Vadim Shcherbakov
Soviet Air Defence Force officer
Vadim Petrovich Shcherbakov (Russian: Вадим Петрович Щербаков) was an officer in the Soviet Air Defense Forces (PVO Strany). As a senior lieutenant, he was serving in the 260th "Bryansky" Anti-Aircraft Missile Regiment. In 1966–1967 Shcherbakov's whole regiment was temporarily assigned as a Group of Soviet Military Advisors in Vietnam (Группа советских военных специалистов во Вьетнаме) and in March 1966 was transferred to North Vietnam, where the regiment was tasked with establishing a training center and training the NVA's 274th Anti-Aircraft Missile Regiment for combat duty. In North Vietnam Shcherbakov served as a SAM operator/instructor, and specialized as a fire control operator during combat deployments. For his service Shcherbakov received the Order of Lenin, the highest Soviet decoration after returning from North Vietnam in 1967.
American Task Force Russia: POW/MIA in their 18th report claims that formerly closed Soviet sources credited Colonel Shchbakov with 10 combat engagements and 6 kills. After Vietnam, Shcherbakov continued his service, eventually reaching the rank of colonel. Very little is known about his biography except for multiple brief mentions in Soviet Officers' Vietnam War memoirs. He was still alive in 1991, when he was attending an annual meeting of the Russian Association of Vietnam War veterans. He was a retired Colonel at that time.
The public source identifies “Vadim Shcherbakov” as soviet Air Defence Force officer. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Vadim, Shcherbakov and Soviet.
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This entry incorporates text from “Vadim Shcherbakov” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.