How Margelov forced the Germans to surrender. Vasily Filippovich Margelov
August 2, 1930 was the birthday of the Airborne Forces of the country. Then, for the first time in world history, paratroopers were used at the exercises of the Moscow Military District, which were attended by diplomats from Western countries.
Since then, 72 years have passed. During this time, the "winged infantry" covered itself with unfading glory on the battlefields of the Great Patriotic War, showed excellent skill and courage in a number of large-scale exercises, local conflicts, in the mountains of Afghanistan, during the first and second campaigns in Chechnya, in Yugoslavia ... A whole galaxy of remarkable military leaders grew up in the ranks of the landing troops. Among them, the first of the first to name the name of the legendary Commander of the Airborne Forces, Hero Soviet Union Army General Vasily Filippovich Margelov, who created modern air landing troops.
"Commander of a large caliber"
On September 28, 1967, Izvestia reported on its pages: “It must be said that the paratroopers are warriors of boundless courage and courage. They never get lost, they always find a way out of a critical situation. Paratroopers are fluent in various modern weapons, own it with artistic skill, each fighter of the "winged infantry" knows how to fight one against a hundred.
For the days spent on the teachings ( we are talking about the big autumn exercise of the Soviet Armed Forces "Dnepr" in 1968. Then the landing of thousands of airborne troops took only a few minutes. - Auth.), We had to see a lot of skillful actions not only of individual soldiers and officers, but also formations, units and their headquarters. But, perhaps, the strongest impression left on the Airborne Forces, which is headed by Colonel General V. Margelov (after completing successful exercises, he was awarded the rank of General of the Army. - Auth.), And the pilots of the Military Transport Aviation Marshal of Aviation N. Skripko . Their soldiers showed filigree landing technique, high training and such courage and initiative that one can say about them: they worthily continue and increase the military glory of their fathers and older brothers - the paratroopers of the Great Patriotic War. The relay race of courage and valor is in good hands.”
...Recently, I read in one of the magazines that scientists who study people have studied the biographies of about 500 graduates of one of the Russian military institutes and have established a direct dependence of the choice of a military specialty on the date of birth. According to it, pundits are ready to predict whether a given person will be military or civilian. In a word, human destiny is predetermined from the day of birth. I don't know if you can believe it?
In any case, the future successor of the glorious dynasty of the defenders of the Fatherland Margelov, Vasily Filippovich, was born at the beginning of the last century, on December 27, 1908 (according to the old style), in the city of Yekaterinoslav (now Dnepropetrovsk). All went to his father, Philip Ivanovich, who was distinguished by enviable strength and article, a participant in the German war of 1914, St. George Cavalier. Margelov Sr. fought skillfully and bravely. In one of the bayonet battles, for example, he personally destroyed up to a dozen enemy soldiers. After the end of the first imperialist, he served first in the Red Guard, then in the Red Army.
Why not in your place?
- Well, well ... How are you doing?
Patriarch of the Elite Troops
And Vasily was, like a father, tall and strong beyond his years. Before the army, he managed to work in a leather workshop, as a miner, and a forester. In 1928, on a Komsomol ticket, he was sent to the Workers 'and Peasants' Red Army. So he became a cadet of the United Belarusian Military School in Minsk. Only one stroke. At the beginning of 1931, the school command supported the initiative of the country's military schools to organize a ski crossing from the places of deployment to Moscow. One of the best skiers, foreman Margelov, was assigned to form a team. And the February transition from Minsk to Moscow took place. True, the skis turned into smooth boards, but the cadets, led by the course commander and foreman, survived. They arrived at their destination on time, without sickness and frostbite, about which the foreman reported to the People's Commissar of Defense and received from him a valuable gift - a "commander's" watch.
How later a thorough sports hardening was useful to Captain Margelov, the commander of a separate reconnaissance ski battalion rifle regiment who took part in the winter war with the Finns! His scouts, together with the battalion commander, made daring raids on enemy rear lines, set up ambushes, inflicting sensitive damage on the enemy.
He met the Great Patriotic War with the rank of major. At first, I had a chance to head a separate disciplinary battalion. The penitentiaries doted on their commander. They loved him for his courage and justice. During the bombings, they covered him with their bodies.
On the outskirts of Leningrad, Vasily Margelov commanded the 1st special ski regiment of sailors of the Baltic Fleet, then the 218th regiment of the 80th rifle division…
Becoming a commander, for all subsequent years, decades, Vasily Filippovich never changed his rule - always and in everything to be an example for subordinates. Somehow, at the end of the front-line spring of 1942, about two hundred experienced enemy warriors, having infiltrated through the defense sector of a neighboring regiment, went to the rear of the Margelovites. The regiment commander quickly gave the necessary orders to block and liquidate the fascists who had broken through. Without waiting for the approach of the reserves, he himself lay down behind the easel machine gun, which he masterfully owned. Well-aimed bursts mowed down about 80 people. The rest were destroyed and captured by a company of submachine gunners, a reconnaissance platoon and a commandant's platoon that arrived in time.
Not without reason, in the mornings, when his unit was on the defensive, Vasily Filippovich, after physical exercises, invariably fired from a machine gun, could cut the tops of trees, knock out his name on the target. After that - a leg in the stirrup and exercises in the wheelhouse. Indefatigable strength played in his iron muscles. In offensive battles, he personally raised battalions on the attack more than once. Loved to oblivion hand-to-hand combat and, if necessary, unaware of the feeling of fear, fought desperately with the adversary in the forefront of his fighters, like his father in the first German war. Margelov did not like it if one of his subordinates, when asked about this or that soldier, took up the list of personnel. He said:
— Comrade Commander! Alexander Suvorov knew all the soldiers of his regiment not only by name, but also by name. After many years, he recognized and named the names of the soldiers who served with him. With paper knowledge of subordinates, it is impossible to predict how they will behave during the battle!
In those years, the commander wore a mustache and a small beard. In incomplete 33 years, they called him Batya.
“Our Batya is a commander of a large caliber,” the fighters spoke with respect and love about him.
And then there was Stalingrad. Here Vasily Filippovich commanded the 13th Guards Rifle Regiment. When, during the fierce, bloody battles in the regiment, the battalions became companies, and the companies became incomplete platoons, the regiment was withdrawn to replenish the Ryazan region. The regiment commander Margelov, his officers thoroughly took up combat training personnel of the unit. Prepare for the upcoming battles in good conscience.
