Interview with HSU Sturmovik pilot Alexei Batievskii

[FPSOlkor]

http://mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/pilots/batievskii/batievskii.htm
As always - comments, discussions welcome. Feel free to post on other forums

[Blackdog_kt]

What an excellent, lengthy interview! Took me more than an hour to read it all, as i wanted to do it carefully and not miss a thing.

That guy is what, 89 years old and he still remembers so many things and most of all, interesting and "daredevil" ones along with the usual tactical stories that we find in war time memoirs.

My hat is off to these guys, they didn't only have to fight against some of the most dangerous enemies in the world at that time, but they also had to fight against the weather, poor logistics and even some of their own countrymen...it's always the most near-sighted people that get the powerful positions and make decisions based only on rules and regulations, while the ones who already do all the dangerous work have to take the extra risk due to these actions. I've read quite a few of your interviews and while many pilots seem neutral or even nostalgic of the old days and the previous government system, most of them have bad things to say about political commisars or officers who were getting awards for doing nothing or sending the rest to certain death and rightly so.

Translation is not perfect but it's good enough to understand 100% of the story, so no issues there.
A little thing that might help would be to have a short summary of places mentioned in the interviews and the names of the people involved in the story, maybe in diagram form to make it easier to do. Of course, i understand that this is extra work for you guys and i'm not nitpicking.

The reason is that it would help a lot in understanding the area of operations and the people involved, as we see a lot of names that rise through ranks and get transferred between units (or even across entire fronts) during the course of the story, only to return at later dates. For example, i had to double-back and read again certain paragraphs to make sure that the person i was reading about was indeed the one mentioned in a previous point of the story.

In any case, just interviewing these people is excellent work on its own. This interview is a lengthy one but still a terrific read (i couldn't stop reading once i started), especially since Mr. Batyevskii faced such interesting situations. It contains loads of different stories... from training and tactical considerations to daring stunts and immense feats of strength and courage. It combines the stuff that movies are made of with the realism and grim considerations of real war. Just talking to these great people and making it possible for us to know all this is good enough in my book, keep up the good work :grin:

[cmirko]

thank you, another great interview :)

cheers

[Tempest123]

Thanks, great read!

[rakinroll]

Yea great one, thanks.

[JtD]

Entertaining, interesting, scary. Thanks!

[KG26_Alpha]

I had to read it twice to digest it all.

Very interesting opinion he has regarding the Pe-2 :)

>>

— What did you fly there?

In Mozdok, before the war ended, I flew sturmovik over Chechnya. When I was at the courses I flew torpedo bomber.


— What type?

Tu-2. It was a good plane, excellent one, but it came too late. If it would come one or two years earlier, the war might have ended several months sooner, because it was a mighty plane. Pe-2 was an absolute junk. It was created under impressions gained after the Germans started to dive at London and bombed precisely. And we hastily built this Pe-2 machine.
It had an ability to dive, but its bomb load was just 1000 kilograms. It dove rather poorly. It had two engines but no ability to fly on one engine. If one engine failed it couldn’t fly straight, it went with a descent. What kind of a plane is that? Two engine airplanes must have an ability to fly horizontally on one engine.
Our sturmovik Il-2 with a 1600 hp engine could lift 600 kilograms of bombs in overload.



— By the way, did you hang RSs when you took 600 kilograms of bombs?

Of course. Overload — 6 bombs and all the same. RSs and VYa 23mm cannons, 300 rounds per cannon, machine guns, 1500 rounds per barrel. Gunner also had large caliber machine gun with ammunition.
Pe-2 was an unsuccessful plane. Tu-2 had lower speed than dive bomber, but 2500 kilograms of bombs. And it had longer range. It was a great plane, it could fly on one engine.
But it came late, too late... There were not enough engines. This plane was designed by Tupolev in prison.

[zapatista]

good read, thx for posting it !

[swiss]

This plane was designed by Tupolev in prison.

LOL

Which Soviet airplane was NOT designed in Prison?

[rakinroll]

I had to read it twice to digest it all.

Very interesting opinion he has regarding the Pe-2 :)

>>

— What did you fly there?

In Mozdok, before the war ended, I flew sturmovik over Chechnya. When I was at the courses I flew torpedo bomber.


