Stalin's Organs

[Jim O]

Katyusha multiple rocket launchers are a type of rocket artillery built and fielded by the Soviet Union beginning in the Second World War. Compared to other types of artillery, multiple rocket launchers are able to deliver a devastating amount of explosives to an area target in a short period of time, although with low accuracy, and then take a relatively long period of time to reload. They are relatively fragile but inexpensive and easy to produce. Katyushas of World War Two, the first self-propelled artillery mass-produced by the Soviet Union, were usually mounted on trucks. This mobility gives Katyushas (and other self-propelled artillery) another advantage: they are able to deliver a blow and then move before the other side is able to attack their position with counter-battery fire.

Katyusha weapons of World War Two included the BM-13 launcher, light BM-8, and heavy BM-31. Today, the nickname is also applied to newer truck-mounted Soviet multiple rocket launchers—notably the very common BM-21—and their derivatives worldwide. It can also refer to Katyusha artillery rockets launched individually using man-portable launchers, a mode of attack sometimes used in guerrilla warfare, military harassing fire, or attacks against population, for example by the National Front for the Liberation of Vietnam, Hezbollah, the Iraqi insurgency, and the Taliban.

Red Army troops adopted the nickname from Mikhail Isakovsky's popular wartime song, "Katyusha", about a girl longing for her absent beloved, who is away performing military service (Zaloga 1984:153). Katyusha (Катюша) is the Russian equivalent of "Katie", an endearing diminutive form of the name Katherine: Yekaterina →Katya →Katyusha. German troops coined the sobriquet Stalin organ (German: Stalinorgel), after Soviet premier Joseph Stalin, and alluding to the sound of the weapon's rockets.


Second World War Katyushas

Katyusha rocket launchers were mounted on many platforms during World War II, including on trucks, artillery tractors, tanks, and armoured trains, as well as on naval and riverine vessels as assault support weapons.

The design was relatively simple, consisting of racks of parallel rails on which rockets were mounted, with a folding frame to raise the rails to launch position. Each truck had between 14 and 48 launchers. The 132-mm diameter M-13 rocket of the BM-13 system was 180 centimetres (5.9 ft) long, 13.2 centimetres (5.2 in) in diameter and weighed 42 kilograms (92 lb). It was propelled by a solid nitrocellulose-based propellant of tubular shape, arranged in a steel-case rocket engine with a single central nozzle at the bottom end. The rocket was stabilised by cruciform fins of pressed sheet steel. The warhead, either fragmentation, high-explosive or shaped-charge, weighed around 22 kg (48 lb). The range of the rockets was about 5.4 kilometres (3.4 mi). Later, 82-mm diameter M-8 and 300-mm diameter M-30 rockets were also developed.

The weapon was less accurate than conventional artillery guns, but was extremely effective in saturation bombardment, and was feared by German soldiers. A ripple-fired seven to ten-second BM-13 salvo delivered 4.35 tons of high explosive rockets over a four-hectare (10 acres) beaten zone (Zaloga 1984:154). Katyusha batteries were often massed in very large numbers to create a shock effect on enemy forces. Its disadvantage was the long time it took to reload a launcher, while conventional guns could maintain a sustained rate of fire.


Development

The development of the Katyusha multiple rocket launcher was a response to Nazi Germany's development of the six-barreled Nebelwerfer rocket mortar in 1936. In June 1938, the Soviet Jet Propulsion Research Institute (RNII) was authorized by the Main Artillery Directorate (GAU) to develop a multiple rocket launcher for the RS-132 aircraft rocket (RS for raketny snaryad, 'rocket shell'). I. Gvay led a design team in Chelyabinsk, Russia, which built several prototypes firing the modified 132mm M-132 rockets over the sides of ZiS-5 trucks. These proved unstable, and V.N. Galkovskiy proposed mounting the launch rails longitudinally. In August 1939, the result was the BM-13 (BM stands for Boyevaya Mashina, 'combat vehicle' for M-13 rockets). Testing with various rockets was conducted through 1940, and the BM-13-16 with launch rails for sixteen rockets was authorized for production. Only forty launchers were built when Germany invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941 (Zaloga 1984:150-53).

