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Polish State Railways as a Mode of Transport for Troops of the Warsaw Pact

Technology in Service of a Doctrine

by Zbigniew Tucholski (Author) Barbara Bienias (Revision)
©2020 Monographs 448 Pages
Open Access

Summary

The subject of the book is the history of the planned use of Polish railway infrastructure during the Cold War as part of the strategic plans of the Warsaw Pact. Analysing both technical and operational issues related to railway military transportation in a historical perspective, the author presents the history of the military transportation service of the Polish Army and provides a detailed characteristics of the organizational structure, equipment and tasks of the military transportation units and railway troops. The book also deals with rail transports of the Soviet Army on the Polish State Railways. The work is not only the result of archival queries and interviews with retired officers of the military transportation service but also field research of railway infrastructure.

Table Of Contents

  • Cover
  • Title
  • Copyright
  • About the author
  • About the book
  • This eBook can be cited
  • Table of contents
  • INTRODUCTION
  • 1. DEVELOPING THE CONCEPT OF MILITARY RAILWAY USE
  • 2. RED ARMY MILITARY TRANSPORT IN THE FINAL STAGES OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR – TRANSPORT-BASED SECURITY OF THE RED ARMY OPERATIONS IN BELARUS AND THE VISTULA-AND-ODRA REGION
  • 3. RECONSTRUCTING, ORGANISING, AND DEVELOPING THE HEADQUARTERS OF MILITARY TRANSPORT IN THE YEARS 1944–1962
  • 3.1 Department of Military transport, Military District Command I Warsaw
  • 3.2 Reconstruction of Railway Units
  • 3.2.1 The 5th Railway Troops Battalion in Darłowo
  • 3.2.2 3rd Railway Troops Battalion in Pikulice near Przemyśl
  • 3.2.3 7th Railway Troops Battalion in Września
  • 4. PREPARING THE Polish State Railways NETWORK FOR A MILITARY CONFLICT AS PART OF WARSAW PACT STRATEGIC PLANS
  • 4.1 Securing Transport for the Frontline Offensive Campaign
  • 4.2 Evacuation of the Wounded
  • 4.2.1 Temporary Transhipment Areas
  • 4.2.2 Organisational Structure of Military Transport on the Frontline
  • 4.2.3 Organising Technical Protection for the Frontline Railway Network
  • 4.2. Destruction of Railway Lines, Stations, Facilities and Rolling Stock
  • 4.3.1 Bridge Destruction
  • 4.3.2 Bridge Mining
  • 4.4 Temporary Reconstruction (Construction) of Railway Lines
  • 4.4.1 Reconstruction of Water Supply Facilities
  • 4.4.2 Reconstruction of Buildings Indispensable to Railway Traffic
  • 4.4.3 Reconstruction of Railway Signalling Devices
  • 4.4.4 Temporary Bridge Reconstruction
  • 4.5 Folding Railway Bridges
  • 4.6 Railway Bridge Crossings Built by the Road and Railway Units of the Polish Armed Forces as part of the Warsaw Pact Military Exercises and Performing Tasks to Support the National Economy
  • 5. MILITARY TRANSPORTS
  • 5.1 Military Transports – Typology
  • 5.1.1 Military Rail Transport
  • 5.1.2 Anti-Aircraft Defence of Military Transports
  • 5.1.3 Anti-Tank Defence of Military Transports
  • 5.1.4 Safeguarding the Confidentiality of Transports
  • 5.1.5 Rolling Stock used for Military transport Purposes
  • 5.1.6 Loading Areas, Stations, and Sites; Loading Devices
  • 5.2 Transporting Soviet Army Troops in Transit by the Polish State Railways
  • 5.3 Transports for Soviet Army Troops Stationed in Poland
  • 6. MILITARY RAILWAY SIDINGS AND MILITARY RAILWAYS
  • 6.1 Military narrow-gauge railways
  • 6.1.1. Military siding no. 289 Hrubieszów (Hrubieszów narrow-gauge railway)
  • 6.1.2. Narrow-gauge military railway at the Field Artillery Research Centre in Zielonka (military siding No. 182) and standard-gauge siding No. 127727
  • 6.1.3. Rolling stock
  • 6.1.4. Narrow-gauge 600mm railway on the Hel peninsula (military siding No. 582)
  • 6.1.5. Narrow-gauge 600 mm military railway Gdynia-Port Wojenny Oksywie, (military siding No. 581) JW 3643 Gdynia Port-Oksywie, siding No. 407
  • 6.1.6 Military railway Świnoujście, military siding No. 881 (600 mm)
  • 6.1.7 Military siding No. 181, JW 1540 Nowe Miasto and sidings for fuel re-pumping station in Piaseczno No. 101/183 (standard- and narrow-gauge)
  • 6.1.8 Military siding in Zegrze Pomorskie and fuel re-pumping point siding in Koszalin
  • 6.1.9 Military siding JW 4420 No. 180 (Mława narrow-gauge railway)
  • 6.2. Military rolling stock
  • 6.2.1 Locomotives
  • 6.2.2 Wagon and special rolling stock
  • 6.2.3 Management of military rolling stock
  • 6.2.4 Road trailers for wagon transport
  • 6.2.5 Narrow-gauge military tank wagons of the Ministry of National Defence
  • CONCLUSION
  • BIBLIOGRAPHY
  • INDEX
  • Series index

