops 6, 673
5.Escort troops 4, 320

Total 75, 000

Although it might seem that with so many NKVD officers attending to purely military duties there must have been certain mess and bureaucracy, it appears that NKVD machinery was perfectly adjusted to wartime scenarios. Naturally, when NKVD high-ranked officers were given free hand, which happened in critical situations when Stavka thought that especially harsh leadership was essential, their performance was quite dubious, and Red Army commanders regarded their NKVD colleagues sceptically, as General Shtemenko points out in his memoirs: “The Chief Caucasus mountain range was neither in zone of responsibility of Black Sea or North Army Groups. The 46th Army that defended Caucasus range was to be subordinated directly to the Front Commander, but eventually there emerged a special institution attached to the Front Headquarters, that was called “Headquarters of the Troops Defending Caucasus”, headed by General G.L. Petrov from NKVD. I must confess that it was a purely artificial intermediate structure, that actually duplicated the functions of 46th Army Staff. ”
It was also here in the North-Caucasus Front that other NKVD units have seen combat, such as Ordzhonikidze Rifle Division and Grozny Rifle Division of Home Security troops, and in certain cases were engaged in mass atrocities. The darkest page of the bloody list of NKVD massacres and executions of civilians includes the ethnic purges in the Kabarda-Balkaria Autonomous SSR in November-December 1942. As we all know, the nations of the North Caucasus Soviet republics offered massive support to the advancing German troops struggling to reach the fabulous Transcaucasus oil deposits, providing them with valuable intelligence information, attacking retreating Soviet formations and smaller units, creating self-defence troops that held the mountainous villages and assisted the Wehrmacht infantry in maintaining security in the occupied areas. In retaliation the commander of Soviet 37th Army Major General Kozlov ordered to destroy several Balkar villages and eliminate the “criminal elements”, issuing a phone order to Colonel Shikin of the 11th NKVD Rifle division. On the 28th of November 1942 the NKVD troopers under the command of captain F. Nakin stormed seven villages and massacred in cold blood approximately 700 civilians and burned up to 40% of the buildings. In December 1942 an internal investigation was carried out within the 37th Army, resulting in a conclusion that the personnel of the 11th NKVD Rifle division committed atrocities and employed unbecoming measures, such as taking the hostages and executing them afterwards. But in 1994 the General Attorney of the Russian North-Caucasus MD held the heated court-hearings in order to decide the gravity of the guilt of Major General Kozlov and Colonel Shikin in the operation which was officially recognised as a part of genocide of Balkar nation in 1992.
After the German withdrawal from occupied North-Caucasus territories in early 1943, the Soviet leadership was fully aware that the local population would not remain passive and most probably would mount a full-scale guerrilla war. As a consequence of daring guerrilla warfare conducted by Caucasus ethnic groups, massive deportations followed in 1943 and 1944, secured by some 100,000 NKVD troops, withdrawn from the front or other places of service.