And for good reason. "Myshkova, the river in Volgograd region, the left tributary of the Don, at the turn of which, during the Battle of Stalingrad from December 19 to 24, during the Kotelnikov operation of 1942, the troops of the 51st and 2nd Guards armies repulsed the blow of a strong group of Nazi troops and frustrated the plans of the Nazi command to deblockade enemy troops surrounded near Stalingrad. It's from the Military encyclopedic dictionary» 1983 edition. “It would not be an exaggeration to say that the battle on the banks of this obscure river (Myshkov) led to the crisis of the Third Reich, put an end to Hitler’s hopes for an empire and was a decisive link in the chain of events that determined the defeat of Germany.” And this quote is from the book of the German military historian General F. Mellenthin "Tank Battles 1939-1945".
Do you remember the book of the front-line writer Yuri Bondarev "Hot Snow"? Front-line soldiers, participants in those battles, believe that the author truly reflected the heroic and at the same time dramatic picture of those fierce battles on the tributary of the Don.
So, Margelov's regiment was part of the 3rd Guards Rifle Division of Major General K. Tsalikov, 13th Guards rifle corps Major General P. Chanchibadze,
2nd Guards Army Lieutenant General R. Malinovsky. And as you know, the guard can die, but never surrender to the enemy!
Before the battle of the Guards, Lieutenant Colonel Margelov said to his subordinates:
— Manstein has a lot of tanks. His calculation on the strength of a tank strike. The main thing is to knock out the tanks. Each of us must knock out one tank. Cut off the infantry, force them to cling to the ground and destroy them.
... And it began. Predatory arrows on the German headquarters maps materialized into endless waves of enemy armor and fire, methodically rolling on the positions of our troops, shell explosions, the whistle of thousands of fragments looking for their prey. Armadas of German bombers were howling from the sky black with soot, trying with exemplary German pedantry and accuracy to deliver a multi-ton deadly load to the location of the guards. The Germans understood that if their monstrous armored fist got stuck in defense, then the consequences would be irreversible. More and more forces were thrown into battle. They tried to take our defending units, formations into tank pincers.
Margelov was where a threatening situation was created, where his battalion commanders, on their own, could not hold back the onslaught of the enemy.
Guards Major General Chanchibadze:
- Margelov, how many of you do you need to look for? Where are you sitting now?
- I am not sitting. I command from the command post of the battalion commander-2!
Why not in your place?
“My place is here now, comrade number one!”
- I ask again, where is your mesto ?!
I am in command of the regiment. My place is where my regiment needs me!
- Well, well ... How are you doing?
— The regiment stands on its lines. Not going to give them up.
Embittered by failures, enraged by the stubbornness, skill and courage of the Soviet soldiers, the enemy furiously dug the ground with steel tracks, breaking through. But all the efforts of the combined army group "Goth" were in vain, it was defeated and forced to retreat.
The further combat path of Vasily Filippovich Margelov and his units lay already to the west. In the direction of Rostov-on-Don, the breakthrough of the impregnable Mius Front, the liberation of the Donbass, the crossing of the Dnieper, for which the division commander, Colonel Vasily Margelov, was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. Pushing off with their foot from the Stalingrad land, the Margelovites, as Vladimir Vysotsky sang, "the axis of the earth ... moved without a lever, changing the direction of the blow!"
The soldiers of his 49th division brought freedom to the inhabitants of Nikolaev, Odessa, distinguished themselves during the Iasi-Kishinev operation, entered Romania, Bulgaria on the shoulders of the enemy, successfully fought in Yugoslavia, took Budapest and Vienna. The unit of the Guards, Major General Vasily Margelov, ended the war on May 12, 1945 with the brilliant bloodless capture of the elite German SS divisions "Dead Head", "Great Germany", "1st police division SS". What is not the plot for a full-length feature film?
During the Victory Parade on Red Square in Moscow on June 24, 1945, the combat general led one of the battalions of the combined regiment of the 2nd Ukrainian front.
Patriarch of the Elite Troops
During the Great Patriotic War, the Airborne Troops fought heroically at all its stages. True, the war found the Airborne Forces at the stage of reorganizing brigades into corps. The formations and units of the winged infantry were manned, but did not have time to fully receive military equipment. From the very first days of the war, paratroopers fought bravely at the front along with soldiers of other branches of the armed forces, and offered heroic resistance to the well-oiled Nazi machine. In the initial period, they showed examples of courage and perseverance in the Baltic States, Belarus and Ukraine, near Moscow. Soviet paratroopers participated in fierce battles for the Caucasus, in Battle of Stalingrad(remember the House of Paratrooper Sergeant Pavlov), they smashed the enemy on Kursk Bulge... Were a formidable force at the final stage of the war.
Where to use well-trained, cohesive and fearless commanders and fighters of airborne formations and units was decided in the war at the very top, at the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command. Sometimes they were the lifesaver of the high command, which saved the situation at the most decisive or tragic moment. The paratroopers, who were not accustomed to waiting for the weather by the sea, always showed initiative, ingenuity, and onslaught.
Therefore, taking into account the rich front-line experience and the prospects for the development of this type of troops, the Airborne Forces were withdrawn from the Air Force in 1946. They began to report directly to the Minister of Defense of the Soviet Union. At the same time, the post of commander of the Airborne Forces was reintroduced. In April of the same year, he was appointed Colonel-General V. Glagolev. After the end of the Great Patriotic War, General Margelov was sent to study. For two intense years, under the supervision of experienced teachers, he studied the intricacies of operational art at the Academy General Staff(in those years - the Higher Military Academy named after K.E. Voroshilov). After graduation, he received from the Minister of the Armed Forces of the USSR and Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers N. Bulganin unexpected offer- to take command of the Pskov airborne division. They say that it was not without the recommendation of Marshal of the Soviet Union Rodion Yakovlevich Malinovsky, at that time the commander-in-chief of the troops of the Far East, the commander of the troops of the Far Eastern Military District. He knew Margelov well from his front-line affairs. And at that time, the Airborne Forces needed young generals with combat experience. Vasily Filippovich always made decisions promptly. And this time he did not force himself to be persuaded. A military man to the marrow of his bones, he understood the importance of the mobile Airborne Forces in the future. Yes, and fearless officers and paratroopers - he admitted this more than once to his relatives - reminded him of the front-line years when he commanded a naval regiment in the Baltic Fleet. Not without reason later, when General Margelov became commander of the Airborne Forces, he introduced uniform blue berets and vests with stripes of the color of the sky and tireless sea waves.
Working in his usual mode - day and night - a day away, General Margelov quickly ensured that his unit became one of the best in the landing troops. In 1950 he was appointed commander of the airborne corps on Far East, and in 1954 Lieutenant General Vasily Filippovich Margelov became commander of the Airborne Forces.
