Russo-Finnish War

pmaitra

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Historical Recreation (4,5,6/6)



 
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civfanatic

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A classic example of how training, tactics, and terrain can be successfully used on a large scale against a much more powerful foe.

On paper, the Red Army should have been able to overrun Finland with little difficulties, but the reality was quite different.
 

pmaitra

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Actually, Leningrad Oblast, where the city of St. Petersburg is located, was captured by Tsar Peter the Great (Peter I) and incorporated into the Russian Empire. They all belonged to Finland anyway! Finland then was a Swedish subject, so Russia actually fought against Sweden in the The Northern War with Sweden (1700-1721).





Historically, trains departing Moscow in the direction of Finland departed from a station called the Finlandsky Vakzal or Station (Финля́ндский вокза́л):

 

Rahul92

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The Winter War was a political success for the Germans. Both the Red Army and the League of Nations were humiliated, and the Allied Supreme War Council had been revealed to be chaotic and powerless. However, the German policy of neutrality was not popular in the homeland, and relations with Italy had suffered badly. After the Peace of Moscow, Germany did not hesitate to move to improve ties with Finland, and within two weeks Finno-German relations were at the top of the agenda.
 

indian_sukhoi

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Thought of coming with a Topic on Finland - Soviet War and Simo Haya Sniper Kills. Glad there is already one!

A classic example of how training, tactics, and terrain can be successfully used on a large scale against a much more powerful foe.

On paper, the Red Army should have been able to overrun Finland with little difficulties, but the reality was quite different.
All because of Stalin. During The Great Purge, Almost half of the Red Army officers were executed. There wasnt any proper chain of command and the army was led by inexperience officers.

Winter had also played a crucial role. Finnish had better uniforms and snow-camouflaged which made them almost invinsible, Whereas the Soviets were wearing regular military uniforms. One of the reasons why Soviet soldiers became a easy target to snipers.
AFAIK, They did learn lessons from the Finnish campaign and perfromed well during winter, Operation Barbarossa.

Soviets even used Artillery to neutralize him, After most of thier counter sniper tactics failed. Compare to other Counter-Sniper methods, Using of Artillery to counter Sniper threat is not a bad idea.

The In-experienced Soviet Army used "Close With And Destroy", orders given to rush the sniper's position. Which costed more casualty.



There is a band called Sabaton who all songs are based on Military History. Sabaton is about Simo Häyhä. A Finnish sniper that in the Winter War had 505 confirmed kills.

 
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Waffen SS

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It was possible,because Soviets had quantity,their army was made of by mainly poorly trained conscripts.Many could not understand why they are fighting?:confused:

Finnish soldiers were more innovative and trained.
Soviets utterly underestimated Finnish strength.Mannerheim is one of the best General in world,in defensive warfare.

But most important factor,that's why Soviets suffered too many causality in Finland that was Stalin himself.
1947 Purge,hundreds of skilled officers were purged,because Stalin could not trust them any more.

1937-1941 - Military Purges

To keep Stalin's regime running,and to save Stalin from Military coup it was good,but for USSR and people it was a disaster.
But why Stalin had to purge?
By 1932-1933,Stalin forced farmers to accept Communist system,it was executed poorly,even those who said it should be revised they were also sent to Gulag.
Resulted in famine,known as Holodomor.Mainly in Ukraine,but also in other parts of Russia.Many oposed or could not accept this,so they were to be removed.

Stalin always wanted to take his personality in such level that no one could even touch it.So,whose personal glory was was gaining fame,Stalin also considered them as "spy".
 

Rudra7678

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The Soviet-Finnish War of 1939-40 is an interesting prologue to the World War II. When the discussions about the WWII crop up, this war is seldom talked about and the reason being that the war lasted a little about 3 months and Soviet Union got some major leverage for their security concerns around the Leningrad and Gulf of Finland. While, there is no dearth of material around the Internet over the Winter War, unfortunately, 95% of the material gives credence to the Finnish claims, while completely ignoring the Soviet side of the events. Of late, some works have been made available in English language for the readers who are interested in the particular episode of pre-WWII military history.

