Unbelievable Tank Rescue At The Leningrad Frontlines

The most exotic units participated in the battles on the Leningrad Front, both in their origin, such as the Norwegians, Spaniards and Flemings, and in their military purpose.

Mountain rifle units fought on both sides in the swamps and forests of the Leningrad Region, German airborne troops confronted Soviet soldiers on the Nevsky Pyatachok, and Luftwaffe “airfield” divisions were in the Peterhof area.

But it is not so difficult to imagine how soldiers who descended from the sky or came down from the mountains fought in the Ladoga swamps, not to mention the marines. In addition, in all wars there are such desperate moments when especially valuable specialists, carefully trained for completely different tasks, on whom a lot of money and time were spent, go to certain death in the infantry formation.

Sometimes they are wasted through stupidity or malicious intent, and in our army this is not a completely eradicated practice. But if I said that people from the underwater expedition took part in the assault on the Sinyavinsky Heights and were used for their intended purpose, you would think that the author had gone crazy.

However, there are some things that you can’t make up on purpose, and here’s a document for you:

“… For example, recently a group of fighters under the command of warrant officer Osipov received the task of extracting fourteen large and medium tanks from a quagmire in the Sinyavino area. The fighters and junior commanders of this group, comrades Osipov, Ermakov, Ilyin and Shishkin, took on this task with exceptional enthusiasm and in a short time, using rigging equipment and Russian ingenuity, extracted all 14 tanks, which were soon sent to destroy the Nazi bastards.

It is characteristic that before this group of Epronovites [from EPRON — Special Expedition for Underwater Works] worked, the evacuation tank detachment tried to lift one “KV”, but in vain. Whereas Osipov’s group lifted the same “KV” in 5 hours.

The army command of the evacuation tank unit not only highly appreciated the work of the Epronovites group, but also awarded it cash bonuses and presented all participants in raising the tanks to government awards.”

Everything falls into place if you consider that EPRON was created not just to explore the seas, but as an organization for pulling out large heavy metal things from great depths.

For those who raised submarines and even battleships, it was quite easy to pull tanks out of the swamp. Hurricane shelling complicated the task somewhat, but it could neither frighten nor stop those who could easily pull a devilfish by the tail.

*F.171, o.3, d.25, l.107. Report of the Chief of the Political Directorate of the ASO /EPRON/ KBF Captain 2nd Rank Burachenko to the Chief of the Political Directorate of the KBF Captain 1st Rank Volkov from 10.06.1943