Darren Baker provides an in-box review of Russian Army Assault Infantry, a twelve figure set by Tamiya in 1/35.

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If you have comments or questions please post them here.

Thanks!

Hi Darren,

Good review, I remember when these got released I thought they would be a reallly useful set. I waited patiently to see if some similar British figures might appear but alas that was not to be!

I'm not much on Russian Military History but I believe they had complete Battalions issued with SMGs, but perhaps someone can expand on that, although I agree a few rifles would have been good in the mix of weapons too.

Al

Thanks Alan. Tamiya did release a set of eight British troops in the desert uniform, I have 2 sets sitting upstairs and I am willing to send you a set of them if you have a use for them.

Hi Darren,

Thanks for the offer but I'm OK thanks. The early Tamiya desert troops weren't particilarly good and MiniArt have some British Tank Riders shown along with Engineers, Tank crew and Jeep crews so plenty to look forward to these days.

Thanks again.

Al

I've also read about complete battalions equipped solely with submachine guns, but I doubt they were Thompsons. While I'm not an expert on the subject either, I'd stick with Russian SMGs, perhaps with the exception of tank crews in American lend-lease vehicles.

Wikipedia's article on the Thompson claims that while the Soviet Union received Thompsons with lend-lease tanks, they weren't issued to the red army because of ammo shortages.
Modern Firearms mentions them being used, but not liked by the Soviets.
While this page has quite a comprehensive listing of lend-lease shipments, it unfortunately puts all .45 cal SMGs under one listing, "Submachine, Cal. .45, (All Types)", with 137,729 weapons shipped to the USSR.

Someone was telling me the other day that Russian shock troops were all armed with automatic weapons, which is where Tamiya could have been coming from with this offering.

Hi Eetu,

Delete Tommy Gun think SMG and the PPSH-41. There were SMG Battalions, where the main weapon was the PPSH-41 with the round drum magazine. This was a cheap and easy weapon to produce and very effective in the close fighting that occurred in the cities and towns.

It was the Russians who pioneered the Assault Rifle form the close quarter fighting experience, but it was a later development if I recall and a compromise between the PPSH41 and the rifle.

The Russians produce some 6 million of these weapons, equiping whole Battalions and even divisions with them. Some more details here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PPSh-41

Hi Darren this links with what you heard.

Al

Thank you Alan that link is helpful.

Nice Review!

I have the 1/48 version of this set and I really liked it.

Poses where good and I liked the various seated and leaping from a tank options.

Although the detail is rather undefined, you can get away with this more in 1/48 I think, but on the 1/35 set it really starts to show.

In addition to the weapon issue though I also found the vast mixture of different uniform rather odd.
Winter great coats, light summer fatigues, and early Soviet and later soviet Tsarist style all jumbled together.

Also why only give a few Ushanka and the others light peak caps? It's like a Russian Uniform 101 set

I actually see all the uniform types as a plus, however I can see that if the set was purchased to use at one time it may look odd. With all that said the digging I have done indicates that Russian forces of the period wore a very mixed bag of uniform with kit from before and just after Barbarossa still being seen in use during the invasion of Berlin. I do accept that the troops wearing cold weather gear may look out of place in a summer setting and vice versa.

Nice review, i am currently building this set for a T34 dio and have found all the figures very well made. The range of poses is great, and a lot of the figures designed to ride the tank actually fit better into other parts of the dio. I plan to use all of these in one dio with the posible exeption of figure F, whose pose is a little too relaxed and doesn't really fit in with the other figures who are either running forward, firing or taking cover.

Luke figure I looks as if he is ready for a sausage and a potato followed by a smoke rather than going to war. Smoke and a pancake maybe.

agreed, maybe i'll just use him for spares