A Brief History.
================
The general area, which is known as Finland today, was area which was for centuries inhabited by Finnish tribes. This area was ruled by Sweden for around 800 years before it became the part of the Imperial Russian Empire in the early 19th century and was declared as the 'Grand Dutchy' of the Russian Empire. The majority of the aristocracy and the ruling class were Swedish by descent.

In the revolution of February 1917, when Tsar abdicated his powers and a provisional government was formed in Petrograd (St. Petersburg today) under the leadership of Kerensky. At this time, the Social Democratic party of Finland, which had 103/200 seats in Finnish DIET (Parliament), called for greater autonomy for Finland (with foreign relations and military issues remaining with Russia) and demanded social reforms (Power Act) that were rejected by the provisional Russian government of Kerensky and the DIET was dissolved. Soon after the successful October Revolution, when Bolsheviks seized power, the ruling class of Finland comprising of Swede-Finnish aristocracy, rich landlords, bankers and capitalists, which was abhorrent and apprehensive of the Bolshevik government in Russia, rose to declare independence of Finland. As per the program of the Bolsheviks, they had avowed that any ethnic nationality that wanted to secede from the Russian empire could do so. The draft of the Finnish independence was drafted by (hold your breath) I. V. Dzhugashvili aka Stalin and the draft was ratified by newly formed Soviet Republic in January 1918.

It should be noted that Finnish ruling class had no role at all in the struggle for separate identity or freedom from the Tsarist Russian empire. They were happy being part of the Russian empire as long as their property, wealth, influence was protected. Baron Carl Gustaf Mannerheim, was a highly decorated army officer in the Russian imperial army and had fought wars on behalf of Russia empire in WWI and Russo-Japanese War of 1904-05. He was standing next to Tsar Nicholas II on his coronation and there is nothing to say of his reservations and protestations against the “Russification of Finland” policy of Tsar or the brutal suppression of Finnish workers and masses in the aftermath of the failed 1905 revolution. Just like his class compatriots, he had no qualms about a Russian ruled Finland.

After the White Guards (with help from Britain, France in terms of money and arms and military help from Germany, which sent 12,000 strong expeditionary force under the command of General Rudiger and General von Golz) managed to defeat the Red Guards in the Finnish civil war, which lasted from 1918-1920. In 1920, both USSR and Finland signed the Treaty of Tartu, which was much more favorable to Finland than USSR, which also saw the Russian district of Pechango (Petsamo) which had an ice-free port and had huge nickel resources going to Finland. Pechango was never ever a part of the Finland, it was never ever shown on maps when Finland was still the Grand Dutchy of the Tsarist Russian empire.

The Finnish leadership, as reactionary as it was, was not satisfied with just the present borders but it also wished to annex the parts of the Soviet Union from eastern Karelia (Petrozavodsk) to the Urals in the south to come under what is known as “Greater Finland”. During the Russian civil war, Finland provided all material help to the Russian White Guards and the whichever army was participating in the anti-Bolshevik and anti-Soviet Union war. The Finnish army even carried out attacks on the Soviet territory. In the early 1920s, the Finnish government carried out several militant (terrorist) activities in the eastern Karelia, which is inhabited by people who are of Urgic-Finnic ethnicity to rebel against the soviet government. In 1922, the Soviet forces kicked the Finns out of the Soviet Karelia and the dreams of “Greater Finland” were shelved but only temporarily as an uneasy peace prevailed between the two neighbors. In the meantime, the threat from socialists and communists persisted in Finland and during the period from 20s to the early 30s, many socialists, communists, their family, friends, sympathizers were killed, imprisoned exiled on the slightest pretext, while the Finnish fascists (Lapua Movement) were given only a slight slap on the wrist. One of the famous Lapuan fascist sympathizer, Martii Wallenius, who was serving in the Finnish Army and was dishonorably discharged in the aftermath of Winter War. Wallenius was found guilty in conspiracy in the kidnapping of Finland’s first President Kaarlo Stahlberg in October 1930.



Security Concerns of the Soviet Union.
================
For almost the majority of the 1920s and 1930s, the relationship between the Soviet Union and Finland remained lukewarm. Though Finland was a democracy just for name’s sake, the real power was held by extra-constitutional militia “Civic Guards” (Soujeluskunta in Finnish) which was formed from the erstwhile ‘White Guards”. The White Guard membership was about 100,000 active members, all of whom had extensive military training. Nothing could move forward in the Finnish DIET or the government without the tacit approval of the organization, whose head of Carl Mannerheim.

