People's Commissariat for the Tank Industry

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The People's Commissariat for the Tank Industry of the USSR (Russian Народный комиссариат танковой промышленности СССР; Abbreviation: НКТП СССР; Transcription: NKTP) was a state organ of the Soviet Union . It corresponds to a present-day ministry and was founded on September 11, 1941, after the start of the German-Soviet war , after the heavy losses of tanks .

Loading of T-34s in the “Uralmash” plant in Sverdlovsk . (February 1942)

At that time, such specialized people's commissariats also existed in the Soviet Union for other branches of the arms industry, such as aviation. Because of the war situation, the People's Commissariat for the Tank Industry was set up in Chelyabinsk instead of Moscow . The local tractor factory was converted to the production of tanks shortly after the start of the war.

The first people's commissar for the tank industry was Vyacheslav Malyshev ( Russian Вячеслав Александрович Малышев ). In July 1942 he was replaced by Isaak Salzman (Исаак Зальцман).

The People's Commissariat was initially only responsible for the production of heavy tanks from the KW series ( KW-1 , KW-2 ). The medium tanks of the better known type T-34 were built as early as 1940.

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