Before the First World War, the Russian Army utilized a combination of imported armored car designs and a small number of indigenous vehicles. The country did not, however, at this time possess the industrial base to series produce armored cars. There were several small automotive plants in Russia, but these were restricted to the production of limited numbers of light vehicles.

 

Interest in armored vehicles was forced on Russia as a result of the 1904-05 Russo-Japanese war, which proved a major learning experience for Russian forces at sea and on land. The war showed the backwardness of Russian tactics and also demonstrated the value of mechanized machine gun support for breakthrough operations. As a direct result of this wartime experience, several armored car designs were developed and prototypes tested for the Russian War Ministry, but series production of Russian armored cars was still some years in the future.

 

The first armored car designed in Russia was developed in 1905 by the Georgian engineer M.A.Nakashidze. His design for a machine gun armed vehicle with 4-8mm of armor, combat weight of 3,000kg, and a road speed of 50km/hour was accepted by the Russian War Ministry for service with the Russian Army. However, as no Russian plant was considered capable of producing the vehicle, manufacture was subcontracted to the French company Charron, Girardot, and Voigt, which completed and delivered nine vehicles to the Russian Army. At least one other vehicle was mysteriously "lost" en route to Russia through Germany and was subsequently evaluated by the German Army.

 

Several military plants began the development of armored cars during the period immediately following the Russo-Japanese War, including the Izhorskiy plant at Kolpino, near St. Petersburg, which had formerly specialized in the production of armor plate for naval vessels. The Izhorskiy plant produced its first armored car in 1906 and after many years of small scale production, the plant was to become the primary manufacturer of Russian armored cars during the 1930s.

 

In 1908, the Russko-Baltiysky (Russo-Balt) light vehicle plant in Riga, Latvia developed and produced its first indigenously designed armored car. The plant produced limited numbers of chassis for armored cars in Riga from 1908 until 1915, when parts of the plant (which also produced aircraft assemblies) were split and evacuated to Fili, Taganrog, and locations in the St. Petersburg region. The part of the plant relocated to Fili (now part of Moscow) was subsequently converted to specialize in the manufacture and repair of armored cars, tanks, and other vehicles. The plant was later renamed as the "First Brone-Tanko Avtomobilniy Zavod (BTAZ)." The Izhorskiy plant manufactured the armored bodies for these vehicles, which were assembled at the relocated Russko- Baltiysky plant after 1915. The most common early production model armored car was the Russo-Balt M, armed with three 7.62mm M-1905 "Maxim" machine guns, though 37mm main armament could also be installed. The vehicle was particularly slow, with a maximum speed of only 20km/hour, but was otherwise capable and well armed and mounted on a strong chassis.

 

The first Russian half track was designed in the garage of Tsar Nicholas 2 in 1909 and was produced at the Russko-Baltiysky plant from 1913. On this chassis, the first Russian series-produced half-track armored car was developed and produced; this vehicle also being commonly referred to as the Russo-Balt. To put armored car manufacture at this time in perspective, during the six year period 1908-14, the Russko-Baltiysky plant produced only 450 vehicles in total, of which only a small number were armored cars.

 

At the beginning of the First World War, the major armored car manufacturers of the 1930s were in their formative years. Nearly all armored cars used in the Russian Army were foreign designs; principally imported from Great Britain and Italy as a result of a series of Russian War Office contracts issued in 1913. Some of the first foreign vehicles imported were sold to Russia by the firms Packard, White, Benz, Jeffrey, and Garford. These vehicles proved particularly unsuitable for Russian conditions, with weak chassis and light construction that did not survive well on Russian roads. Lacking available alternatives, Russian armored car designers nevertheless made maximum use of imported chassis, there being significant development of armored cars after 1914 using locally developed armored bodies mounted on these imported chassis. Late in 1914, the Putilov Plant in St. Petersburg began production of an 8,000kg armored car armed with a 76.2mm field gun. The new Putilov-Garford armored car was designed by F.F. Lender, who placed the 76.2mm gun in a rear turret. This provided a good arc of fire, with additional machine gun armament being provided for close support. It was later claimed by Russia as the world's first wheeled self propelled gun. The Putilov Garford was built in small numbers and made a significant contribution during the First World War and the Russian Civil War, which followed the 1917 Revolution. The vehicle, with its impressive 76.2mm armament, was often used to engage armored trains and served with the Red Army into the 1930s as a railway artillery vehicle, with its wheels converted to run on the Russian rail system.