Given the history of relationship between the two countries, Soviet Union had no two thoughts about the security of its borders in the northwest. The largest industrial town of Leningrad (erstwhile Petrograd/St. Petersburg) was merely twenty miles or 32 kilometers from the Soviet-Finnish border. The Soviet government was concerned that Finland was just too small of a nation (with total population around 4 million) to remain neutral and should it fall to an invading force, it could be used as a springboard to launch an attack on the Soviet Union. The vitriolic anti-Soviet attitude prevailing in the Finland was also not something that Soviet leadership could ignore and hence the security issues regarding Leningrad were of top-most concern. The existence of Finnish fascism, which was espoused by Academic Karelian Society and Finnish patriotic organization IKL, which openly demanded that Finland attack and annex parts of Soviet Karelia (which as told earlier, were historically never part of Finland) along with Leningrad.

In 1933, when National Socialist German Workers’ Party (NSDAP) led by Hitler, assumed power in Germany, there was no doubt in the mind of the Soviet leadership about the final outcome and that was attack on Soviet Union with the intention of destroying it, enslaving Slavic population and utilizing land east of Germany for the spread of Reich’s territory (Lebenesraum).

Keeping in view of the German intentions, the Soviet leadership had to act quickly. In 1938, Soviet diplomat Boris Yartsev apprised the Finnish government of the Soviet security concerns with respect to Leningrad and the Gulf of Finland. Soviet Union offered a non-Aggression pact Finland, but the Finnish leadership showed no such interest, as they had declared “neutrality” like the other Scandinavian countries like Sweden and Norway.

With the time running out to prepare for the ultimate outcome, Soviet government hurriedly signed the ‘Non-Aggression Pact’ with Nazi Germany with them (USSR) being the last country in Europe to have signed a pact with the Third Reich and thus averted the war for a few years, which gave them ample time to re-strengthen their armed forces and take measures to alleviate their security concerns.

The Soviet Finnish negotiations started in in all seriousness in 1939 at Moscow. The Finnish delegation was represented by R. Holsti, J. Paasikivi and V. Tanner. The basic Soviet aims in the negotiations were expressed in a memorandum handed by Stalin and Molotov to Paasikivi on 14 October:
"In the negotiations with Finland, the Soviet Union is mainly concerned with the settlement of two questions:
a) securing the safety of Leningrad;
b) becoming satisfied that Finland will maintain firm, friendly relations with the Soviet Union.

In order to fulfil this duty, it is necessary:
(1) To make it possible to block the opening of the Gulf of Finland by means of artillery fire from both coasts of the Gulf of Finland in order to prevent warships and transport ships of the enemy penetrating, to the waters of the Gulf of Finland.

(2) To make it possible to prevent the access of the enemy to those islands in the Gulf of Finland which are situated west and north-west of the entrance to Leningrad.

(3) To have the Finnish frontier in the Karelian Isthmus, which is now at a distance of 32 km. from Leningrad, i.e., within the range of long-distance artillery, moved somewhat farther northwards and northwestwards".

('The Development of Finnish-Soviet Relations of 1939”; Helsinki 1940; p. 49-50).

The Soviet leadership offered twice the amount of land in northern Karelia in return for the Finland moving back its borders a dozen of kilometers from the existing Soviet-Finnish border on the Karelian isthmus. On the Gulf of Finland, the Finns were ready to consider giving up islands of deep in the gulf but Soviet leadership rejected it saying that strategically the it makes more sense to counter hostile navy at the entrance, near Hanko peninsula, than deep inside the gulf, which offers no protection at all to the security of Leningrad. The Soviet leadership asked if the Finnish government could consider handing over or at least leasing the islands on Hanko peninsula and have them jointly fortified by the Soviets and the Finns. These proposals were rejected and while Mannerheim, Holsti, Paasikivi and Tanner agreed in principle with Soviet demands, the Finnish foreign minister Erkko was in no mood to provide any concessions to Soviets. As a result, the talks broke down and threat of war loomed large on the horizon.

(to be contd.)
 

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