From Margelov's brochure "Airborne Troops", published by the publishing house of the Znanie society a quarter of a century ago: And I still never cease to be amazed at how a warrior transforms after the first jump. And on the ground, he walks proudly, and his shoulders are widely deployed, and there is something unusual in his eyes ... Still: he made a parachute jump!
To understand this feeling, you must stand at the open hatch of the aircraft over a hundred-meter abyss, feel the chill under your heart in front of this incomprehensible height, and decisively step into the abyss as soon as the command sounds: “Let's go!”
Then there will be many more difficult jumps - with weapons, day and night, from high-speed military transport aircraft. But the first jump will never be forgotten. A paratrooper, a strong-willed and courageous person, begins with him.
When Vasily Filippovich retrained from an infantry commander to an airborne division commander, he was not even forty. How did Margelov start? From skydiving. He was not advised to jump, after all, nine wounds, age ... During his service in the Airborne Forces, he made more than 60 jumps. The last of them at the age of 65. In the year of the 90th anniversary of the birth of General of the Army Margelov, “Red Star” wrote about him in the article “Legend and Glory of the Landing Forces”: “Being the eighth commander of the Airborne Forces, he nevertheless earned himself a respectful reputation in these troops as the patriarch of the landing business. During his command Airborne troops five ministers of defense were replaced in the country, and Margelov remained indispensable and irreplaceable. Almost all of his predecessors have been forgotten, and the name of Margelov is still on everyone's lips.
“Oh, how difficult it is to cross the Rubicon so that a surname becomes a name,” the poet remarked. Margelov crossed such a Rubicon. (He made his branch of the armed forces elite.) Having quickly and energetically studied airborne business, military air technology and military transport aviation, having shown outstanding organizational skills, he became an outstanding military leader who did an extraordinary amount for the development and improvement of the Airborne Forces, for their growth prestige and popularity in the country, in order to instill love for this elite branch of the military among the draft youth. Despite the enormous physical and psychological stress landing service, young guys dream of the Airborne Forces, as they say, they sleep and see themselves as paratroopers. And in the country's only forge of officer landing personnel - the Ryazan Higher Command School twice Red Banner named after General of the Army V.F. Margelov, recently transformed into the Institute of the Airborne Forces, the competition is 14 people per place. How many military and civilian universities can envy such popularity! And all this was laid down under Margelov ... "
The Hero of Russia, Lieutenant-General of the Reserve Leonid Shcherbakov, recalls:
- In the seventies of the last century, Army General Vasily Filippovich Margelov set himself the difficult task of creating highly mobile, modern Airborne Troops in the Armed Forces of the country. A rapid rearmament began in the Airborne Forces, airborne combat vehicles (BMD) arrived, on their basis reconnaissance, communications and control equipment, self-propelled artillery, anti-tank systems, engineering equipment ... Margelov and his deputies, heads of services and departments were frequent guests at factories, training grounds, in training centers. The paratroopers daily "disturbed" the ministries of defense and the defense industry. Ultimately, this culminated in the creation of the best landing equipment in the world.
After graduating from the Academy in 1968 armored forces I was assigned to a test job at the Research Institute of Armored Vehicles in Kubinka. I had a chance to test many samples at the training grounds of Transbaikalia, Central Asia, Belarus and in the middle of nowhere. Somehow we were instructed to test the new equipment of the Airborne Forces. I worked with colleagues day and night, in various modes, sometimes prohibitive for technology and people.
The final stage is military trials in the Baltics. And here the divisional commander, catching my white envy of the paratroopers, offered to jump with a parachute after the combat vehicle.
Passed pre-jump training. Take off early in the morning. Climb. Everything was going well: the BMD got out of the plane and fell into the abyss. The crew followed. A sudden strong wind blew us to the boulders. The joyful feeling of flying under the dome ended with pain in the left leg - a fracture in two places.
Gypsum, autographs of paratroopers on it, crutches. In this form, he appeared before the commander of the Airborne Forces.
- Well, did you jump? Margelov asked me.
- Jumped, comrade commander.
- I'm taking you to the landing. I need such ones, - Vasily Filippovich made a decision.
At that time, there was an acute issue of reducing the lead time landing units on alert after landing. The old landing method - military equipment was thrown from one aircraft, crews from another - is pretty outdated.
After all, the spread on the landing area was large, sometimes reaching five kilometers. While the crews were looking for their equipment, time was running out like water in the sand.
Therefore, the commander of the Airborne Forces decided that the crew should be parachuted along with the combat vehicle. This was not the case in any army in the world! But this was not an argument for Vasily Filippovich, who believed that there were no impossible tasks for the landing force.
In August 1975, after landing equipment with dummies, I, as a driver, together with the son of the commander, Alexander Margelov, were entrusted with testing the joint landing complex. They named him "Centaur". The combat vehicle was mounted on a platform, behind it was attached an open vehicle for crew members with their own parachutes. Without means of rescue inside the BMD, testers were located on special, simplified space chairs for astronauts. We have completed the task. And this was a major step towards a more complex experiment. Together with the son of the commander, Alexander Margelov, we tested a parachute-reactive system, which was already called "Reaktavr". The system was located at the stern of the BMD and went to the take-off airfield with it. She had only one dome instead of five. At the same time, the height and speed of landing decreased, but the landing accuracy increased. There are many advantages, but the main disadvantage is huge overloads.
In January 1976, near Pskov, for the first time in world and domestic practice, this “reactive” landing was carried out with a huge risk to life, without individual means of rescue.
"And what happened next?" the discerning reader will ask. And then in each airborne regiment in winter and summer, crews landed inside combat vehicles on parachute and parachute-rocket systems, which became perfect and reliable. In 1998, again near Pskov, a crew of seven people in standard seats descended from the skies inside the then newest BMD-3.
For the feat of the seventies, twenty years later, Alexander Margelov and I were awarded the title of Hero of Russia.
I will add that it was under General of the Army Margelov that it became a common practice: to raise an airborne assault, say, in Pskov, make a long flight and land near Ferghana, Kirovabad or in Mongolia. It is not for nothing that one of the most popular decodings of the abbreviation of the Airborne Forces is “Uncle Vasya’s Troops”.
