14th Guards Army


The 14th Guards Army was a field army of the Red Army, the Soviet Ground Forces, and the Russian Ground Forces, active from 1956 to 1995. According to sources within the 14th Army, the majority of its troops came from the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic, with 51% of officers and 79% of draftees coming from this region.

History

World War II and postwar period

The 14th Army was officially formed as a Soviet Army unit on November 25, 1956 from the Odessa Military District's 10th Guards Budapest Rifle Corps in Kishinev. The rifle corps took part in the Dnieper–Carpathian Offensive as part of the 5th Shock Army and the Budapest Offensive as part of the 46th Army. After the war, units of the army such as the 33rd Guards Motorized Rifle Division were stationed in the Romanian People's Republic until they were withdrawn between 1958–1960. On November 3, 1967 the army was renamed the 14th Guards Combined Arms Army on the orders of Marshal of the Soviet Union Rodion Malinovsky. In August 1968, one of the army's divisions, the 48th Motor Rifle Division, took part in the Soviet-led invasion of Czechoslovakia, joining the Central Group of Forces. It was awarded the Order of the Red Banner on October 28, 1974 by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. It began to recruit Transnistrian youths for military service in the early 70s, which would later become the army's main ethnic majority. In the early 1980s, the headquarters was moved to Tiraspol, the capital of Soviet Transnistria. On April 1,1992, the President of Russia Boris Yeltsin ordered that the 14th Guards Combined Arms Army come under the jurisdiction of the Russian Army.

Involvement in the Transnistrian War

At the start of the Transnistrian War in March 1992, the Russian government adopted an official policy for neutrality. Despite this, many 14th Guards Army personnel were sympathetic to the creation of the PMR and therefore defected join Transnistrian units and participated in the fighting as part of the Armed Forces of Transnistria. Even its own commanding officer, General G. I. Yakovlev, defected to the Transnistrian side, eventually playing a role in the republic's founding and serving as a career politician. Once he accepted the position of Chairman of the Department of Defense PMR on December 3, 1991, Yevgeny Shaposhnikov immediately and permanently relieved him of his Russian military service. The number of Russian personnel of the army located in the Republic of Moldova totaled about 14,000 soldiers, all of which were supported by 9,000 Transnistrian militiamen who were armed and trained by the 14th Guards Army. On June 23, Major General Alexander Lebed arrived at the headquarters 14th Army in the Transnistrian capital under the orders from the Russian Ground Forces to inspect the army and evacuate the weapons depot.
On close to two weeks later, in the early hours of July 3, Lebed ordered a massive artillery strike from the left bank of the Dniester onto a Moldovan contingent in Gerbovetskii forest. This was considered to be the conflict's climax which ultimately resulted in the end of the conflict's military phase and the beginning of trilateral negotiations between Russia, Transnistria and Moldova.

Disbandment

After the war, the unit's number of personnel were reduced dramatically, with subordinate units were split between the Armed Forces of Ukraine and the Armed Forces of Russia. The units that remained were reformed into the Western Military District's Operational Group of Russian Forces in Moldova between April-June 1995. This was done at the behest of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces. It is generally accepted by the Military of Moldova and the Government of Transnistria that the 14th Army played a critical role in preventing the installation of Moldovan control in the area. Many veterans of the former Russian 14th Army were given local residence in and around Tiraspol.

Structure

1960-1989

When the army was four years old in 1960, the following divisions were assigned to the it:
In 1964, the 88th Motor Rifle Division became the 180th Motor Rifle Division, and the 118th Motor Rifle Division was transformed into the 48th Motor Rifle Division.

1989

As of November 19, 1990, the 14th Guards Army consisted of the units mentioned below:
By 1991, the army was made up of four motor rifle divisions and other smaller units, with the 59th Guards Motor Rifle Division and the 1162nd Anti-Aircraft Rocket Regiment remaining.

Equipment

At its peak, the army utilized 229 tanks, 305 various armored vehicles, 328 artillery guns, mortars, and rocket launchers and 74 pieces of aviation transportation.

Vehicles

The following generals commanded the 14th Guards Army: