- Service ensign · official · carried by Ground Forces
- State affiliation · Russia
- Vigil category device · not official insignia
Identity provenance
Service ensign: Flag of the Russian Ground Forces — carried by Ground Forces, not issued to this record. The service flag of the Ground Forces, adopted 2004. The design itself is not an object of copyright: Article 1259(6) of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation excludes official symbols and signs. The file shipped is the Wikimedia Commons SVG "Flag of the Russian Ground Forces.svg", released under PD-RU-exempt on that basis, so no attribution or share-alike obligation attaches. Optimised for web display; geometry unaltered.
State affiliation: Russia.
The smaller square mark is a Vigil category device, drawn from this record’s own domain, echelon and role — not an official insignia.
In brief
Motor-rifle division of the 20th Army re-established in 2016 in Smolensk oblast as part of the return to divisions on the western frontier; committed on the northern axes in 2022 and tracked on the Svatove–Kreminna line since.
- Scope
- Structure, role, lineage and links. No subordinate records published.
- Subordination
- Subordination reported
- Sources
- 5 on the record
- Record state
- Partial
- Broad area of activity
- Peacetime: Smolensk oblast. Wartime: the northern axes in 2022 and the Svatove–Kreminna line in Luhansk oblast since, by ISW's tracking. No current disposition is authored.
- Notable history
- A Soviet division disbanded in the 1990s and re-established in 2016 at Yelnya as one of the two divisions the 20th Army received in the return to divisional structures on the Ukrainian border — a structural signal that predated the invasion by six years. It fought the 2022 northern operation and the retreat from Kharkiv oblast, and has since been among the formations tracked on the Svatove–Kreminna line, the sector the 20th Army has held longest.
- Strengths
- A divisional structure built for this frontier before the war, with the artillery and support that a division brings and separate brigades do not.
- Limitations
- Re-formed on paper faster than it was filled; its 2022 performance reflected that, and it has been reconstituted since. Nothing below the division is authored.
Lineage & institutional history
Assessed as of — 2026-07 Last reviewed — 2026-09-28
See this force in the structure Interactive: select this record and follow what connects to it.