In the ranks - sons and grandchildren
Recalls retired Major General Gennady Margelov:
- During the war, until 1944, I lived with my grandparents - the parents of my father Vasily Filippovich Margelov. In the evacuation came to us somehow Lance Sergeant. I still remember the last name - Ivanov. Well, he won me over with his stories about serving in his father's division. I wasn't even thirteen then. He was going to return to the unit. He left the house in the morning, and I was with him, as if to school. Himself in the other direction ... and - to the station. We got on the train and went. And so he fled at the age of 12 from the fifth grade to the front. We arrived at the division. Father did not know that I had arrived. We met face to face and did not recognize each other. It is not surprising, because they had seen each other before the Finnish War, when he wore one "sleeper" in his buttonhole. From the first days of the Great Patriotic War he was at the front. There was no time for vacation.
And so I ended up in my father's division near Kherson in the Kopani region. It was then the end of February, in some places there was still snow. Mud. I ran away from home in holey felt boots. So he caught a cold, his whole face was in boils, he even saw poorly. I ended up in a medical battalion, treated myself.
And then the dad calls: “Well, did you rest in the medical battalion?” Me: "That's right!" “Then go study at training battalion».
I arrived, as expected, reported to the battalion commander. There were three companies in the battalion: two rifle companies and a company of heavy weapons. So they sent me to a platoon of anti-tank rifles.
Well, PTR is PTR. We had guns of two systems: Degtyarev and Simonov. I got Simon's. The Germans were not as afraid as this gun: the soldiers were healthy, and I was very small, I thought that the recoil after the shot would throw me somewhere. Later, when they were already put into combat formation and the foreman first gave me a rifle, it turned out that it was longer than me. Replaced with a short cavalry carbine.
During the fighting in Odessa, two comrades and I (one was a year older, the other a year younger, the sons of the division chief of staff, Colonel V.F. Shubin) left with battalion scouts to beat the Germans on the streets of the city. What is a fight in the city? Sometimes you don’t understand where yours are and where your enemies are. In general, I was alone ... In one of the houses I came across a wine cellar. And suddenly, out of nowhere, a hefty German with a machine gun! Of course, he would have “mowed” me with a burst at the moment, yes, apparently, he got a Fritz of wine from the barrels, which is why he hesitated. I shot him with my carbine. But for my sortie I received from my father three days in a guardhouse, because it was forbidden for me to arbitrarily go to the front line. He served, however, only a day. The Shubin brothers received combat medals each. Always in our family, the demand from the Margelovs was strict.
When the division was already beyond the old Romanian border, in the town of Chobruchi, the commander called me and showed me the magazine "Red Army" (which later became the "Soviet Warrior"). And there, on the cover, there is a photo of the Suvorovites of the Novocherkassk SVU on the stairs at the main entrance. So beautiful!..
- Well, are you going to study? - asked the battalion commander.
“I’ll go,” I answered, fascinated looking at the photo, not knowing that the battalion commander was following the order of the division commander.
This is how the Great Patriotic War ended for me, the guards of Private Gennady Margelov, and the service in the training battalion of the 144th Guards Rifle Regiment, Colonel A.G. Lubenchenko, a service that was considered the most honorable even for adult soldiers, since the training battalion trained sergeants and was the last reserve of the division commander. Where it was difficult, the training battalion entered the battle.
I met Victory Day already in the Tambov SVU. Being a Suvorovite, he made several parachute jumps in Pskov in the 76th Airborne Division, commanded by his father, Major General V.F. Margelov. Moreover, the first two jumps - without the knowledge of the father. The third was performed in the presence of his father and the deputy commander of the corps for airborne training. After landing, I reported to the deputy commander: “Suvorovets Margelov made another, third jump. The materiel worked perfectly, I feel good!” My father, who was preparing to hand me the badge of a first-class parachutist, was extremely surprised and even said a couple of “warm” words. However, he soon came to terms with this “misconduct” and proudly said that his son was growing up as a real paratrooper.
After graduating from SVU in 1950, I became a cadet at the Ryazan Infantry School, after graduating from which I was sent to the Airborne Forces of the Far Eastern District.
In the airborne troops, he went from platoon commander to chief of staff of the 44th training airborne division. He jumped with a parachute, as I reported at the interview for admission to the Academy of the General Staff, "from Berlin to Sakhalin." There were no more questions.
After graduating from the academy, he was appointed commander of the 26th motorized rifle division, which was located in the city of Gusev. Since 1976 he served in Transbaikalia - the first deputy commander of the 29th combined arms army. He celebrated his fiftieth birthday as the head of the Military Institute twice of the Red Banner physical culture in Leningrad. He graduated from the service as a senior lecturer in the Department of Operational Art of the Academy of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the USSR.
The second son of Vasily Filippovich, Anatoly, also devoted his whole life to protecting the Motherland. A graduate of the Taganrog Radio Engineering Institute, he worked in the defense industry for decades. The doctor of technical sciences in his thirties did a lot for the development of new types of weapons. On account of the scientist more than two hundred inventions. When meeting, he likes to emphasize:
- Private reserve, Professor Margelov.
The deputy director of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service, Colonel-General Vitaly Margelov, recalls:
- After the evacuation, together with my mother and brother Anatoly, we lived in Taganrog. I still remember well how in 1945 we went with Tolik to the Oktyabr cinema, which was next to our house. And there, in the documentary chronicle, they show the Victory Parade. For us boys, it's a breathtaking sight. Marshals Zhukov and Rokossovsky on white horses. On the podium of the Lenin Mausoleum, Stalin himself. The front-line generals, officers, soldiers are marching in front, military orders and medals sparkle on their uniforms ... You can’t take your eyes off. And suddenly I see my father in the front columns. From delight as I will shout to the whole hall:
- Dad, dad...
The hushed spectators perked up. Everyone began to look with great curiosity who was making noise. Since then, the ushers began to let my brother and me into the cinema for free.
For the first time in a general's uniform, my father saw me at his birthday party. I was delighted, of course, with my career growth, but I tried not to show it. When we were left alone, he asked me about the service, gave a number of "diplomatic" advice from his rich practice.
There is such a tradition in our Margelov family, inherited from our father: do not spoil your sons, do not patronize them and respect their life choices.
... The younger twin brothers Margelov, Alexander and Vasily, were born on October 21 in the victorious 1945. Our newspaper wrote many times about the Hero of Russia, reserve colonel Alexander Margelov, who served in the landing troops. About his courage and fearlessness, shown during the test of the Reaktavr. After completing his service, he remained faithful to the Airborne Forces and the memory of his legendary father. In his apartment with his brother Vasily, he opened a home office-museum of Army General Vasily Filippovich Margelov.
