Patriot Park Technical Center ex. Kubinka Tank Museum

Our reference book and the guide to automobile and the armored vehicles of the Second World War based on documents and photographs from our own archives.

When creating a tank museum in 1938 and after the Second World War, armored vehicles were just in the open air on the outskirts of Kubinka of a scientific and test training ground. At the official opening of the museum in 1972, covered hangars of a standard military type, as well as a separate administrative building, were built. In 7 hangars, not only historical domestic and foreign armored vehicles were located, but also samples of Western weapons of NATO countries captured as trophies. A special hangar N8 was made to store secret armored vehicles, not to be displayed even to visitors to the museum. Note that the museum visitors were only cadets of military schools and academies, KGB officers and engineer-designers of armored vehicles. The museum was considered part of the tank regiment from the structure of the landfill. Cleaning premises, servicing armored vehicles were made by soldiers and officers of this regiment. The museum staff were also listed in this regiment and received monetary maintenance, being considered temporarily seconded to the museum. The territory of the museum was fenced from the regiment and had one main entrance to the training ground and two official doors to the territory of repair shops.

The regiment building, probably built before the Second World War, included the Stalinist barracks for soldiers (left wing), the central part with the library and the secret archive, and repair boxes for tanks in the right wing. Near repair workshops there was an open space for storing equipment to be repaired. The doors for the passage from the museum to repair shops, the library and the barracks were open, sometimes closing to the castle. From the repair workshops and hangars of the Museum of armored vehicles, sometimes left for testing on the landfill highway, which is less than a kilometer. The museum employees had the status of existing military personnel or in stock, but continuing to serve at the museum in the posts of a tank regiment or training ground. In the administrative building there was a cafe (buffet) for dinners of the museum and soldiers. The toilet inside the building was intended only for employees of the museum and guests of the highest command personnel. For soldiers and visitors at the opening of the museum, a separate concrete tile toilet of a military type was built outside, which is now an unofficial monument of the Cold War.
Thus, by 1992, the museum was part of the test training ground, but had some autonomy. Large transformations have begun, among which it is necessary to note the following points with our small comments. Visiting military museums by members of the families of military personnel has always been traditions in the Soviet Army. Usually, this happened on the main military holidays – February 23 (Sovetsky Army Day), May 9 (Victory Day) and the second Sunday of September (Tank Troops Day). The entrance to the museum was opened through the military town and territory of the landfill. The soldiers set up a cordon so that the visitors did not go to the prohibited zone of the landfill. Visiting the tank museum was free as a patriotic action. The 90s in Russia were nicknamed “gangster”, and the army had no money. In order to profit from profit, the landfill management allowed ordinary civilian visitors to inspection of the museum every day for the entrance fee. An additional separate entrance to the museum from the Minsk highway was opened and a ticket office was installed for the sale of tickets. The tank regiment and the training ground received money for visiting the museum, and instead of tickets they issued special receipts with the seal of the military unit.
The history of the opening of the museum and the training ground is described in detail in the section “Warrixes, Intourist and admission of foreign citizens to the facilities of the Ministry of Defense with a special regime”.
The barracks, repair shops and secret library were located in an old, dilapidated building that needed repairs. The soldiers from this barracks moved to another place deep in the training ground, closer to the military town. The general, the head of the training ground, also ordered the urgent vacating of the central room of the secret library. According to the rules for declassifying documents in the Soviet Army, a decision was made about their future fate after 50 years: 1) remove the secret classification 2) destroy as useless 3) keep forever as secret. The library and archives contained all the documents related to the history of the capture of captured equipment and its study during World War II and local conflicts of later times. Most of these secret archives were deemed to have no current military significance and were destroyed. Thus, a large part of the history of the exhibits of the tank museum was destroyed. The left side of the building with the barracks was completely destroyed, the central part with the library and the right side with the workshops were slightly restored. After minor renovations, the library rooms were used for museum research staff, and the bays in the right wing of the building were used for repairing armored vehicles.

Scale model makers were the first civilians to visit the Kubinka tank museum. There was a special club in Moscow where you could buy or sell the scale models in a factory kit or already assembled and painted. It is very important for scale model makers and painters to see and study armored vehicles with various parts. In the late 90s, the first volunteer team of up to 10 people appeared in the museum, who began to paint the museum’s armored vehicles in historical colors for free. The first painting was very unsuccessful, as it was sometimes incorrect and not durable. Any artist has the right to fantasy and has a lack of knowledge. For example, the British Mk-5 Rhombus was painted as a German trophy, which never really happened. The second group of volunteers appeared in the museum in the early 00s, also numbering no more than 10 people with experience in restoring old military equipment. This team of civilians worked only on weekends and did not want the presence of military employees of the museum, veterans of the tank forces. It turned out to be a kind of closed club, which was subordinate only to the head of the museum. This team of repairmen sometimes also searched for military equipment on the battlefields of the Second World War. A second team was formed from the residents of the military town, which repaired an armored train and also participated in the search for military equipment on the battlefields of the Second World War.
Even in the Soviet era, during holidays for the headquarters of the military testing ground and important guests, they showed a demonstration of military equipment in motion, usually T-72 and T-80 tanks, armored personnel carriers and airborne combat vehicles. A small military parade of the Kubinka garrison. Soldiers of the nearby special forces battalion of the Airborne Forces demonstrated hand-to-hand combat techniques and shooting at the enemy. After restoration, historical armored vehicles also began to take part in parades on holidays.

to be continued