Formation The 2nd Tank Army was formed during January and February of 1943 from the 3rd Reserve Army of the
Bryansk Front under the command of
Prokofy Romanenko. On February 1, 1943, the Army's order of battle was as follows:
2nd Tank Army •
16th Tank Corps (Major General of Technical Forces A. G. Maslov) • 107th Tank Brigade • 109th Tank Brigade • 164th Tank Brigade • 15th Motor Rifle Brigade •
6th Guards Rifle Division •
16th Rifle Division • 37th Guards Mortar Regiment* • 51st Motorcycle Battalion • 357th Engineer Battalion In the middle of February the army joined the
Soviet Central Front and as part of Central Front in February – March took part in offensive operations in the direction of
Bryansk, which ultimately failed.
Summer of 1943 By July 1st, 1943, the 2nd Tank Army had been reorganized as a fully mechanized formation, with the following order of battle:
2nd Tank Army •
3rd Tank Corps (Major General of Tank Forces
Maxim Sinenko) • 50th Tank Brigade • 51st Tank Brigade • 103rd Tank Brigade • 57th Motor Rifle Brigade • 74th Motorcycle Battalion • 881st Tank Destroyer Regiment • 728th Tank Destroyer Battalion • 234th Mortar Regiment • 121st Anti-Aircraft Artillery Regiment •
16th Tank Corps (Major General of Tank Forces V. E. Grigor'ev) • 107th Tank Brigade • 109th Tank Brigade • 164th Tank Brigade • 15th Motor Rifle Brigade • 51st Motorcycle Battalion • 1441st Self Propelled Artillery Regiment • 614th Tank Destroyer Regiment • 729th Tank Destroyer Battalion • 226th Mortar Regiment •
11th Guards Tank Brigade • 87th Motorcycle Battalion • 357th Engineer Battalion In July – August – 2nd Tank Army took part in the Orel strategic offensive operation –
Operation Kutuzov – within the
Kromy’-Orel offensive operation and the Chernigov-Pripyat offensive operation (26.08–30.09.1943) under the command of
Alexey Rodin.
The Soviet Offensives, 1943-1945 In the beginning of September 1943 Rodin was replaced by
Semyon Bogdanov as commander, and the 2nd Tank Army was redeployed to the
Stavka VGK reserve. In the middle of January 1944, it joined the
1st Ukrainian Front and remained in its structure until the end of January when it participated in the repulse of German counter-strokes in the direction of
Vinnitsa; in February the army fought in the south-west of the Korsun-Shevchenkovsky operation. As part of the
2nd Ukrainian Front, and from the middle of June 1944 within the
1st Belorussian Front, the Army participated in the
Uman-Botoşani offensive,
Lublin – Brest, and the Warsaw-Poznan offensive. For its service in the above operations the Army was granted the title of the '''Second Guards '
Red Banner' Tank Army''' in November 1944 and almost all of its formations and units received combat awards, with the majority of sub-units awarded honorifics commemorating operations they distinguished themselves in. After participating in the
East Pomeranian Offensive and the
Seelow-Berlin offensive operation, it was the first Soviet Army to enter Berlin during the
Battle for Berlin. During the war, over 103,000 soldiers of the army were awarded awards and medals, 221 of them being awarded the decoration of the
Hero of the Soviet Union, while the army commander
Semyon Bogdanov was awarded the
Hero of the Soviet Union twice. ==Cold War==