Katyusha
"On the Fuhrer's birthday, a barrage of Katyusha rockets will tear Berlin to pieces! With your bullets... with your bayonets... with your bare hands. Do the same to their wretched soldiers!"
- – Commissar Markov, CoD: World At War
"Katyusha! They call them Stalin's Organ. No, a musical organ, you idiot!"
- – Anonymous Red Army soldier, Company of Heroes 2
Flames of War
Mid War
Late War
In Real Life
The BM-series of rocket artillery, nicknamed Katyusha by the Red Army's cannon fodder, is the Soviet response to the German Nebel- and Panzerwerfers (German for:"(it) werfs nebels"). Katyusha refers to the firing system that fired the rockets themselves, with the Soviets placing them on whatever they had at the time. Because of this, there were as many variants to the system as there were mounts and warheads. Unlike the rest of Europe and the Americans, who placed rocket systems on their tanks (Sherman Calliope, Firefly Tulips) or halftracks (Panzerwerfers, Walking Stukas), the Soviets used them on trucks (and the occassional T-60). Not only were trucks cheaper to produce and easier to maintain, it also meant they didn't have to take a tank/halftrack out of service or away from its intended use.
Katyushas could thus be churned out in much larger quantities and have entire units dedicated to them. This was great, because the Katyushas were most effective when used en masse: rocket artillery was inaccurate and slow to reload, so the best way to use them was for an entire unit to fire all the rockets they had and drive away; the rockets would hit the target all at once, the only warning being the distinctive whirring of the rocket's motors that you heard just before everything around you turned to shit. Apparently, they were so effective, that in its first deployment, a team of seven managed to cause enough casualties and destruction to an entrenched German position that they broke and fled. It's not that hyperbolic when you consider how much the Russians hated the German Stuka, who similarly used their distinctive sound to build up dread and terror riiiight before they blew you up with bombs.
The Soviets loved the Katyusha so much, that not only does it continue to be a symbol for the Red Army during the War, but they continued to develop the MRLS technology up to the present-day.
| Soviet Forces in Flames of War | |
|---|---|
| Tanks: | T-70 - Valentine - M5/M3 Stuart - M3 Lee - T-34 - KV - Churchill - IS-2 - Captured Tank Platoon - T-28 - BT-7 - KV-2 - T-26 |
| Transports: | M3 Scout Car - Universal Carrier - SdKfz 251 |
| Infantry: | Rifles - Motor Rifles - Penal Company - Storm Group - SMG Company - Engineer Sapper Company |
| Artillery: | Katyusha - 152mm Artillery - 122mm Artillery - 76mm Artillery - 120mm Mortars - 82mm mortars |
| Tank Destroyers and Assault Guns: | 45mm Anti Tank - 57mm Anti Tank - 76mm Anti Tank - 100mm Anti Tank - SU-76 - SU-85 - SU-100 - SU-122 - SU-152 - ISU-122/ISU-152 |
| Recon: | Scout Platoon - BA-64 Platoon - Armored Reconnaissance Platoon - Reconnaissance Platoon |
| Aircraft: | Il-2 Sturmovik |
| Anti-Aircraft: | ZSU M17 - DShK AA MG Platoon |
| Midwar Monsters: | KV-3 - KV-5 - T-43 |