85th Rifle Division (Soviet Union)

The 85th Rifle Division was a infantry division of the Soviet Red Army active from 1931 and converted to a motorised formation in 1957. It is now part of the Russian Ground Forces.The division was originally formed in 1931 in the Ural MD, seemingly at Chelyabinsk. It seems to have been sent to Belorussian Special Military District, soon to be Western Special Military District, 1940. Assigned to 4th Rifle Corps, 3rd Army, Soviet Western Front on outbreak of war. Narod.ru seems to indicate that the division was formed twice, in 1931 and 1941.
*From 1957 85th Motorized Rifle Division; Novosibirsk, Siberian Military District
*Current commander (as at 2003): Ashitok, Vladimir Gen Maj (KZ2003-0423) Commander of Leningrad-Pavlovsk Division.
*Previous commanders: (late 1990s-e2000s) Lunev, Vasiliy Gen Maj; Makushkin, Anatoliy Gen Maj; commanded by Gen. Igor Puzanov 1983-86
*At the end of the 1980s it consisted of the 387th Tank Regiment, 141st, 59th(?), 228th MRRs, 167th Artillery Regt, 1133 Anti-aircraft Rocket Regiment
*the 228th 'Sevastopol' Motor Rifle Regiment, 85 MRD, the only Russian regiment to be fully equipped with the BMP-3, was reequipped with MT-LB armoured personnel carriers in 2000 because a six-month tour in Chechniya had reduced the service life of the vehicles by half. [AVN Military News Agency report, 31 July 2000, in Orr June 2000, p.98, 101] In other words, maintenance problems were much greater when the vehicles were conscript-crewed.
*Honorifics Leningrad-Павловская Red Banner

ources

*Lenskii
*Feskov et al
*Scott and Scott, Russian Military Directory 2004
*http://samsv.narod.ru/Div/Sd/sd085/default.html
*http://orbat.com/site/ww2/drleo/012_ussr/41_oob/western/army_03.html
*http://www.rkka.ru/handbook/reg/85sd31.htm