“I note that the gift of the current owner of the Arbat apartment (Alexander Vasilyevich lives with his family in his father’s apartment) is not only military-technical, but also artistic. No wonder the house is full of books on various fields of knowledge. He called the first descent system inside the BMD on a multi-dome parachute "Centaur" - for he noticed that when the car moves in a stowed position, the driver is visible to the waist, resembling a mythical creature, only in a modern version, ”wrote in his article“ Military -home museum" Petr Palamarchuk, published in 1995 in the magazine "Rodina". Since then, the museum has been visited by over a thousand people, among whom were prominent statesmen, politicians of our country, near and far abroad. Delighted by the exhibits they saw, they left their entries in the visitor's book.
During his life, Alexander Margelov performed many deeds worthy of respect. Among them is the creation document book"Army General Margelov", which was published in Moscow in 1998. He prepared the next edition of the book, which is due to be published this autumn, in collaboration with his brother Vasily, a reserve major, an international journalist who is currently working as the first deputy director of the Directorate of International Relations of the Voice of Russia RGC. By the way, Vasily's son, reserve junior sergeant Vasily Margelov, named after his grandfather, served urgently in the Airborne Forces.
It should be noted that all the sons of Vasily Filippovich jumped with a parachute and proudly wear landing vests.
Army General Margelov has many grandchildren, there are already great-grandchildren who continue and are preparing to continue the family traditions - to serve the Motherland with dignity. The eldest of them, Mikhail, son of Colonel General Vitaly Vasilievich Margelov, Chairman of the Federation Council Committee on International Affairs, Deputy Head of the Federal Assembly Delegation Russian Federation in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.
Mikhail graduated from the Faculty of History and Philology of the Institute of Asian and African Countries at Moscow State University named after M.V. Lomonosov. Fluent in English and Arabic, was the head of the Office of the President of the Russian Federation for Public Relations.
The same faculty was successfully graduated in 1970 by his uncle, Vasily Vasilyevich.
Mikhail's brother, Vladimir, served in the border troops ...
* * *
For almost a quarter of a century, Vasily Filippovich Margelov commanded the Airborne Forces. Many generations of winged guards grew up on his example of selfless service to the Fatherland. The Ryazan Institute of the Airborne Forces, the streets of Omsk, Pskov and Tula bear his name. Monuments were erected to him in Ryazan, Omsk, Dnepropetrovsk, Tula. Officers and paratroopers, veterans of the Airborne Forces every year come to the monument to their commander at the Novodevichy cemetery in Moscow to pay tribute to his memory.
During the Great Patriotic War, a song was composed in the division of General Margelov. Here is one of her verses:
The song praises the Falcon
Brave and daring...
Is it close, is it far
Margelov's regiments marched.
They are still going through life, his regiments, in the ranks of which are his sons, grandchildren, great-grandchildren and tens, hundreds of thousands of people who cherish in their hearts the memory of him, the creator of the modern Airborne Forces.
The legendary paratrooper Alexander Margelov died: Biography
In January 1973, during the test of the Centaur complex, Margelov was the first in world history to parachute from an aircraft while inside a combat vehicle
The legendary paratrooper Alexander Margelov died at the age of 71 after a long illness.
Margelov is the son of the Hero of the Soviet Union, commander of the USSR Airborne Forces, Army General Vasily Margelov, a native of Dnepropetrovsk (then Yekaterinoslav).
Alexander Margelov was born on October 21, 1945 in Chisinau. In 1970, he graduated from the Rocket Engineering Faculty of the Moscow Aviation University and got a job at the Central design department experimental engineering (TsKBEM) engineer. Since 1971, he served in the Soviet Army (VDV) of the USSR Armed Forces, until 1980 - in the Scientific and Technical Committee of the Airborne Forces. During this time he graduated from the Airborne School as an external student and the Military Academy of Armored Forces (FRIS).
Margelov has 145 parachute jumps. He is the world record holder for landing along with military equipment. He has two flights inside the BMD and one - together with the BMD.
On January 5, 1973, for the first time in world practice, he carried out a parachute-platform landing in the Centaur complex from an An-12B military transport aircraft, while inside a BMD-1 tracked armored combat vehicle with two crew members on board.
Desants.livejournal.com
The crew commander was Lieutenant Colonel Leonid Gavrilovich Zuev, and the operator-gunner was (senior lieutenant) Margelov Alexander Vasilyevich. The father of Alexander Vasilyevich, Vasily Filippovich Margelov, commanded the operation. Alexander's father was at the command post with a loaded pistol at the ready, so that in case of failure he would shoot himself, Alexander later recalled. According to him, Vasily Margelov then smoked more than one pack of cigarettes.
Desants.livejournal.com
Three years later, on January 23, 1976, as the crew commander of the BMD-1 airborne combat vehicle, Margelov also, for the first time in world history, landed inside a BMD on a parachute-rocket system in the Reaktavr complex, together with Lieutenant Colonel Leonid Shcherbakov.
sergsmir wrote on August 1st, 2015
Original taken from muravei_s in Vasily Margelov. Paratrooper #1
On August 2, blue will splash across Russian cities, as well as water from park fountains. The most publicly connected branch of the military will celebrate the holiday. "Defend Russia" remembers the legendary "Uncle Vasya" - the one who created the Airborne Forces in their modern form.
There is no such number of myths and tales as about "Uncle Vasya's troops" about any other unit Russian army. It seems that strategic aviation flies the farthest, the presidential regiment strikes a step like robots, the space troops can look beyond the horizon, the GRU special forces are the most terrible, underwater strategic missile carriers are capable of destroying entire cities. But "there are no impossible tasks - there are landing troops." There were many commanders of the Airborne Forces, but they had one most important commander.
Vasily Margelov, "Uncle Vasya" is a legendary man. During his leadership, the airborne divisions have become elite troops capable of "redrawing" the map of Europe overnight.
Vasily Margelov was born in 1908. Until Yekaterinoslav became Dnepropetrovsk, Margelov worked at a mine, a stud farm, a forestry enterprise, and a local deputy council. Only at the age of 20 did he enter the army. Measuring career steps and kilometers on the march, participated in Polish campaign Red Army and the Soviet-Finnish War. In July 1941, the future "Uncle Vasya" became a regiment commander in a division of the people's militia, and 4 months later, very far away - from skiing - began the creation of the Airborne Forces.
Perhaps it was during the Great Patriotic War that he showed himself to be a brilliant military leader. What is worth one surrender without a fight to the "Soviet Skorzeny" (as the Germans called him) of the divisions of the SS Panzer Corps "Dead Head" and "Grossdeutschland" on May 12, 1945, which were ordered not to be allowed into the zone of responsibility of the Americans. The enemy driven into a corner is capable of much - there is nothing to lose. For the SS men, retribution for the atrocities was inevitable, and new victims were inevitable. And the order was clear - to capture or destroy.
