Ar-2 in combat

updated on May 10, 2005 file name: operative.html

The type reached service in the second half of 1940 and was handed over to regiments in parallel with SB.
As a result regiments could have from one to several Ar-2 planes among their SBs.
63 such planes (then still called SB-RK) were built and devivered to units before the end of 1940, while 127 were built 1n 1941; the last 7 of them were delivered after June 22, 1941, for a total of 190.
In 1942 Aircraft factory 22, then moved to Kazan, manufactured neither SBs or Ar-2s, but carried out the scheduled overhaul of 112 airplanes of both types.

Two only photos of Ar-2 in service after the first days of war are known.
On the left:
gunner Sgt.V.E. Kapitonov in front of his aircraft, possibly "white 40" of 33 BAP, 19 BAD, during summer 1941.
A veteran recalls that all planes in the regiment initially were "silver" (uncamouflaged). It's not clear if this is true for Ar-2s too: the finish of the aircraft on the picture looks the factory one.
The unit had 23 Ar-2 on July 22, 1941, but by July 11 only 4 survived, of which only 2 in flyable conditions.
The regiment used obsolescent types in combat over Voronezh, Kharkov and Stalingrad, until 1943 when it started retraining for the Boston III.
below:
an Ar-2 during winter 1941, one of the few survivors at the date.
The aircraft looks to have been partially repainted white.

Units that had this type were:

2SBAP of 2SAD, a/d Krestsy, Leningrad area, 20 Ar-2
46SBAP of 7SAD, a/d Shauliai, Lithuania, total 62 SB and Ar-2
54SBAP in 54SAD, a/d Vilnius, Lithuania, total 68 SB+AR-2 and 7 Pe-2
13SBAP, 9SAD, Ross, Borisovschina, total 51 SB+Ar-2. This regiment saw action in late June 41 and lost all a/c until the end of the month.
33BAP, 19BAD, Belaya Tserkov, Gorodische, Kiev district, total 31 SB + 23 Ar-2 at 22 June 1941.
Ar-2 was also delivered to 27IAP, a fighter unit, mainly for pilots to acquire diving skills. On June 23, 1941 its second squadron was sent to the Western front. It was based on Borisov airfield and flew 89 combat missions, of those 41 involved dive bombing.
73BAP of 10SAD VVS KBF (Red Banner Baltic Fleet) had 43 SB and 18 Ar-2 planes and was located in Pärnu, Estonia, at the war outbreak.Other 8 a/c of the Navy were in second line. Some notes on their activity:

On July 10, 5 Ar-2s bombed Pärnu that by that time was already in German hands.

On July 13, 11 Ar-2 of 73BAP then based in Tallinn struck the German convoy 10 miles north the Ust-Dvinsk (the fortress near Riga in the mouth of the Daugava, in Latvia). 2 attempts were made, on 7:37 and 11:37.

On July 23 6 Ar-2s attempted an attack vs a Finnish warship near the Nagu island.

On July 25 the 73BAP base in Tallinn was attacked by 16 Ju88s and 2 Ar-2s were lost in fire.

On Aug 3, 2 Ar-2 bombed the Pärnu harbour and reported hits into a bridge. Another four of the Ar-2s attacked merchant ships in Riga.

The operative life of Ar-2 was very limited not only due to its limited production, but also because a lot of them were destroyed or captured on the ground or sent to attack the enemy without any fighter escort in the first days of war.
According to official sources, 95 Ar-2 were lost during 1941, but the extreme rarity of photos of this type in service (compared with the wide availability of photos of wrecks in German hands) suggests that real losses were higher than this number.

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