76th Rifle Division (Soviet Union)
The 76th Rifle Division was a Red Army infantry division, formed twice. The division was formed in 1922 and was known also as the 76th Armenian Mountain Division. It was a Soviet infantry fighting unit of the Red Army that fought on the Eastern Front during the Second World War. The 76th was made up primarily of Armenians from the newly established Soviet Socialist Republic of Armenia, but also included among its ranks several different nationalities. The division became the 51st Guards Rifle Division on 23 November 1942 for its actions in Operation Uranus. The division was reformed in 1943 from a rifle brigade. The division's second formation was disbanded in the summer of 1945. Interwar period The division was originally formed as the Armenian Rifle Division by an order of the Separate Caucasus Army on 5 September 1922 from the Consolidated Armenian Brigade, which had itself been formed from the Armenian Red Army on 18 November 1921, after the Red Army invasion of Armenia. The division was part of the Separate Caucasus Army. The 76th was led by several non-Armenian commanders including Major Generals S. V. Chernikov, E. F. Pryakhin, K. E. Goryunov, N. E. Kaladzen, N. T. Tavarkiladze (the latter two were ethnic Georgians), Colonel G. G. Voronin, and subordinate commanders A. P. Melik-Shahnazaryan, H. T. Atoyan (the latter two being Armenians). Instruction was carried out in Armenian and the unit published a military newspaper, The Red Soldier, and a newsletter The Red Fighting Man (both in Armenian). During the Second World War, a third paper, Voroshilovets, under the aegis of Armenian novelist Hrachya Kochar, began publication in Russian. The division was reorganized as the Armenian Mountain Rifle Division in 1931. In 1935, the division became part of the Transcaucasian Military District when the Separate Caucasus Army was reorganized. On 2 December of that year, the division was named after Soviet Central Committee member (and later Marshal of the Soviet Union) Kliment Voroshilov. On 21 May 1936 it was redesignated as the 76th Armenian Mountain Rifle Division when the Red Army standardized its numbering system. The division was awarded the Order of the Red Banner on 29 May in commemoration of its fifteenth anniversary. In 1938, soldiers of other Soviet nationalities began to enter the ranks of the division, though it remained in the Armenian SSR and retained its flag, its number, and traditions. On 16 July 1940, the division's Armenian designation was removed when the Red Army officially converted national formations into regular units. The Second World War Iran In the summer of 1941, Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union and drove into the large landmass of Russia and Ukraine on three fronts. The southernmost drove through the Caucasus with the objective of capturing the petroleum fields and reserves in Baku, Azerbaijan. By autumn, the German Wehrmacht had pushed far into the regions and was nearing the outlet of the northern Caucasus. In order to prevent a possible link up between Iran, whose leader Reza Shah Pahlavi