Margelov took a decisive step. With a group of officers armed with machine guns and grenades, the divisional commander, accompanied by a battery of 57-mm cannons on his "jeep" arrived at the group's headquarters. By ordering the battalion commander to set up direct fire guns at the enemy headquarters and shoot if he does not return in ten minutes.
Margelov presented an ultimatum to the Germans: Either they surrender and save their lives, or complete destruction using all the fire weapons of the division: “by 4.00 in the morning - the front to the east. Light weapons: machine guns, machine guns, rifles - in piles, ammunition - nearby. The second line - military equipment, guns and mortars - vents down. Soldiers and officers - we are building to the west. Time to think - just a few minutes: "until his cigarette burns out." The nerves of the Germans cracked first. The picture of the surrender of the SS was amazing. The exact count of trophies showed the following figures: 2 generals, 806 officers, 31,258 non-commissioned officers, 77 tanks and self-propelled guns, 5847 trucks, 493 trucks, 46 mortars, 120 guns, 16 locomotives, 397 wagons. For this military feat, at the Victory Parade, Margelov was entrusted with commanding the combined regiment of the 2nd Ukrainian Front.
"You won't be coming home"
In 1950, already a former soldier, Margelov took command of the Far Eastern Special Corps of the Airborne Forces. At that time, landing troops were not very popular. They were compared with fines, and the abbreviation itself was deciphered: “It is unlikely that you will return home.” It is impossible to believe, but after a few months the Airborne Forces became the best part ground forces. Subsequently, primitive equipment was replenished with a Kalashnikov assault rifle with a special folding butt so that it does not interfere with the opening of the parachute, lightweight aluminum armor, an RPG-16 anti-tank grenade launcher, and Centaur platforms for landing people in military vehicles. And the fatalistic name was replaced in the 70s with "Uncle Vasya's Troops", as the airborne troops themselves called themselves, emphasizing the special warmth of feelings for their commander.
Margelov was the number one paratrooper formally not all the time of his service. His history of relationships with the post of commander, and with the country and its regime, is similar to the career path of the commander in chief Soviet fleet Nikolay Kuznetsov. He also commanded with a short break: Kuznetsov had four years, Margelov had two (1959–1961). True, unlike the admiral, who survived two disgraces, lost and received ranks again, Margelov did not lose the stars on his shoulder straps, but only grew them, becoming an army general in 1967.
First jump
During the training of paratroopers, Margelov paid special attention to parachuting. He himself first appeared under the dome only in 1948, already in the rank of general: “Until the age of 40, I vaguely imagined what a parachute was, I never even dreamed of jumping. It turned out on its own, or rather, as it should be in the army, by order. I am a military man, if necessary, ready to go to hell. And so it was necessary, already being a general, to make the first parachute jump. The impression, I tell you, is incomparable.” In the 1960s, after the first flight into space of Yuri Gagarin and his parachute landing as a result of a malfunction of the ship during landing, the road to incredible aerial experiments opened up for Margelov and his winged guards. Soviet paratroopers set absolute records: jumping from the stratosphere from a height of 23 km with the immediate opening of a parachute, landing on the mountains of the Caucasus and the Pamirs.
Vasily Margelov himself once said: “The one who has never left an airplane in his life, from where cities and villages seem like toys, who has never experienced joy and fear free fall, whistling in the ears, a stream of wind beating in the chest, he will never understand the honor and pride of a paratrooper. "He himself subsequently, despite his middle age, made about 60 jumps, the last at the age of 65 years.
Margelov significantly increased the mobility of the Airborne Forces (in Ukraine, for example, they are called airmobile troops). Actively working with the military-industrial complex, the commander achieved the commissioning of the An-22 and An-76 aircraft, which even today release parachute dandelions into the sky. For the paratroopers, new parachute and rifle systems were developed - the massive AK-74 was "cut off" to the AKS-74U with a shortened barrel and a folding butt. They began to land not only people, but also military equipment - due to the enormous weight, parachute systems were developed from several domes with the placement of jet thrust engines, which worked out a short period of time when approaching the ground, thus extinguishing the landing speed.
In 1969, the first of the domestic airborne combat vehicles was adopted for service. The floating tracked BMD-1 was intended for landing - including using parachutes - from the An-12 and Il-76. In 1973, the world's first landing on the BMD-1 parachute system took place near Tula. The crew commander was Margelov's son Alexander, in the 90s for a similar landing in 1976 he received the title of Hero of Russia.
An indicative result of the reforms VDV Margelov and, in particular, is that in matters of landing our "winged guards" in the 90s, even the vaunted American "devil's regiment" - the 82nd Airborne Division of the United States could not compete. At the demonstration performances of its soldiers in 1991, where the Minister of Defense of the USSR Marshal of the Soviet Union D.T. Yazov was present, almost half of the paratroopers received serious injuries and injuries, and the combat vehicles, after a “soft landing”, no longer moved.
Vests
In 1968, after the occupation of Czechoslovakia, Margelov managed to convince the Minister of Defense Marshal Grechko that the winged guards should have vests and berets. Even before that, he emphasized that airborne troops should adopt the traditions of the "big brother" - marines and honorably continue them. “For this, I introduced vests to the paratroopers. Only the stripes on them match the color of the sky - blue ... ".
When, at a military council chaired by the Minister of Defense, Admiral of the Fleet of the Soviet Union, Sergei Gorshkov opposed, stating that the paratroopers "steal" the sailors' vests, Vasily Filippovich sharply objected to him: "I myself fought in the Marine Corps and I know what paratroopers deserve and What are sailors! And he fought famously with his "marine infantry" - in offensive battles he often fought in the forefront, thus raising the morale of his soldiers. For fierce battles, the Nazis nicknamed the USSR marines "striped death."
30 minutes is everything
During the Czechoslovak crisis in 1968, even during the preparation of Operation Danube, the 7th and 103rd Guards Airborne Divisions were fully mobilized and ready to land on the territory of Czechoslovakia at any moment. When, on August 18, 1968, at a meeting of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the CPSU, a decision was finally made to send troops. It was not coordinated with the highest party and government authorities of Czechoslovakia. Therefore, the commander of the Airborne Forces was given complete freedom of action.
30 minutes were spent on the entire operation to seize airfields, secure the runway and set up take-off and landing equipment. Subsequently, during his report to the Minister of Defense of the USSR, Margelov noted: “When the paratroopers broke into the building of the Zapototsky Academy, the officers of the Czechoslovak people's army sat over the maps and plotted the position of our troops that had crossed the border. Their arrival in Brno was expected in the middle of the day.