Meanwhile, let us shed some light on the career of one of the most prominent NKVD figures—Lieutenant General I.I. Maslennikov, whom we already mentioned as Commander of the 29th Army in July 1941. He maintained his high post in the NKVD(People’s Commissar Deputy), and led 39th Army(December 1941—July 1942) in the murderous battle near Rzhev(until Army was encircled and virtually demolished, the remnants disbanded), then took up the command of the North Army group of the North-Caucasus Front(8th of July 1942—24th of January 1943), to be promoted to Commander of North-Caucasus Front(24th of January 1943—13th of May 1943) and receive the Colonel-General rank(30th of January 1943). After unsuccessful attempts to drive the German 17th Army from the Kuban Bridgehead, he was removed from command and appointed Deputy Commander of the Volkhov Front (May 1943—August 1943) in the North, and finally transferred to the Red Army (thus losing his position of People’s Commissar Deputy responsible for operative troops in NKVD) on the 3rd of July 1943. Afterwards a number of short-term secondary appointments followed: Deputy Commander of the South-Western Front (August 1943—October 1943), Deputy Commander of the Third Ukrainian Front (October 1943—December 1943), Commander of the 42nd Army (December 1943—March 1944), Deputy Commander of the Leningrad Front (March 1944—April 1944). Eventually, Maslennikov was designated the Commander of the Third Baltic Front, formed of the troops on the left wing of the Leningrad Front for the liberation of Baltic states, which was to become his most successful campaign. Maslennikov’s troops broke through the Panther-Line in July 1944, and maintained heavy pressure on the Germans until the front was disbanded on the 16th of October 1944, and it was in July that Maslennikov was awarded the rank of Army General. After a long leave Maslennikov was designated the Deputy Commander in Chief of Soviet Forces in the far East(August-September 1945) and thus was concerned with the victorious war with Japan. After the war was over, he served relatively short terms as a commander of Baku and Transcaucasus Military Districts, to return to active service in Ministry of Internal Affairs since 1948, on his previous important position. But in the turmoil years that followed after the death of Stalin and fall of Berija, Maslennikov’s omnipotent chief, he was facing the threat of investigation concerning his activities as NKVD key figure, and to avoid this he committed suicide in March 1954.

During the desperate Soviet attempts to thwart the unceasing German onslaught on the city-fortress of Stalingrad in August 1942, the 10th NKVD Rifle division under the command of Colonel A.A. Saraev(also the commander of the garrison of the city) fought staunchly on the northern outskirts, suffering tremendous losses and being decorated with the Order of Lenin for the valour of its personnel. Simultaneously, spurred by the bitter need of raising new formations, preferably with firm and ruthless leadership, the Soviet High Command decided to perform a step similar to the formation of the Sixth SS Panzer Armee.

State Committee of Defence Decree concerning the formation of NKVD field armies

N 2411cc
14 October 1942 Moscow

1. The suggestion of NKVD concerning the formation of NKVD field army comprising six Rifle divisions of a total of 70, 000 men should be accepted.
2. For the army formation 55, 000 personnel should be allocated, at the expense of NKVD troops (including: 29, 750 of the border guards, 16, 750 of the home security troops and 8, 500 of the railway guards).
People’s Commissariat of Defence—com. Shchadenko and Rumjantsev should select 15, 000 of servicemen (privates and officers) for the completion of Army’s technical services—artillery, signal troops, engineer troops and other according to the NKVD’s application.

3. People’s Commissariat of Defence—com. Shchadenko— should be obliged to draft and direct to the NKVD troops 50, 000 servicemen born in 1925 in order to cover the number of NKVD personnel deployed for the Army formation.
4. People’s Commissariat of Defence—com. Shchadenko, Khruljev, Jakovlev, Fedorenko, Aborenkov and Peresypkin—should provide the Army with weapons, ammunition, communication equipment, engineer and chemical equipment, trucks, fuel and lubricants, and also with the missing uniforms, gear and horses according to the applications of NKVD.
5. The Army Staff should be created and deployed in the city of Sverdlovsk.
The formation of divisions should be performed in Khabarovsk, Chita, Novosibirsk, Sverdlovsk, Cheljabinsk and Tashkent. The formation of the Army and deployment of divisions in the vicinity of Sverdlovsk should be finished before the 15th of January 1943.
6. People’s Commissar of Internal Affairs com. Berija and People’s Commissariat of Defence—com. Zhukov—should present the candidates to fill the position of Army Commander, Military Council members, Chief of Staff and divisional commanders for the approval of High Command.
7. The Army should be entered into the High Command Reserve and in all respects be equal to the Guards Troops.