 

Small numbers of vehicles were also produced during this period at the Izhorskiy plant. The Putilovsky, Izhorsky, and Obukhovsky (later Bolshevik) plants, which were all located in the St. Petersburg area, were to form the industrial center of Russian armored car production in the following decade. At this time, the Putilov plant was by far the largest producer of armored cars, to be overtaken by the Izhorsky plant in the 1930s when the Putilov plant was converted to heavy tank production. In the meantime, St. Petersburg was renamed Petrograd in 1914 and again renamed, this time to Leningrad, in 1924. The renaming of cities, which was popular after 1917, was also applied to factories. The Putilovsky plant became the Krasniy Putilovsky (Red Putilovsky) plant in 1917, and was redesignated as the Kirovsky plant in 1934 in honor of Sergei Mironovitch Kirov, the then-current head of the Leningrad Communist Party.

 

During the First World War, before the major armored car manufacturers of the 1930s became established, many enterprising private individuals also designed armored vehicles on imported chassis in an attempt to have their projects accepted for lucrative military contracts. Many Russian armored car designs developed in the period 1914-18 included innovative features which were not included in series-produced vehicles until many years later. Noteworthy developments included the engineer Poplavko's Poplavko-Jeffery (AB-9) armored car of 1915 with its 4x4 chassis, twin engines, twin driver's positions, five forward and five reverse gears, and 16mm frontal armor. The Renault Mgebrov, designed in 1914 with its highly faceted armor for maximum ballistic protection and the incorporation of armored glass was also an interesting design concept. The futuristic-looking Renault Mgebrov was manufactured in small numbers from the spring of 1916. During the same period, 1915-17, N.N. Lebedenko designed several armored cars in the town of Dmitrov, near Moscow. In 1915 Colonel Gulkevitch designed a 40 tonne armored car on the imported Lombard chassis armed with a field gun intended for heavy fire support for infantry. Gulkevitch's design was impractical and not developed beyond conceptual stage, however he was particularly interested in the advantages of halftracks for crossing obstacles, including barbed wire defenses. He went on to significantly modify his original plans and developed his designs into the first Russian half-track armored car for which the Putilov plant provided the armored body.

 

Though their ideas were not generally developed beyond prototype or limited series production stage at the time, these designers would play a prominent part in the development of future series-produced armored cars, while many of the ideas, such as the twin engines used on the Poplavko-Jeffery AB-9, were to be incorporated many years later in post World War Two vehicles such as the BTR-60 APC series.

 

In the autumn of 1914, the Putilovsky plant halted production of transport vehicles and reorganized as a specialized armored car manufacturer. In 1916, on government orders, it began production of Austin Putilov halftrack armored cars with their distinctive twin offset turrets, which maximized the armament's arc of fire. The Austin Putilovets combined a half-track designed by the French engineer Regresse (who worked in St. Petersburg on contract to the Russian government) on an Austin chassis armored by the Putilovsky plant. The vehicle was developed in the spring of 1916 and extensively field trialled during the months of August and September the same year. The vehicle excelled in trials and was immediately accepted for service in the Russian Army. The Austin-Putilov, with its two 7.62mm M-1910 machine guns, 8mm armor, and 25km/hour road speed was officially referred to as a half track armoured car, but the vehicles were often referred to as "poltanka" (literally "halftank") in service. The vehicle is also referred to as the "Austin Kegresse" or "Putilov Kegresse". Later in 1916, the Putilov plant developed a new turret which provided an element of anti-aircraft fire capability.

 

The year 1916 was another important year for foreign procurement, with armored car purchase contracts being completed with the British firms Austin, Lanchester, Sheffield Simplex, Armstrong Whitworth, and Jarrott. Small numbers of vehicles were also purchased from Fiat of Italy and the French company Renault, while the purchasing expeditions also procured MkV and Whippet tanks from Great Britain and Renault FT tanks from France. Russia was gathering the knowledge and experience which would be refined in the development of indigenous vehicles in the years ahead, incorporating the best of ideas from these imported designs.

