Hard demographic data on RKKA?

[daveshoup2MD]

Not only university degrees but also complete or nearly complete course of secondary school or even those without diploma or school cerificate who could pass special exams.

Thanks.

[Art]

By 1 January 1929 former officers of the Russian Army made 14.4% of the Red Army's commanding personnel (i.e. officers in the narrow sense), of them:
73.7% of the higher commanding personnel (i.e positions from brigade commander and above)
48.2% of the senior - (from battalion to regimental commander)
5.3% of the medium - (from platoon commander to assistant battalion commander)

The percentage of professional officers commissioned before the start of WWI was:
55.2% of the higher -
18.1% of the senior -
1.4% of the medium commanding personnel.

By the start of 1930 of 49 880 commanding personnel of the Red Army 7047 or 14.1% were former officers of the Russian Imperial Army, of 10 497 administrative personnel 945 or 9.0% were former officers. Also officers made 2.1% of medical personnel, 1.8% of veterinary personnel and 1.0 of political personnel and 10.6% of the total RA "officer" corps.
Former officers made 33.7% of personnel of the central apparatus of the Military Commissariat, 25.7% of district headquarters, 22.3% of military schools and academies, 74.1% of corps and division commanders of ground forces, 57.3% of regimental commanders, 32.7% of the battalion commanders, 6.0 of company, squadron and battery commanders, 0.8% of platoon commanders.

By 1 April 1932 of 2985 higher staff of the ground forces 56.7% or some 1700 were former Imperial officers, of 17 650 senior staff - 22.0% or some 3900, of 61 005 medium staff - 2.0% or some 1200.

(R.M. Abinyakin in "Voyenno-istoricheskiy zhurnal" No.5, 2012).

[daveshoup2MD]

By 1 January 1929 former officers of the Russian Army made 14.4% of the Red Army's commanding personnel (i.e. officers in the narrow sense), of them:
73.7% of the higher commanding personnel (i.e positions from brigade commander and above)
48.2% of the senior - (from battalion to regimental commander)
5.3% of the medium - (from platoon commander to assistant battalion commander)

The percentage of professional officers commissioned before the start of WWI was:
55.2% of the higher -
18.1% of the senior -
1.4% of the medium commanding personnel.

By the start of 1930 of 49 880 commanding personnel of the Red Army 7047 or 14.1% were former officers of the Russian Imperial Army, of 10 497 administrative personnel 945 or 9.0% were former officers. Also officers made 2.1% of medical personnel, 1.8% of veterinary personnel and 1.0 of political personnel and 10.6% of the total RA "officer" corps.
Former officers made 33.7% of personnel of the central apparatus of the Military Commissariat, 25.7% of district headquarters, 22.3% of military schools and academies, 74.1% of corps and division commanders of ground forces, 57.3% of regimental commanders, 32.7% of the battalion commanders, 6.0 of company, squadron and battery commanders, 0.8% of platoon commanders.

By 1 April 1932 of 2985 higher staff of the ground forces 56.7% or some 1700 were former Imperial officers, of 17 650 senior staff - 22.0% or some 3900, of 61 005 medium staff - 2.0% or some 1200.

(R.M. Abinyakin in "Voyenno-istoricheskiy zhurnal" No.5, 2012).

Thanks; interesting details. Obviously, by 1941 there would have been some retirements because of age/fitness and dismissals (or worse) because of the purges; are similar figures available for the Soviet officer corps before the German invasion? And anything on those who had been dismissed or imprisoned and were rehabilitated in 1941-42?

[Art]

I doubt that anybody compiled systematic statistics by that moment. By the year 1941 the median age of the regimental commander was circa 38, and the battalion commander - circa 34, which means that most of them were too young to take part in WWI or serve in the military prior to 1918 in any capacity and rank and were entirely the product of the Red Army. Apparently only only on the higher level some considerable representation of WWI veterans existed, and even those were mostly young men in junior ranks by 1917. One should keep in mind that the Soviet officer corps by the year of 1941 was very young, even generals had the median age of circa 43.
According to my calculations by June 1941 of 17 military district commanders 7 were officers and 5 NCOs - of the Russian Imperial Army, of 20 field army commanders - 13 and 4 respectively.

[Yuri]

There were reports on principal demographic characteristics of personnel submitted by military units twice each year as of 1 January an 1 July. Which included breakdown of personnel by age, ethnicity, education, partly affiliation, military service prior to the war (for enlisted men). Bezugolny in his doctorate thesis quoted numbers for ethnic make-up based on statistical data accumulated on the level of the Red Army's General Staff:
viewtopic.php?p=2224155#p2224155
Similarly official publications (Krivosheyev) provide average age and ethnic distribution for 1943-45 based on the same sources.

Thanks Art. Interesting thread. If you don't know of any studies on socioeconomic status data of RKKA, I don't know who would. I'm not surprised by the lack of such data, as otherwise Reese wouldn't have resorted to his near-anecdotal data on SES in his 2011 Why Stalin's Soldiers Fought. Archival access seems not to have improved since 2011.

When forming (re-forming) the division at the time of the end of the process, summary statements were necessarily compiled, broken down by:

-age categories;
-nationalities;
-social groups;
-education;
- the number of communists and Komsomol members
- the number of years of service in the army and other indicators.
Earlier, in another branch, I gave such information for the 333rd Rifle Division as of the time of sending to the front on October 2, 1942. This division was reformed in August-September 1942 in the region where I was born. In November-December 1942 this division participated in the battles of Stalingrad as part of the 66th, 21st and 5th tank armies, in particular in the battle of State farm 79 in December 1942.