— What type?

Tu-2. It was a good plane, excellent one, but it came too late. If it would come one or two years earlier, the war might have ended several months sooner, because it was a mighty plane. Pe-2 was an absolute junk. It was created under impressions gained after the Germans started to dive at London and bombed precisely. And we hastily built this Pe-2 machine.
It had an ability to dive, but its bomb load was just 1000 kilograms. It dove rather poorly. It had two engines but no ability to fly on one engine. If one engine failed it couldn’t fly straight, it went with a descent. What kind of a plane is that? Two engine airplanes must have an ability to fly horizontally on one engine.
Our sturmovik Il-2 with a 1600 hp engine could lift 600 kilograms of bombs in overload.



— By the way, did you hang RSs when you took 600 kilograms of bombs?

Of course. Overload — 6 bombs and all the same. RSs and VYa 23mm cannons, 300 rounds per cannon, machine guns, 1500 rounds per barrel. Gunner also had large caliber machine gun with ammunition.
Pe-2 was an unsuccessful plane. Tu-2 had lower speed than dive bomber, but 2500 kilograms of bombs. And it had longer range. It was a great plane, it could fly on one engine.
But it came late, too late... There were not enough engines. This plane was designed by Tupolev in prison.

I hope il2 plane modellers did not read that kind of russian pilot memories. Otherwise, we are trying to fly in a suspicious software...

[Flanker35M]

S!

Rakinroll, what do you mean? A VVS pilot, even a decorated Hero of the Soviet Union, gives critics to Russian designs and that should be neglected? How about an aircraft mechanic one of squad member knew..this guy had been an IL-2 mechanic during war and said the engine on it was crap. After a few flights it was a heap of scrap and needed to be changed. But usually the plane was just put aside as at that point production kept up more than enough with losses etc.

Memoirs can be used to supplement other data, not as factual data. Can be quite interesting at times to see how they differ or match. There are not many Russian pilot memoirs translated floating around, so very interesting to read them.

[engarde]

http://mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/pilots/batievskii/batievskii.htm
As always - comments, discussions welcome. Feel free to post on other forums



with anything internet based, i do have a slight question as to its authenticity, but for that matter little gems like this keep my interest in this forum.

nice work.

[engarde]

"Infantry was not covered by AAA, soldiers had to fight strong wind blowing them into the faces, so they were not looking at the sky, and that same wind did not allow them to hear my engine. I simply pressed the trigger and saw blue traces disappearing in the column. When first soldiers disappeared under the nose of my Il I released bombs. That time my bomb bays were loaded with 16 AO-25 fragmentation bombs with a delay set for 5 seconds. I kept firing, but there was no end to this mass of infantry, so I fired all eight RSs"

Killing humans has never been so dispassionate.

Imagine the havoc created on the ground, I doubt every soldier hit died instantly.

A subtle reminder of the mindset required to do this grim work day after day.

[Blackdog_kt]

It's true, dirty tricks are used all the time in war, at least in this case it was used against combat forces and not civilians. Let's bear in mind however that WWII, especially in the east, was a totally different and much more brutal affair than the "clean" and sanitized version we have today.

For example, i don't know how i would react if an opposing military force had declared all the people in my country as only being suitable for slave labor and extinction and set out to accomplish just that. Eventually, this is the vicious circle of human nature...the more brutality one receives, the more of it he's ready to dish out. In this sense we don't differ much from dogs :grin:

Going silent on the attack run is practiced today as well. My country has a mix of professional and conscript soldiers (conscripts are the majority) and i served for a year as an AA gunner in the air force. When we were training in boot camp we had about 11 roll-calls/assemblies during the day for various reasons. If it was time to eat we assembled and marched to the mess hall, if it was time for the guard duty briefing we assembled and marched to the guard control center and so on. During our training there were frequent visits by F-16 block 50/52 units and during one of those times i actually, truly realized how powerless a foot soldier is against the air force. We were assembled and about to march out, when i suddenly caught a silhouette with my peripheral vision. Turning my eyes to see better, i could clearly make out a F-16 making a mock attack run against our assembled company. It was less than a kilometer away and that thing was freaking silent as a sleeping baby!