Vasily Margelov can be compared with Yuri Andropov in terms of his influence on the perception of the subordinate structure by the mass consciousness. If the term “public relations” existed in the Soviet Union, the commander of the Airborne Forces and the chairman of the KGB would certainly be considered cool “communicationsmen”.
Andropov clearly understood the need to improve the image of the department, which inherited the people's memory of the Stalinist repressive machine. Margelov was not up to the image, but it was with him that the most famous films about paratroopers came out, which created their positive image. It was the commander who insisted that “In the zone of special attention” the fighters of the group of captain Tarasov, as part of the exercises conducting reconnaissance behind the lines of a mock enemy, wore blue berets - a symbol of paratroopers, which obviously unmasks the scouts, but creates an image.
Vasily Margelov died at the age of 81, several months before the collapse of the USSR. Four of the five sons of Margelov connected their lives with the army.
On March 4, 1990, a man whose name is known to every Ryazan passed away. Over the years, he essentially became our fellow countryman. Because "Ryazan is the capital of the Airborne Forces", and he is "paratrooper No. 1" in it. But he did not receive this “title” right away. With an essay on the life and fate of Vasily Margelov, we continue the cycle of publications jointly with the administration of Ryazan "The name of the Hero on the streets of his native city."
A regular guy
On December 27, 1908 (January 9, 1909 according to the new style) in the city of Yekaterinoslav (now Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine), a son was born to a family of immigrants from Belarus, who was named Vasily. By the way, the father's surname was Markelov, the son's one-letter distortion occurred much later, due to an error when issuing a party card.
Father - Philip Ivanovich and mother Agafya Stepanovna were simple workers, and Vasily continued " family tradition". As a teenager, he worked as a loader and carpenter. Then he entered the leather workshop as an apprentice, and soon became the master's assistant. Further "career growth" did not portend any "breakthrough" in the biography: he graduated from the school of rural youth, worked as a delivery forwarder postal items on the Kostyukovichi-Khotimsk line, in Yekaterinoslav he got a job as a laborer at a mine, was a driver of horses carrying trolleys. In 1925 he was listed as a forester in the timber industry, in 1927 he became the chairman of the working committee in it.
Every second young man, and even two-thirds of the population, could “boast” of such a track record in the young country of the Soviets. Everything changed the service in the army and the experience gained on the battlefields in the Finnish war, and then in the Great Patriotic War.
"Hey, claws!"
In 1928, Margelov was called up on a Komsomol ticket to the Red Army. He was sent to the Order of the Red Banner of Labor United Belarusian Military School. The CEC of the BSSR, where he was enrolled in a group of snipers, from the second year he was a foreman of a machine-gun company. In April 1931, the cadet graduated with honors from a military school, was appointed commander of a machine-gun platoon of the regimental school of the 99th rifle regiment of the 33rd territorial rifle division (Mogilev, Belarus).
The war began for him in 1940. In the Soviet-Finnish war, Margelov was the commander of the Separate reconnaissance ski battalion of the 596th rifle regiment of the 122nd division. His battalion made daring sorties behind enemy lines, set up ambushes, causing great damage to the enemy.
In one of the raids, they even managed to capture a group of officers of the Swedish General Staff, which gave the Soviet government reason to make a diplomatic demarche about the actual participation of the allegedly neutral Scandinavian state in the hostilities on the side of the Finns.
The experience of ski raids was remembered in the late autumn of 1941 in besieged Leningrad. Major V. Margelov was assigned to lead the First Special Ski Regiment of sailors of the Red Banner Baltic Fleet formed from volunteers.
The veteran of this part N. Shuvalov recalled:
- As you know, sailors are a peculiar people. In love with the sea, they do not particularly favor their land brothers. When Margelov was appointed commander, some used to say that he would not take root there, the “brothers” would not accept him.
The prophecy did not come true. When the regiment of sailors was lined up for the show, Margelov, seeing a lot of gloomy faces, instead of the words of greeting “Hello, comrades!” put in such cases, without hesitation, loudly shouted:
- Hello, buggers!
A moment - and in the ranks not a single gloomy face ...
Two decades later, the commander of the Airborne Forces, General of the Army Margelov, ensured that the paratroopers received the right to wear vests.
- The daring of the "brothers" sunk into my heart! he explained. - I want the paratroopers to adopt the glorious traditions of their older brother - the marines and continue them with honor. For this, I introduced the paratroopers vests. Only stripes on them to match the color of the sky - blue ...
Gunners vs Tanks
Few people know that the Margelovites were the prototype of the heroes of Yuri Bondarev's novel "Hot Snow". The soldiers under the command of Vasily Filippovich stood in the way of Manstein's tank armada, which was trying to break the encirclement around the 6th army of Paulus in Stalingrad. Here is how it was.
In October 1942, Guard Lieutenant Colonel Margelov became commander of the 13th Guards Rifle Regiment, which was part of the 2nd guards army Lieutenant General Malinovsky. For two months, while the regiment was in reserve, Vasily Filippovich intensely prepared his fighters for fierce battles. Near Leningrad, he more than once had to meet "face to face" with fascist tanks, he perfectly studied their vulnerabilities.
Having taken the blow of the Goth tank group, which was heading to join the Paulus breakthrough group, the Margelovites not only were not afraid of the newest heavy Tigers, they did the impossible. For five days of fighting (from December 19 to 24, 1942), without sleep and rest, suffering heavy losses, they burned and knocked out almost all enemy tanks in their direction! Vasily Filippovich himself was severely shell-shocked in these battles, but did not leave the line.
Since 1944, Margelov changed subordinates, became the commander of the 49th Guards Rifle Division of the 28th Army of the 3rd Ukrainian Front. He liberated Donbass, for crossing the Dnieper and liberating Kherson on March 19, 1944, Margelov was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
The final military chord was no less effective than all the others. In May 1945, on the border of Austria and Czechoslovakia, the 49th Infantry Division captured an SS Panzer Corps, which was trying to break through to the West to surrender to the Americans. The corps included the elite armored forces of the Reich - the divisions "Grossdeutschland" and "Dead Head". The brilliance of the process lay in the fact that the Margelovites carried out the so-called bloodless operation of captivity.
Eminent Newcomer
After graduating from the Higher Military Academy in 1948, Vasily Filippovich took command of the Pskov airborne division. This appointment was preceded by a meeting between Major General Margelov and USSR Minister of Defense Nikolai Bulganin. He began the conversation with kind words about the paratroopers, their glorious military past, said that a decision had been made to develop this relatively young branch of the military.