Stop spreading all kinds of speculation about the lack of access to archive data.
The fact that foreigners are not allowed into the archives is the fault of the foreigners themselves, and to be precise, the Germans. By personal agreement between Russian President Boris Yeltsin and Chancellor of Federal Germany Helmut Kohl in the mid-1990s, German researchers were admitted to the TSAMO in the 500 fund (archive the trophy documents). These Germans colluded with translators (who worked in fund 500) and as a result, a large array of documents on the SS division "Reich" for 1941 disappeared, as well as a whole bag of letters from soldiers and officers of this division. There were only 13 translators working in the 500 fund, 3 or 4 translators participated in the criminal fraud. However, in order not to conduct an investigation, all the translators in the 500 fund (except one) were offered to resign on their own. Many did not want to quit, but they were eventually persuaded. Thus, 12 people applied for dismissal. There is only one oldest translator left. This man was a veteran of the Great Patriotic War, he served in the headquarters of the 3rd Shock Army and participated in the interrogations of German generals and senior officials who were captured in Berlin in April-May 1945. When I worked at the 500 Foundation, I met this veteran translator and learned a lot of interesting things from him. After this incident, the head of the TSAMO said that no foreigner would approach the archive building at a distance closer to the range of a direct shot of the 57-mm ZiS-2 gun, which is installed in front of the entrance gate to the archive territory. He also stated that he would punch anyone (regardless of position, age and sex) who asked him to let some foreigner into the archive.

[Art]

Social composition of the Red Army
in April 1926 - 18.1% workers and 68.5% peasants
in January 1929 - 27.3 workers and 60.6% peasants

NCOs:
1925 - 20.2% workers and 73% peasants
1929 - 21.1% workers and 72.8% peasants

privates:
1925 - 12.6% workers and 83.4% peasants
1929 - 18.2% workers and 75.9% peasants

Officers:
1926 - 23.1% workers - 33.5% peasants - 43.4% others
1927 - 25.8% workers - 33.2% peasants - 40.9% others
1929 - 29.4% workers - 34.4% peasants - 36.2% others
The percentage of workers among military school graduates in 1925-29 was 36-37%

By positions:
District and army commanders - 22.2% peasants - 77.8% others
Corps commanders - 18.2% workers - 31.8% peasants - 50.0% others
Division commanders - 25.9% workers - 42% peasants - 32.1% others
regimental commanders - 16.2% workers - 23.3% peasants - 60.5% others
Battalion commanders - 17.3% workers - 18.1% peasants - 64.6% others
Company commanders - 27.0% workers - 34.5% peasants - 38.5% others
Platoon commanders - 32.8% workers - 46.5% peasants - 20.7% others

The percentage of the Civil War veterans increased from 25.8% (?) in 1923 to 50.8% in 1927.
Perecentage of former Russian Army officers:
medium commanders - 5.3% (of them 1.4% active officers (pre-WWI))
senior commanders - 48.2% (of them 18.1% active officers)
higher commanders - 73.7% (of them 55.2% active officers)

The number of commanding personnel with military education btained in the Red Army increased from 34.3% in 1923 to 93.5% in 1925. Military education in the old Russina Army only - decreased from 52.2% to 8.8%. Without military education - from 13.4% to 8.2%.

From a report of the Revolutionary Military Council on the state and prospects of the USSR's armed forces (1929).

[Art]

Chacteristics of the Red Army's top brass by the start of 1937. According to my calculations the number of men who were given top military ranks in 1935-36 included:
Marshal - 5
Komandarm (army commander) 1st rank (equivalent to army general) - 5
Komandarm 2nd rank (equivalent to colonel general) - 10
Komkor (corps commander, equivalent to lieutenant general) - 64
These 84 men included 43 Russians, 12 Ukrainians, 3 Belorussians, 2 Poles, 12 Latvians, 2 Lithuanians, 1 Estonian, 6 Jews, 2 Armenians, 1 Kalmyk. The average year of birth was 1891 (meaning that most were quite young in WWI and Russian Civil War). 58 were former officers of the Russian Army. That included 20 career officers commissioned prior to WWI and 38 wartime officers most of whom recieved very brief military training in 1914-1917. 17 held senior ranks (from captain to colonel), none was a former general of the Russian Army (yet there were former generals at the lower levels). 13 were trained in the Generals Staff Academy before the revolution including incoplete or short course. In addtion to 58 former officers there were 12 former NCOs of the pre-revolutionary army.

[Art]

Voroshilov at the VKP(b) Central Comittee's plenary session in early 1937:

The army* has 206 thousand officers, of them 107 thousand commanders, and others are political, engineer-technical, medical, veterinary, administrative personnel and others.
...
As I have said of 206 thousand officers 107 thousands are commanders. 67 % of command personnel are party members, and further 8% are Komsomol members.
Of 107 thousand commanders 50 942 or 47.5% are former workers, with completed military training - 96 390 men or 90% of all the command personnel.
Military tehcnical personnel. Here were have more than 60% party members and almost 15% Komsomol members. Fomer workers make almost 65%. More than 90% of technical personnel have completed specialized education.
There are 22 thousand military political personnel in the army, 100% are party members, 58% are former workers, 50% of political personnel have completed military or political eduction. Recoginizing the situation when 50% of political personnel do not have military or political training as normal is impossible, because the men have to carry out important work with private and officers.
Military medical personnel. Here the situation is worse. Part members make only 27.2% of medics, Komsomol members - 5%, workers - about 14%, 91% have specialized education.
Situation with military veterinary personnel is about the same (party members make 29%, Komsomol members - 4%, workers - 13.5%)
But worse of all is the situation with military administrative personnel. Military admiinistrative personnel make a large part of officers - almost 26 thousand men, but only 9331 of these 26 thousand are party members or 36%, Komsomol members - 3.8%. Workers make 23 % of this group of officers and only 43% have military or specialized training.

* Obviously meaning Red Army's ground forces, air forces and navy combined