After their success in the first month of the war, mass production was ordered and the development of other models proceeded. The Katyushas were very inexpensive and could be manufactured in light industrial installations which didn't have the heavy equipment to build conventional artillery gun barrels (Zaloga 1984:154). By the end of 1942, 3,237 Katyusha launchers of all types had been built, and by the end of the war total production reached about 10,000 (Zaloga 1984:154-55).

The truck-mounted Katyushas were installed on ZiS-6 6×4 trucks, as well as the two-axle ZiS-5 and ZiS-5V. In 1941, a small number of BM-13 launchers were mounted on STZ-5 artillery tractors. A few were also tried on KV tank chassis as the KV-1K, but this was a needless waste of heavy armour. Starting in 1942, they were also mounted on various British, Canadian and U.S. Lend-Lease trucks, in which case they were sometimes referred to as BM-13S. The cross-country performance of the Studebaker US6 2-1/2 ton truck was so good that it became the GAU's standard mounting in 1943, designated BM-13N (Normalizovanniy, 'standardized'), and more than 1,800 of this model were manufactured by the end of World War II (Zaloga 1984:153–54). After World War II, BM-13s were based on Soviet-built ZiL-151 trucks.

The 82mm BM-8 was approved in August, 1941, and deployed as the BM-8-36 on truck beds and BM-8-24 on T-40 and T-60 light tank chassis. Later these were also installed on GAZ-67 jeeps as the BM-8-8, and on the larger Studebaker trucks as the BM-8-48 (Zaloga 1984:154).

Based on the M-13, the M-30 rocket was developed in 1942. Its bulbous warhead required it to be fired from a frame, called the M-30-4, instead of a launch rail. In 1944 it became the basis for the BM-31-12 truck-mounted launcher (Zaloga 1984:154).


Combat history

The multiple rocket launchers were considered top secret at the beginning of the war. They were called by various code names such as "Kostikov Guns", and finally designated Guards Mortars. A special unit of the notorious NKVD was raised to operate them (Zaloga 1984:154). On July 7, 1941, an experimental artillery battery of seven launchers was first used in battle at Orsha in Belarus, under the command of Captain Ivan Flyorov, destroying the station with several supply trains, and causing massive German Army casualties.

Following the success at Orsha, the Red Army immediately organized new Guards Mortar batteries for the support of infantry divisions. A battery's complement was standardized at four launchers. They remained under NKVD control until German Nebelwerfer rocket launchers became common (Zaloga 1984:154–55).

On August 8, 1941, Stalin personally ordered the formation of eight Special Guards Mortar regiments under the direct control of the General Headquarters Reserve (STAVKA-VGK). Each regiment comprised three battalions of three batteries, totalling 36 BM-13 or BM-8 launchers. Independent Guards Mortar battalions were also formed, comprising 36 launchers in three batteries of twelve. By the end of 1941, there were eight regiments, 35 independent battalions, and two independent batteries in service, holding a total of 554 launchers (Zaloga 1984:155).

In June 1942 Heavy Guards Mortar battalions were formed around the new M-30 static rocket launch frames, consisting of 96 launchers in three batteries. In July, a battalion of BM-13s was added to the establishment of a tank corps (Zaloga 1984:147). In 1944, the BM-31 was used in Motorized Heavy Guards Mortar battalions of 48 launchers. In 1943, Guards Mortar brigades, and later divisions, were formed equipped with static launchers (Zaloga 1984:155).

By the end of 1942, 57 regiments were in service—together with the smaller independent battalions, this was the equivalent of 216 batteries: 21% BM-8 light launchers, 56% BM-13, and 23% M-30 heavy launchers. By the end of the war, the equivalent of 518 batteries were in service (Zaloga 1984:155).


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BM-13 battery fire, during the Battle of Berlin, April 1945, with metal blast covers pulled over the windshields


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132mm calibre M-13 rockets being loaded onto the rails of a BM-13


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Source: Wikipedia

Other references:

• Rocket Launchers ("Katyushas"), photos of various mounts
• Creation and Development of Rocket Artillery in the First Phase of the War, translation of a 1976 article published by the USSR Defence Ministry

[Klaus]

That was an interesting articel. I always wanted to know more about the Stalinorgel since I first saw a piture of them when I was a kid. I forgot about my interest as it seems. Now I remember again and will have to look if I can find my model of it.

I pitty the bastards that lay under their fire.