Danube Flotilla (Soviet Union)

The Danube Flotilla was a naval force of the Soviet Navy's Black Sea Fleet during World War II (in Russia, called the Great Patriotic War) and afterwards, existing 1940–1941 and 1944–1960. The Flotilla operated on the Danube River and also, at times, on other rivers connected to the Black Sea.

The Soviet occupation of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina in 1940 gave the Soviet Union a border on the Danube, so the first Danube Flotilla was constituted to help defend this border. It was based in Izmail and was formed of ships transferred from the Dnieper Flotilla. The new Danube Flotilla initially consisted of five monitors (armed with 102mm and 130mm guns), four armored boats, five transports, and four launches, supported by an anti-aircraft battalion, fighter and bomber squadrons, a rifle and a machine gun company, and several shore batteries (two 152mm, one 130mm, and two 45mm gun batteries). Upon the start of the war the flotilla was reinforced by an additional 18 armored boats from the Baltic Fleet, a naval infantry company, and another three shore batteries (122mm, 76mm and 45mm), in exchange for the transfer of the four launches to the Black Sea Fleet.

At the beginning of the Romanian–German invasion of the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941, the Flotilla cooperated with Red Army troops in the defense of the southern front. On June 24–25, 1941, the Flotilla participated in a counterattack crossing of the Danube onto the Romanian side. After this, the Flotilla supported troops trapped in bridgeheads, and as the Red Army withdrew to Odessa the Flotilla ferried troops across the Southern Bug and Dnieper Rivers.

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