Bibliographic Information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek
The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in
the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic
data is available in the internet at
http://dnb.d-nb.de.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for
at the Library of Congress.

About the author

The Author
Zbigniew Tucholski, Ph.D., is a professor at the Institute of History of Science of the Polish Academy of Science, a technical historian, specialised in the history of railways, transportation, industry and military technology, and the preservation of transport infrastructure and architecture heritage.

About the book

Zbigniew Tucholski

Polish State Railways as a Mode of Transport
for Troops of the Warsaw Pact

The subject of the book is the history of the planned use of Polish railway infrastructure during the Cold War as part of the strategic plans of the Warsaw Pact. Analysing both technical and operational issues related to railway military transportation in a historical perspective, the book presents the history of the military transportation service of the Polish Army and provides a detailed characteristics of the organizational structure, equipment and tasks of the military transportation units and railway troops. The book also deals with rail transports of the Soviet Army on the Polish State Railways. It is not only the result of archival queries and interviews with retired officers of the military transportation service but also field research of railway infrastructure.

This eBook can be cited

This edition of the eBook can be cited. To enable this we have marked the start and end of a page. In cases where a word straddles a page break, the marker is placed inside the word at exactly the same position as in the physical book. This means that occasionally a word might be bifurcated by this marker.

Table of contents

INTRODUCTION

1. DEVELOPING THE CONCEPT OF MILITARY RAILWAY USE

2. RED ARMY MILITARY TRANSPORT IN THE FINAL STAGES OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR – TRANSPORT-BASED SECURITY OF THE RED ARMY OPERATIONS IN BELARUS AND THE VISTULA-AND-ODRA REGION

3. RECONSTRUCTING, ORGANISING, AND DEVELOPING THE HEADQUARTERS OF MILITARY TRANSPORT IN THE YEARS 1944–1962

3.1 Department of Military transport, Military District Command I Warsaw

3.2 Reconstruction of Railway Units

3.2.1 The 5th Railway Troops Battalion in Darłowo

3.2.2 3rd Railway Troops Battalion in Pikulice near Przemyśl

3.2.3 7th Railway Troops Battalion in Września

4. PREPARING THE Polish State Railways NETWORK FOR A MILITARY CONFLICT AS PART OF WARSAW PACT STRATEGIC PLANS

4.1 Securing Transport for the Frontline Offensive Campaign

4.2 Evacuation of the Wounded

4.2.1 Temporary Transhipment Areas

4.2.2 Organisational Structure of Military Transport on the Frontline

4.2.3 Organising Technical Protection for the Frontline Railway Network

4.3 Destruction of Railway Lines, Stations, Facilities and Rolling Stock

4.3.1 Bridge Destruction

4.3.2 Bridge Mining

4.4 Temporary Reconstruction (Construction) of Railway Lines

4.4.1 Reconstruction of Water Supply Facilities

4.4.2 Reconstruction of Buildings Indispensable to Railway Traffic

4.4.3 Reconstruction of Railway Signalling Devices

4.4.4 Temporary Bridge Reconstruction

4.5 Folding Railway Bridges

4.6 Railway Bridge Crossings Built by the Road and Railway Units of the Polish Armed Forces as part of the Warsaw Pact Military Exercises and Performing Tasks to Support the National Economy