State Committee of Defence Chairman
I.Stalin

On February 5, 1943 this army was designated as the 70th Army with Far-Eastern, Transbaikal, Siberian, Central-Asian, Ural and Stalingrad divisions renamed respectively: 102nd, 106th, 140th, 162nd, 175th and 181st Rifle divisions, a total of 69236 personnel. The 70th Army was instantly transferred to the K.K.Rokossovsky’s Central Front, which was preparing a local offensive, and suffered its first defeat. Rokossovsky wrote after the war: “We have been expecting too much from the 70th Army when directing it to the most important sector on our right wing, where our troops linked with the Bryansk Front. But the former border-guards failed due to the poor experience of the officers, who found themselves in a difficult combat situation for the first time. The units entered combat from the march, in elements and disorganised, without proper artillery support and ammunition”. As the carnage battle of Kursk salient loomed on the horizon, the 70th Army was reinforced considerably, with the staffs of 19th and 28th Rifle Corps arriving, followed by the 19th Tank Corp, 132nd, 211th and 280th Rifle divisions, 1st Guards Artillery division, several separate armour, engineer and aerial units. Withstanding countless German assaults during the battle of Kursk, the 70th Army fought quite well, but that is easily explained by its strength—by the end of August 1943 there were 18 divisions within its ranks, with generous supplies and replacements! Eventually, the 70th Army ended its warpath in the battle of Berlin, after heavy fighting in Poland and East Prussia.

All these measures of either incorporating NKVD troops into the Red Army formations for covering the enormous combat losses, or employing them as blocking detachments for boosting the regular unit’s persistence in defence were quite effective also after the battle of Kursk and transition of strategic initiative to the Soviet side. Nevertheless we can still encounter separate NKVD combat formations later in the war being used on the front-line as assault troops, as was the case with the 290th NKVD Rifle regiment. This unit participated within the ranks of 18th Army in the crushing assault on the port of Novorossijsk on the Taman peninsula in autumn 1943, landing in the city with the seaborne element of the operation and breaching the German defences. The same applies to the 3rd Separate Artillery Unit of NKVD Home Security troops in the battle of Koenigsberg, 1st and 2nd NKVD Artillery Regiments in the battle of Novgorod, 273rd NKVD Rifle regiment in the battle of Gdansk, 145th NKVD Rifle regiment in the battle of Poznan, 103rd Separate Mobile NKVD rear-security troops Group in the battle of Stettin—all winning the decorations and the corresponding honorary titles of Novorossijsk, Koenigsberg, Novgorod, Gdansk, Poznan and Stettin for their ruthless actions. However it should be remembered that since 1943 the NKVD troops returned to their original role of home security troops, whose primary objective was to secure Soviet power both in newly liberated areas and in the rear, so the participation of NKVD units in combat since 1943 should be rather treated as an exception.
Much more typical was their employment in the security operations on the territory of Third Reich and its allies, essentially sketched in the State Committee of Defence Decree dated December 1944. According to this document, entitled as “Concerning the security measures in rear areas and communications of the Red Army in East Prussia, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Romania” , NKVD troops were given a task of maintaining security in the areas lying between the state border and the front-line troops, combating the remnants of German troops, nationalist guerrilla movement, “counter-revolutionary and bourgeois elements” among the civilian population, etc. Therefore, 6 new NKVD divisions were raised, somewhat weaker in strength—only with 5,000 of personnel each, given the numbers of 57th, 58th, 59th, 60th, 61st and 62nd NKVD Rifle divisions. After the Third Reich was crushed, these formations comfortably camped in Grmany and Austria, followed by newly raised 63rd, 64th and 65th NKVD Rifle divisions, designated for the occupational service, with the 66th NKVD Rifle divison deployed in Romania. The last accord of NKVD fighting forces expansion was witnessed during the August Storm of 1945, when the 3d NKVD Rifle divison followed the rolling Soviet tanks into Manchuria, to neutralise the japanese resistance and Russian emigrant circles of former ataman Semenov. But the story of their confrontation with the new enemies, like AK or UPA guerrilla armies makes up a separate chapter in the long and fascinating history of Soviet war machine.