I suppose they used to come in low, pop up a little further away from us and then dove in with the engine at idle and you couldn't hear a thing until he was less than 500m from us, by which time he would already have dropped whatever he wanted on our heads. Scary :o

[FPSOlkor]

S!

Rakinroll, what do you mean? A VVS pilot, even a decorated Hero of the Soviet Union, gives critics to Russian designs and that should be neglected? How about an aircraft mechanic one of squad member knew..this guy had been an IL-2 mechanic during war and said the engine on it was crap. After a few flights it was a heap of scrap and needed to be changed. But usually the plane was just put aside as at that point production kept up more than enough with losses etc.


Here is an interview with Il-2 mech I took...
http://mig3.sovietwarplanes.com/pilots/archangelskii/archangelskii.htm

with anything internet based, i do have a slight question as to its authenticity, but for that matter little gems like this keep my interest in this forum.


Well, I keep all sound files on my PC...


Killing humans has never been so dispassionate.

Imagine the havoc created on the ground, I doubt every soldier hit died instantly.

A subtle reminder of the mindset required to do this grim work day after day.
Well, they were not invited for a cup of tea, weren't they? Speaking of mindset - he was twice shot down, crash landed several times without a "replay" button either. If there would be no war - he might as well ended his life as a village school teacher, without any chance of becoming a Hero.
It's true, dirty tricks are used all the time in war, at least in this case it was used against combat forces and not civilians. Let's bear in mind however that WWII, especially in the east, was a totally different and much more brutal affair than the "clean" and sanitized version we have today.
Going silent on the attack run is practiced today as well. My country has a mix of professional and conscript soldiers (conscripts are the majority) and i served for a year as an AA gunner in the air force. When we were training in boot camp we had about 11 roll-calls/assemblies during the day for various reasons. If it was time to eat we assembled and marched to the mess hall, if it was time for the guard duty briefing we assembled and marched to the guard control center and so on. During our training there were frequent visits by F-16 block 50/52 units and during one of those times i actually, truly realized how powerless a foot soldier is against the air force. We were assembled and about to march out, when i suddenly caught a silhouette with my peripheral vision. Turning my eyes to see better, i could clearly make out a F-16 making a mock attack run against our assembled company. It was less than a kilometer away and that thing was freaking silent as a sleeping baby!

I suppose they used to come in low, pop up a little further away from us and then dove in with the engine at idle and you couldn't hear a thing until he was less than 500m from us, by which time he would already have dropped whatever he wanted on our heads. Scary :o
I wouldn't call it a dirty trick, it was one of a life time chance, that he used at best. But if he would not take off due to bad weather or returned from his route as his wingman did there would be no such luck at all.

Speaking of attacks by airplane - in late 80's I worked for pocket money at Fornosovo railway station for a couple of summers, unloading incoming carts. I did not know that this station was used for training purposes by ShAP from Siverskaya. When I once raised my head towards sky and saw a falling planes at me, I shited my pants... Those were Su-22s or something, and they scared me to death... But two month later I didn't even look at the sky when I heard jet engine sound.

[FPSOlkor]

Translation is not perfect but it's good enough to understand 100% of the story, so no issues there.
A little thing that might help would be to have a short summary of places mentioned in the interviews and the names of the people involved in the story, maybe in diagram form to make it easier to do. Of course, i understand that this is extra work for you guys and i'm not nitpicking.


If you will make a list of locations I can do the description - but on the other hand it it quite possible to do a search on wikimapia... In this current interview most of locations mentioned are within 70 KM from Leningrad...

[FPSOlkor]

LOL

Which Soviet airplane was NOT designed in Prison?Could you specify your question so I could answer correctly?

[Blackdog_kt]

I wouldn't call it a dirty trick, it was one of a life time chance, that he used at best. But if he would not take off due to bad weather or returned from his route as his wingman did there would be no such luck at all.

Speaking of attacks by airplane - in late 80's I worked for pocket money at Fornosovo railway station for a couple of summers, unloading incoming carts. I did not know that this station was used for training purposes by ShAP from Siverskaya. When I once raised my head towards sky and saw a falling planes at me, I shited my pants... Those were Su-22s or something, and they scared me to death... But two month later I didn't even look at the sky when I heard jet engine sound.

