After the end of World War II, the corps relocated from Ploiești in Romania, where it was part of the Southern Group of Forces, to Novocherkassk in Rostov Oblast, by the fall of 1945.

The corps was reorganised as the 5th Guards Cavalry Division on 6 May 1946, part of the North Caucasus Military District.

Between 1 and 2 June 1962, the division was involved in the Novocherkassk massacre, the suppression of a strike caused by food shortages.

[5] In April 1966, the division was transferred to Kyakhta, on the Mongolian–Russian border, to reinforce the Transbaikal Military District in the light of deteriorating relations with the People's Republic of China (PRC).

Adam Geibel wrote that 5th "Don" Guards Tank Division, stationed in Buryatia, had received ‘a few’ of the initial group of 150 T-90s produced.

[14] On 23 March 2022 during the Russian invasion of Ukraine, reports emerged from a Ukrainian journalist, social media video and Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, that the brigade commander Colonel Yuri Medvedev had been run over by an armoured vehicle near Makariv driven by a mutinous soldier angered by the brigade's close to 50% combat losses suffered during the battle of Makariv.