5. MILITARY TRANSPORTS

5.1 Military Transports – Typology

5.1.1 Military Rail Transport

5.1.2 Anti-Aircraft Defence of Military Transports

5.1.3 Anti-Tank Defence of Military Transports

5.1.4 Safeguarding the Confidentiality of Transports

5.1.5 Rolling Stock used for Military transport Purposes

5.1.6 Loading Areas, Stations, and Sites; Loading Devices

5.2 Transporting Soviet Army Troops in Transit by the Polish State Railways

5.3 Transports for Soviet Army Troops Stationed in Poland

6. MILITARY RAILWAY SIDINGS AND MILITARY RAILWAYS

6.1 Military narrow-gauge railways

6.1.1 Military siding no. 289 Hrubieszów (Hrubieszów narrow-gauge railway)

6.1.2 Narrow-gauge military railway at the Field Artillery Research Centre in Zielonka (military siding No. 182) and standard-gauge siding No. 127

6.1.3 Rolling stock

6.1.4 Narrow-gauge 600mm railway on the Hel peninsula (military siding No. 582)

6.1.5 Narrow-gauge 600 mm military railway Gdynia-Port Wojenny Oksywie, (military siding No. 581) JW 3643 Gdynia Port-Oksywie, siding No. 407

6.1.6 Military railway Świnoujście, military siding No. 881 (600 mm)

6.1.7 Military siding No. 181, JW 1540 Nowe Miasto and sidings for fuel re-pumping station in Piaseczno No. 101/183 (standard- and narrow-gauge)

6.1.8 Military siding in Zegrze Pomorskie and fuel re-pumping point siding in Koszalin

6.1.9 Military siding JW 4420 No. 180 (Mława narrow-gauge railway)

6.2 Military rolling stock

6.2.1 Locomotives

6.2.2 Wagon and special rolling stock

6.2.3 Management of military rolling stock

6.2.4 Road trailers for wagon transport

6.2.5 Narrow-gauge military tank wagons of the Ministry of National Defence

CONCLUSION

BIBLIOGRAPHY

INDEX

←8 | 9→

INTRODUCTION

The phrase military transport first appeared in Polish military vocabulary in the late 1920s, when the Polish Armed Forces extended the existing scope of tasks of the Railway Division of the General Staff to include other modes of transport for military use, as part of an exercise aimed at re-organising its quartermaster services (to the French army model). In 1928, Headquarters for Military Transport were established as part of the General Staff.1

According to one definition, the phrase military transport shall apply to all of the following items:2

Military forms of transport and communication (fixed and mobile) used in any organised process of moving (transferring) and carrying troops and military supplies.

Organisational and technical ventures associated with the handling of military transport and ensuring the viability of the transport network in use during such ventures.

Military transport service bodies responsible for the management and control of any process involving such ventures.

Military transport units reporting to aforementioned bodies.

Militarised bodies and units (formations) of civilian transport divisions and local forces reporting to the aforementioned bodies operationally.

Another definition of military transport references the actual communication system, which comprises a network of mutually connected roads, military transport units deployed along them, together with assorted military transport formations.3

Once thus defined, the scope of the phrase blatantly includes all modes of land and air transport employed to move troops, equipment and supplies, as well as other related matters. In this work, I have decided to limit the scope of the phrase to the issues of military use of rail transport, essentially restricting it to the operational use of the Polish State Railways network as a mode of transport for the Warsaw Pact troops.

←9 | 10→

The fundamental purpose of this work is to present the history of the Headquarters of Military Transport of the Polish Armed Forces and of the railway units involved, and to analyse all technical issues tying in with military transport from a historical perspective. I took on a task of no lesser importance: that of describing the planned operational use of railway infrastructure on the Polish territory along the Western and Coastal Operational Directions as part of the strategic plans drafted by the parties to the Warsaw Pact.

In addition, my intention was also to create a detailed portrayal of the organisational structure and missions (during warfare and times of peace alike) of military transport bodies and railway troops, and strategic post-war use of railway transport. The narrative describing the transport of Red Army forces (operational transport and supplies) with the use of the Polish State Railways network was of no lesser importance.

