Although naval aviation was never a priority for the Soviet Union, the Beriev MBR-2 (also known as the Be-2) was a widely used flying boat which served mostly as a transport in its civil guise and as a reconnaissance and rescue aircraft for military operations. Designed in the early 1930s as the first original design of Georgii Mikhailovich Beriev, the MBR-2 was not a particularly effective aircraft due to its age and its unusual pusher engine on high struts (the propellers alone were 3 meters in diameter) but was built in large numbers and was used extensively throughout the war particularly with the Soviet Navy's Northern and Black Sea fleets as well as with Aeroflot. Many surviving MBR-2s remained in service well after the war ended and led to a long line of Beriev amphibians which were built throughout the Cold War for both civil and military purposes.

Known as the TsKB-25 in prototype form, first flight was on 3 May 1932. The MBR-2 main production variant utilized a less powerful but more reliable M-17 engine which was eventually substituted by the AM-34 in the considerably improved MBR-2bis. This version also introduced a closed cockpit, additional defensive armament, an optional ski undercarriage, and the ability to carry out attack missions with bombs, mines and depth charges. Civil transport variants included the MP-1 and MP-1bis which corresponded to their military counterparts while the MP-1T was used for freight cargo transportation.