 

Despite extensive overseas procurement from 1916, a significant gap followed in both foreign purchases and domestic manufacture, and by October 1918, the fledgling Red Army possessed a total of only 150 armored cars; this number remaining stable for several years. By 1918 there were thirty-eight armored "groups" in service with a total of 150 armored cars; each group consisting of four vehicles and one hundred supporting infantry. By 1919 there were fifty such groups, and this had risen to only fifty-one by 1920. Towards the end of the First World War in 1918, the Izhorskiy plant at Kolpino produced only 115 armored cars; the first post-World War One armored cars to enter Russian Army service being produced primarily by the relocated Russko-Baltiysky plant.

 

During the Civil War which followed the Russian Revolution, armored cars were the principle AFV on the battlefield. After the Civil War, Russia was left with only a handful of serviceable armored cars and a modernization program was desperately needed. This could not be achieved, however, until the Russian automotive industry was sufficiently advanced to support such a radical indigenous manufacturing program. The development of armored car (and tank) production from a cottage industry to mass production was dependent on the existence of a modern motor industry, which came about in Russia at the end of the 1920s.

 

On 7th November 1924, the AMO F-15 truck, a Russian development of the FIAT F-15 design, was paraded on Red Square, Moscow. The AMO F-15 was the first series-produced Russian truck. It was important in signalling the beginnings of a Russian heavy automobile industry, and with it the ability to use new series-produced chassis on which to mount armored car bodies. There was, however, no significant production of armored cars in Russia between 1918 and 1927. The BA-27 did not enter production until the beginning of the first Five Year Plan in 1927 as part of a major and long overdue program to mechanize the Russian Army.

 

In December 1929, the formal process of mechanizing the Russian Army began and mechanized brigades were formed, each with 220 tanks and 56 armored cars. In line with the overall mechanization plan, some thirty models of armored car were designed and produced during the period 1927-40. In the 1930s Russian armored cars were divided into two types; light and heavy, the difference in classification being in armament rather than weight. The light classification was used for armored cars armed with machine guns, while heavy armoured cars were generally those armed with a 37mm or 45mm tank gun. There were a small number of Russian "medium" armored cars, such as the BA-27M, but these were generally classified as heavy for operational purposes.

 

The first series-produced armored car produced in Russia was the BA-27, produced by the Izhorskiy plant on the AMO F-15 chassis from 1927, with later production batches of the BA-27 being built on the Ford AA chassis. A total of one hundred BA-27 vehicles were built. In 1931, Izhorskiy began production of the D-8 and D- 12 on the light Ford/GAZ-A chassis, and later the same year began production of the heavy BA-I, the first in a series of B A heavy armored cars which remained in production until 1940. With series production of armored cars underway (albeit with limited numbers produced), the early 1930s were to represent the era of modern armored car and tank development in Russia in parallel with most other industrialized nations around the world.

 

The chassis for most armored cars of the 1930s were built by the KIM plant in Moscow and the Gorkiy plant in Nizhny Novgorod. The latter plant was originally known as the Nizhny Novgorod Automobile plant (NAZ), but was renamed as the Gorkiy Automobile Plant (GAZ) in the mid-1930s. These chassis were shipped to the armored car manufacturers (primarily the Izhorskiy and the smaller but longer established Vyksinskiy plant), where the armored bodies were mounted on the chassis and final assembly was undertaken. Prior to 1931, the imported Ford Timken chassis was used for some Russian armored cars. While this chassis was available thereafter, the provision of series production technology to the USSR by Henry Ford in 1931-32 gave a major boost to Russian armored car production. It provided readymade chassis for both light (Ford/GAZ-A and Ford/GAZ-AA-based) and heavy (GAZ-AAA-based) armored cars. ZiS was also later to provide 6x4 chassis for limited production heavy armored cars.

 

During the early 1930s "operational" use of Russian armored cars was, for the most part, restricted to exercises conducted primarily in the Kiev Military District. Small numbers of Russian armored cars (especially the FAI, B A-3, and BA-6) were used during the Spanish Civil War, and experience gained during this conflict was incorporated into future designs which had better ballistic protection, particularly with regard to armor slope. The battles of the Khalkin Gol against Japan in the summer of 1939 were also a significant learning experience, with 345 Russian armored cars and 495 tanks engaged in combat operations during the conflict. Russian armored cars were also used in the invasion of Poland, the Baltic Republics, and Finland before the outbreak of total war against Germany in June 1941. Most armored cars were destroyed or abandoned within weeks of the outbreak of war with Germany, though some stationed in the Far East Military District at the time of war's outbreak appeared only later on the Russian "Western" front. A small number of captured vehicles were used by German Army.