Part 1

If you are older and already have been to the military service, then you served for 2 years and are in reserve. When the mobilisation is declared, you will be notified and be mobilised to “inflate” peace time divisions (which had 1 brigade) to war time divisions (which had 3 brigades). You don’t really need any training - you already know all that is needed and you are combat ready. This however most likely is not your case.

If you are younger and haven’t been to military service yet, then your conscription process will begin if you are going to become 19 years old in the year the drafting will happen. If you study in secondary school, you will be conscripted after you complete the studies or reach 20 [1].

The first training you will get will probably be even before your division is formed. When you reach a certain age, you should go to a local council and they will account you. At school you will be taught basic military stuff 2 hours each week [2]. Military from the nearby base had to lead those lessons. Then in summer you will go to some sort of military training camp, where you will receive some field training. Will learn to aim and fire a weapon and other basic stuff. Its duration is around 10 days. This training was dependent on many factors, such as availability of good teachers from the military side, availability of training materials etc. Not always good conditions were met during the wartime.

If you have already graduated and are working in a factory, then according to order 120 [2] everyone has to undergo 110 hour long pre-military training. So everyone, who wasn’t conscripted yet would gradually be called in and receive some training. It is stated in that order, that people should be called without hurting the production or farming or other jobs. However since the situation was very difficult, this did raise some tensions. Factory has its production plan, the drafting office has its training plan and they would sort of compete for the person, needed to be trained. This is offtopic, but shows the reality better.

For those to be conscripted, the training happens usually in the same year when they will be called in. But it has 2 steps: winter and summer. In winter you will be going to a training camp after work. This would allow you to get some experience on how to live in the army during the winter. Training length is around 300 hours, split between the winter and summer training seasons. That 2 step training system was not performed at all times. For example if some area was liberated in summer, recruits from that area would still be drafted, but miss the winter training. And the total training time has varied throughout the war and from one region to another.

After drafting is announced [like so: http://www.soldat.ru/doc/original/original.html?img=mobilization_b], everyone to be conscripted gets an invitation [like this one: http://www.soldat.ru/doc/original/original.html?img=povestka_b]. It says that you have to arrive at a specific time, shave your head, take some food with you. You come to some local school or cinema or other government building, where temporarily the drafting office is organized. Then you are sent to your training camp. Avoiding your conscription is qualified as a criminal action [1].

Future soldiers would be trained how to handle their weapons, maintain them. The programme included learning how to handle various weapons, starting from pistols and up to machineguns, anti-tank rifles and even light mortars. In this way every soldier knew how to use all light weapons in his unit and could replace, say a machine gunner if needed. This all is covered in respective books of the “Shooting manual”[4]. There was a serious shortage of training material in some places. Some training places had few weapons, others had difficulties with training ammo.

Trench digging, camouflage, mine defusing basics and all other things would be taught to you. Those are covered in respective manuals which are available on the Internet.

The training day lasts 11 hours for infantry. The training would include tactical exercises, both theoretical and in the field. Things like how assaulting of some object is carried out: how and when to get out of your trench; how to close in to the object and how to follow the “fire wall” of the artillery; when to get your grenades and how to throw them into enemy trenches simultaneously, so one soldier's grenades won’t blast other ones back to your positions; what to do when you reach enemy trenches; how to prepare for counter attacks.