The 176th Fighter Aviation Regiment PVO was a fighter regiment of the Soviet Air Defense Forces during World War II and the Cold War. The unit was disbanded in March 1960. History Prewar and World War II The unit was formed on 22 March 1938 as the 19th Fighter Aviation Regiment (IAP) at Gorelovo in the Leningrad Military District from the 58th and 70th Separate Fighter Aviation Squadrons and the 33rd Separate Reconnaissance Aviation Squadron. Equipped with Polikarpov I-15bis fighters, the regiment formed part of the 54th Light (Fighter) Aviation Brigade of the Air Forces (VVS) of the Leningrad Military District. It was shifted to the Skomorokhi airfield in the Kiev Special Military District on 9 September 1939 in order to fight in the Soviet invasion of Poland, which it fought in between 17 and 28 September as part of the VVS Ukrainian Front's 59th Fighter Aviation Brigade, equipped with the Polikarpov I-16 fighter. The 19th IAP returned to the Leningrad Military District in October, and between 30 November 1939 and 13 March 1940 fought in the Winter War against Finland as part of the 54th Fighter Aviation Brigade of the VVS 7th Army of the Northwestern Front. It initially included three squadrons of I-16s and one I-15bis squadron; the latter was transferred to the north in mid-December and replaced by a new I-16-equipped 4th Aviation Squadron by the beginning of January. During the war, the regiment was officially credited with flying 3,646 sorties, downing three Finnish aircraft in aerial combat and destroying two on the ground, and 74 locomotives and 150 railcars destroyed in ground attacks; it suffered no losses. For its "exemplary performance of combat missions", the 19th IAP was awarded the Order of the Red Banner on 11 April. The regiment became part of the 3rd Fighter Aviation Division (IAD) of the VVS Leningrad Military District in November 1940. At the beginning of Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion of the Soviet Union, on 22 June 1941, the regiment fielded fifty I-16s, twenty Polikarpov I-153, and fifteen Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-3 fighters for a total of 85 aircraft in five squadrons. By this point the 3rd IAD was part of the Northern Air Defense Zone of the National Air Defense Forces (PVO). Senior Lieutenant S.V. Tyutyunnikov claimed the regiment's first aerial victory of the war on 6 July, a German Junkers Ju 88 bomber near Lake Lubenskoye. The regiment became