General Margelov, who had many wounds, including severe ones in his legs, asked a single question:
- When can I go to the troops?
"Today," replied the Minister.
It is now for us that the Airborne Forces and Margelov are inseparable, it seems as if he created the airborne troops themselves. In fact, then a newcomer came to the Airborne Forces (at the age of 40 he made his first parachute jump!), Which, fortunately, did not boast of his merits, but began to comprehend the tricky landing science from scratch. Now Army General Vasily Filippovich Margelov is unanimously recognized as the founder of the modern Airborne Forces.
Since May 1954, he has been the commander of the Airborne Forces. From March 1959 to July 1961 he was the first deputy commander. The demotion was due to a major emergency in one of the parts of the Airborne Forces. From July 1961 - again commander of the troops.
Throughout his “landing” life, Margelov had unquestioned authority among his subordinates; the only unofficial title of “Uncle Vasya’s Troops” was assigned to the “air infantry”. Since 1979, the fate of Margelov is directly connected with our city: Vasily Filippovich became the chairman of the State Examination Commission at the Ryazan Airborne School.
This is briefly the actual biography of Vasily Margelov, which over the years slowly but surely turns into a legendary one.
Olga Chelysheva
By the way
- On November 12, 1996, by order of the President of the Russian Federation No. 535-RP, the school was given the honorary name: Ryazan Higher Airborne Command twice Red Banner School named after Army General Margelov V.F.
- On May 6, 2013, a monument to Vasily Margelov was unveiled in Ryazan on the square named after the famous general.
- in honor of Margelov, more than 30 monuments were erected throughout Russia.
Quote
“The photograph of Vasily Filippovich in demobilization albums went to the soldiers at the highest price - for a set of badges. Competition in Ryazan airborne school blocked the figures of VGIK and GITIS, and applicants who were cut off in exams for two or three months, before snows and frosts, lived in the forests near Ryazan in the hope that someone would not withstand the stress and it would be possible to take his place. The spirit of the troops soared so high that the rest Soviet army was included in the category of "solar" and "screws". (Excerpt from the novel "Operation Storm to start earlier...")
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Biography, life story of Margelov Vasily Filippovich
Margelov Vasily Filippovich - Soviet military leader, The hero of the USSR.
Childhood, family
Vasily was born on December 27 (December 14, according to a new style) in 1908 in Yekaterinoslav (now this city is called Dnepropetrovsk) in the family of Philip Ivanovich Markelov, just a metallurgist, and Agafya Stepanovna, a loving wife and caring mother. In addition to Vasily, three more children were born in the family - Ivan (older than Vasily), Nikolai ( younger son) and the girl Maria. Initially, Vasily bore the surname Markelov, but later, due to an error in the party ticket, he became known under the surname Margelov.
In 1923, Vasily's family moved from Yekaterinoslav to small town Kostyukovichi (Mogilev province). The father of the family once lived here.
Education, labor activity
In 1921, Vasily Margelov graduated from a parochial school, and there is also evidence that he attended classes at a school for rural youth. As a teenager, Vasily already tried to help his family, moonlighting either as a loader or as a carpenter. After school, Vasily became a master's apprentice in a leather workshop, and soon became his assistant. For some time he worked as a laborer at the Khlebprodukt plant, was a forwarder for the delivery of postal shipments on the Kostyukovichi-Khotimsk line.
In 1924, Vasily became a laborer at the mine named after Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin, and a little later he received the position of a konogon (a man who drives horses).
In 1925, Margelov became a forester at a timber industry enterprise. Within a couple of years, he gained the respect and trust of his associates and became chairman of the working committee of the timber industry.
Military service
In 1928, Vasily Filippovich was called up for service in the Red Army. To begin with, he was sent to Minsk to study at the United Belarusian Military School. The young man was enrolled in a group of snipers. Already in the second year of study, Margelov became a foreman of a machine-gun company. In the spring of 1931, Vasily successfully completed his studies at military school and was appointed commander of a machine gun platoon. In the winter of 1934, he became assistant company commander, and in the spring of 1936 he himself became commander of a machine-gun company. In 1938 he became commander of a battalion of a rifle regiment, was commander of the intelligence of a rifle division and chief of staff.
CONTINUED BELOW
In the period from 1939 to 1940, Margelov was the commander of a separate reconnaissance ski battalion. During one of the military operations, Vasily Filippovich captured several officers of the Swedish General Staff. After the Soviet-Finnish war was over, Margelov became an assistant regiment commander for combat units.
In July 1941, when the Great Patriotic War, Margelov was appointed to the post of commander of the Guards Rifle Regiment of the People's Militia of the Leningrad Front.
In November 1941, Vasily Margelov became the commander of the sailors' ski regiment. Vasily found very quickly mutual language with the Marines, although many doubted that the team would accept him as their own. Vasily Filippovich, marveling at the strength of the Marines, ensured that the paratroopers also wore vests.
During the war, Vasily Margelov accomplished many feats: in 1943, under his leadership, soldiers broke through two lines of enemy defense, under his command Kherson and some territories of South-Eastern Europe were liberated. For his valor and courage in March 1944 he was awarded the honorary title of Hero of the Soviet Union.
After the end of the war, Vasily Filippovich worked mainly in command positions in the Airborne Forces. In 1959, he was demoted to deputy commander of the Airborne Forces due to an outrageous incident in his regiment (the rape of civilian women), but after a couple of years he again rose to the commander.
In October 1967, Margelov was awarded an honorary military rank"army General".
In early 1979, Vasily Filippovich became a member of the General Inspectors of the USSR Ministry of Defense.
For all my military career in composition of the Airborne Forces Margelov made more than sixty jumps, and last time he jumped at the age of sixty-five.
Death
Vasily Filippovich Margelov died on March 4, 1990 due to natural causes. The body of the commander was buried in Moscow (it was in this city that Margelov lived and worked for the last years of his life) at the Novodevichy cemetery.
Personal life
Vasily Margelov was married three times. The first wife's name was Mary. She left her husband, leaving him in the care of his son Gennady (born in 1931). The name of the second wife is Feodosia Efremovna Selitskaya. She gave birth to Vasily two sons - Anatoly (born in 1938) and Vitaly (born in 1941). Margelov's third wife, Anna Alexandrovna Kurakina, was a doctor. In the marriage of Vasily and Anna, twin boys Alexander and Vasily were born (born in 1945).
Awards and prizes
Vasily Margelov at one time was awarded a great many honorary awards. So, he received as many as four orders