Chronologically, the work spans the period of 1944–1960. The timeframe identified for the purposes of the project ties in closely with the fact that in the late 1950s, following a reduction to the armed forces, railway battalions were reformed into railway regiments, their purpose and organisational structure duly changed. For the Headquarters of Military Transport 1962 became the fundamental watershed: this was when railway transport units were integrated with the road service. In November 1962, the Headquarters of Military Transport of the General Staff of the Polish Armed Forces merged with the 15th Division of the General Staff of the Polish Armed Forces and the Headquarters of Military Transport of the Ministry of National Defence was formed. Due to the interconnectivity of technical matters associated with the preparation of the Polish State Railways network for warfare (requiring a more comprehensive approach), I described the issue up to and including the year 1990. If considered only up until 1962, the account would not have shown the size or importance of comprehensive investments on the Polish railway network.

In analysing significant investments on the Polish State Railways network, one cannot help but ask an undermining question concerning the effectiveness of the techniques used, and the organisation of military rail transport in times of a planned conflict. The usability of infrastructure developed for military purposes, as well as matters concerned with its potential use in times of peace following the Cold War, are also of vital interest. I attempted to answer these questions in individual chapters.

Considerable difficulties were encountered at the stage of collecting source material for this work, due among other things to the fact that the majority of archival materials regarding military transport have until recently been considered classified. Furthermore, given the orders to dispose of documentation ←10 | 11→describing operational and mobilisation exercises as well as technical documents, a considerable part of all resources has been completely destroyed. At the stage of gathering materials for the purpose of this work, it was found that only the very basic military transport service files from the 1970s and 1980s had been preserved at the Ministry of Defence Central Archives in Modlin. Additionally, issues connected with post-1945 military transports were shrouded in secrecy, which is why the few existing materials were published as classified military instructions, or as articles in restricted-access military journals of the time, such as Przegląd Kwatermistrzowski.

Reference sources for this study include technical and operational military and railway files, technical documentation related to rolling stock used for military transport, track layout plans for railway stations, military sidings, transfer routes and transhipment areas; assorted regulations and service instructions related to military transports, as well as the destruction and reconstruction of temporary and permanent railway lines (both military and civilian).

When compiling the reference list I only included the most important sources and studies.

Vital items include an extraordinarily extensive in-house study by Colonel Marian Gembora titled Wojska kolejowe, preserved at the Library of the Military Bureau for Historical Research, as well as a largely forgotten work by Captain Ryszard Strózik, Wojska kolejowe 1944–1946, [The Railway Military 1944–1946], (Master thesis under Professor Stanisław Herbst at the Department of History at Political-Military Academy) Military Office of Historical Research Archive (Military Office of Historical Research Archive), which describes the organisation and military activities of the military transport service of the 1st and 2nd Polish Armies. Interesting items depicting the organisational structure of the military transport service include a study by the Head of Staff of the Military Transport Service of the Chief Quartermaster of the Polish Armed Forces, titled Zarys historii Szefostwa Służby Komunikacji Wojskowej (unpublished). A valuable reference source for the description of tactical, organisational and technical matters related to warfare (“W”) military transport has been provided by a Ministry of Defence Manual, Chief of Transport 33/64, Komunikacja wojskowa, Warsaw 1965.

Details

Pages
448
Year
2020
ISBN (PDF)
9783631829653
ISBN (ePUB)
9783631829660
ISBN (MOBI)
9783631829677
ISBN (Hardcover)
9783631818299
DOI
10.3726/b17291
Open Access
CC-BY-NC-ND
Language
English
Publication date
2020 (September)
Keywords
developing the concept of military railway use military transport Polish state railways network Warsaw Pact Red Army military transport military narrow-gauge railways
Published
Berlin, Bern, Bruxelles, New York, Oxford, Warszawa, Wien, 2020. 448 pp., 65 fig. b/w, 58 tables.

Biographical notes

Zbigniew Tucholski (Author) Barbara Bienias (Revision)

Zbigniew Tucholski Ph. D. is a professor at the Institute of History of Science of the Polish Academy of Science, a technical historian, specialised in the history of railways, transportation, industry and military technology, and the preservation of transport infrastructure and architecture heritage.

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