Service in Germany
3rd Shock Army stayed in Germany after the end of the war, becoming part of the Group of Soviet Forces in Germany. During the 1960s and early 1970s the Army's divisions were equipped with the T-62 and T-55 tanks. During the late 1970s the divisions received T-64A, T-64B (one third of each battalion), and eventually T-64BV with dynamic armour. In 1984 a decision was made to re-equip the formations with T-80BV variants (10th Guards Tank Division), replacing the T-64s BMP-1/2 and variants, and various BTR variants.
The army kept the descriptive title "shock" into the 1950s, when it was re-titled the 3rd Assault Army, before assuming its final name: the 3rd "Red Banner" Combined Arms Army (Russian: 3-я краснознаменная общевойсковая армия).
During 1989–91 a past commanding officer of the Army (1969) V.I. Varennikov was the Commander in Chief of the Ground Forces of the Soviet Union. The Army was relocated from Germany during 1990–1991 and dispersed throughout the former Soviet Union, with many units and sub-units disbanded or converted to training units and storage depots. Army headquarters was briefly sent to the Far East Military District but then disbanded.
Read more about this topic: 3rd Shock Army
Famous quotes containing the words service in, service and/or germany:
“The ability to think straight, some knowledge of the past, some vision of the future, some skill to do useful service, some urge to fit that service into the well-being of the community,—these are the most vital things education must try to produce.”
—Virginia Crocheron Gildersleeve (1877–1965)
“For those parents from lower-class and minority communities ... [who] have had minimal experience in negotiating dominant, external institutions or have had negative and hostile contact with social service agencies, their initial approaches to the school are often overwhelming and difficult. Not only does the school feel like an alien environment with incomprehensible norms and structures, but the families often do not feel entitled to make demands or force disagreements.”
—Sara Lawrence Lightfoot (20th century)
“We are fighting in the quarrel of civilization against barbarism, of liberty against tyranny. Germany has become a menace to the whole world. She is the most dangerous enemy of liberty now existing.”
—Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919)