Well, i didn't mean it in a degrading way, it's more in line with the motto we hear from combat veterans "If you find yourself in a fair fight, you messed up" ;)



If you will make a list of locations I can do the description - but on the other hand it it quite possible to do a search on wikimapia... In this current interview most of locations mentioned are within 70 KM from Leningrad...

Oh, that's good to know then. I understood it had to do with the Leningrad siege, but i didn't know it was such small distances from the city. Again, thanks for bringing this to us :grin:

[FPSOlkor]

Oh, that's good to know then. I understood it had to do with the Leningrad siege, but i didn't know it was such small distances from the city. Again, thanks for bringing this to us :grin:

Some locations with precise cross positions.
former airfield Kamenka
http://wikimapia.org/#lat=60.0547307&lon=30.1839066&z=12&l=1&m=b
former AB Borki
http://wikimapia.org/#lat=59.9452968&lon=29.4550323&z=13&l=1&m=b
former AB Gora-Valday
http://wikimapia.org/#lat=59.9666111&lon=29.197197&z=13&l=1&m=b
Bottleneck Sinyavino
http://wikimapia.org/#lat=59.9040903&lon=31.0514832&z=11&l=1&m=b
Rakvere
http://wikimapia.org/#lat=59.3356409&lon=26.3843536&z=11&l=1&m=b
Volosovo-Narva road where incident discussed above took place
http://wikimapia.org/#lat=59.4031612&lon=29.3307495&z=10&l=1&m=b

[Flanker35M]

S!

Thanks for the links Olkor, interesting read. Comparing these interviews/books from all sides and to historical sources gives quite a good picture on certain things. And can bring up new information.

The saying "which design was not done in prison" has some truth behind it in the Soviet system. Stalin is idolised even today as a great and glorious leader but even Lenin had said that J.S. should never be given any power. Well he got it anyway after Lenin's death and results are history. He wiped out countless of his own people in the "purges" and mass relocations, killed many of top military brass in the 1937 "cleansing" and replaced them etc. The totalitarian regime of the Stalin's era was not any better than Germany's at the time. The flags were different but the methods the same: propaganda and strict "surveillance" kept people in check.

Anyways, back to topic. Keep those links coming.

[FPSOlkor]

S!

Thanks for the links Olkor, interesting read. Comparing these interviews/books from all sides and to historical sources gives quite a good picture on certain things. And can bring up new information.

The saying "which design was not done in prison" has some truth behind it in the Soviet system. Stalin is idolised even today as a great and glorious leader but even Lenin had said that J.S. should never be given any power. Well he got it anyway after Lenin's death and results are history. He wiped out countless of his own people in the "purges" and mass relocations, killed many of top military brass in the 1937 "cleansing" and replaced them etc. The totalitarian regime of the Stalin's era was not any better than Germany's at the time. The flags were different but the methods the same: propaganda and strict "surveillance" kept people in check.

Anyways, back to topic. Keep those links coming.

Oh... Don't start this crap again... Too much Discovery channel viewed...

[Flanker35M]

S!

No discovery channel, just historical researches based on Russian documents. They opened up some years ago.

[FPSOlkor]

S!

No discovery channel, just historical researches based on Russian documents. They opened up some years ago.

We must have read different docs... At least those I studied show picture a lot different then that commonly presented...

[Feathered_IV]

Thank you for sharing this interview. It would be terrible if these peoples stories were lost forever. I very much appreciate you taking the time to record and translate them.

Don't let the youtube-style commentators drag you down.

[Viking]

It’s interesting to hear the real voices from this tragic era in our history.

Clearing up the fog of political propaganda that, for a surprisingly long time, have cast a darkness’ on history. And still do as we can see!

Please keep up the good work.

Regards
Viking

[Flanker35M]

S!

Another book worth reading is Vasili B. Emelianenko - Sturmovik Pilot. HSU after 80 sorties in IL-2, 92 sorties in total. Shot down 3 times but returned to his regiment.

[Viking]

Yes, that’s the” Red star against the swastika” ISBN 1-85367-649-7.

Go get it!

Regards
Viking