Painting WWII Soviet Union Airborne

By Kreighton Long

World War Two served as both the testing grounds and the high water mark for airborne operations.  All the major powers trained and equipped their own airborne corps with some getting more attention than others.  The Germans were the first to gain notoriety for their use of airborne forces during the early war period and the United States and Britain learning from Germany’s successes and improving upon them in their own airborne operations during the mid and late war periods.

My first memory of the Soviet Union’s airborne forces was hearing stories, and seeing photographs, of early Soviet experimentation with transporting paratroopers on the wings of aircraft to their designated drop zone.  My friends and I got a chuckle picturing that.

Many a history book and wargame passed without another mention of Soviet airborne forces until I was investigating the Second Battle of Targul Frumos while working on my Bolt Action late-war Grossdeutschland force.  David M. Glantz, in his book Red Storm over the Balkans,  lists within the Soviet’s 2nd Ukrainian Front’s Order of Battle three Guards Airborne Divisions.  According to prisoner statements, the 3rd Guards Airborne Division was nearly wiped out from a combination of heavy fighting for the strategically important Hill 256 and the stubborn disposition of the paratroopers.  The idea of building a Soviet paratrooper force for Bolt Action passed through my mind but I ended up talking myself out of it.

The idea remained buried until my third notable run-in with Soviet airborne forces.  This time in Warlord Game’s latest addition to their library of Bolt Action supplements — Campaign Case Blue.  The second scenario of the book requires the Soviet player to field a force from the Soviet Airborne Reinforced Platoon Theater Selector and the sixteenth scenario gives the Soviet Player two free Soviet Airborne Squads.

With repeated appearances in the Campaign Case Blue the thought of having a few Soviet Airborne troopers in my collection became too tempting to shake off again.  I moseyed on over to Warlords website and snagged myself a Soviet Airborne Squad to add to my queue.   I decided to paint the uniforms of my Soviet paratroopers slightly different than the rest of my Soviet army to help them stand out a bit more on the table and to add some variety to my see of Khaki and Khaki Grey uniforms.  After Googling around for photographs of Soviet airborne uniforms from WWII I decided to mix in some of Vallejo’s Japan Uniform WWII with the Khaki to give my paratroopers a unique uniform color.

All paints listed below are from Vallejo.

Happy painting!