- Service ensign · official · carried by Airborne Forces (VDV)
- State affiliation · Russia
- Vigil category device · not official insignia
Identity provenance
Service ensign: Flag of the Russian Airborne Forces (VDV) — carried by Airborne Forces (VDV), not issued to this record. The service flag of the Airborne Forces, adopted 2004 — a blue and green bicolour charged with the VDV emblem. 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 Airborne Troops.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
The Ivanovo airborne division, committed across the war's axes — the 2022 Kyiv operation, then the Bakhmut flanks in 2023, where its regiments were publicly identified — and used, like the rest of the VDV, as line assault infantry.
- Scope
- Structure, role, lineage and links. No subordinate records published.
- Subordination
- Subordination confirmed
- Sources
- 4 on the record
- Record state
- Partial
- Broad area of activity
- The Kyiv axis in 2022; the Bakhmut sector in 2023; eastern sectors since, by ISW's tracking. No current disposition is authored.
- Notable history
- One of the two divisions the VDV kept as parachute formations, based at Ivanovo north-east of Moscow, with a lineage that runs through the Soviet airborne and the 2014 Donbas fighting, where its personnel were among the first Russian regulars publicly identified. In 2022 it was part of the force committed on the Kyiv axis, and after the withdrawal was moved to the east; in 2023 its regiments held sectors on the Bakhmut flanks after Wagner's departure, where public reporting identified them, and the division has been employed as assault infantry on eastern sectors since.
- Strengths
- VDV manning priority and cohesion, and a divisional structure the branch has kept intact through repeated reconstitution.
- Limitations
- Employed as ordinary infantry from 2022, at a cost to the experienced core that public reporting has documented; light equipment against a fortified, drone-saturated front. Nothing below the division is authored.
Related locations
Bakhmut: Regiments of the division were publicly identified on the Bakhmut flanks in 2023, after Wagner's withdrawal.
Quick actions
System access
Where this record connects into the rest of Vigil. Each row is here because this organisation actually reaches it.
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.