Kyzylorda Region
The Soviet Space Troops date back to February 12, 1955 when the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and the Council of Ministers of the Soviet Union issued a joint executive order for the establishment of Scientific Research and Testing Range for the development of space exploration technology, codenamed Tayga Installation ("Обект «Тайга»"). The range was formally established on June 2, 1955 on Plot 10 - Zarya in Kyzylorda Region of the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic, when the General Staff of the Soviet Army established the structure and manpower requirements of the range and assigned the formal designation of 5th Scientific Research and Testing Range (5th SRTR, "5-й Научно-исследовательский испытательный полигон" ("5-й НИИП")). Unlike the Soviet Union's main adversary in the Cold War and the space race in particular, where space exploration was assigned to the civilian NASA, in the Soviet Union this has been a military activity from the start. It was an integral part of the Soviet strategic ballistic missile force and by the time of the range's creation in 1955 this was the portfolio of the Deputy Minister of Defence for Special Weaponry and Rocket Technology. The first appointee (since March 1955) was (at the time) Marshal of Artillery, later Chief Marshal Of Artillery Mitrofan Ivanovich Nedelin. On December 17, 1959 CMA Nedelin's Deputy Minister apparatus was transformed into the Strategic Missile Forces (RVSN). As a military unit the range received the designation Military Detachment 11284 ("войсковая часть 11284"). The range was initially commanded by a Colonel of the RVSN, but it had an extensive force structure of division equivalent with its own aviation (the 28th Separate Composite Aviation Squadron, "28-я отдельная смешанная авиаэскадрилья" and the 6th Separate Aviation Flight, "6-е отдельное авиационное звено"), a missile assembly brigade, its own railway network, security, logistics, medical units and flight measurement units as far away as the Kamchatka Peninsula.