Winter War
- Thread starter Quackers
- Start date
Cheezy the Wiz
Socialist In A Hurry
If I had to give you number estimates myself, I couldn't, but I can say that the one-sided nature of the conflict was very much a reality. The Finns mastered every skill needed to wage the war, many of them including hit-and-run tactics by men on skis. One of their favorite tactics was to attack camps and either steal or destroy their cooking equipment and fires; nothing like being without those in the cold Russian winter!
lovett
Deity
- Joined
- Sep 21, 2007
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The 'twist' in this joke isn't apparent because you're Finnish; you actually know stuff about Finland. The vast majority of the internet using population do not really know anything about Finland. They know it's a rather small country somewhere in Europe (Scandinavia, if they're particularly geographically acute) and have probably not heard of it being involved in any wars recently, nor being anything like a militaristic state.
In contrast, most people are quite aware of the USSR's military capacity. "Evil empire", enough nukes to destroy the world, captured Berlin, kept huge armed forces so on and so forth.
The humour, or "twist", comes from the incongruity of the former so completely outfighting the latter.
Quackers
The Frog
So to summarise it was Soviet incompetance, inhospitable terrain and a harsh winter which defeated the Soviet Union.
How about Finnish military tactics on the ground? I would assume a mixture of guerilla type warfare would of been prefable to the Finns whilst a large battle of "Look at how many tanks we've got!" would suit Russia far more.
How about Finnish military tactics on the ground? I would assume a mixture of guerilla type warfare would of been prefable to the Finns whilst a large battle of "Look at how many tanks we've got!" would suit Russia far more.
Verbose
Deity
Well, the Finnish resolve was a necessity. It also helped that the Finns were fighting on their home turf, and it was still a society largely dependent on agriculture, logging etc., with oodles of soldiers used to dealing with heavy outdoor work in the deep winter. Add that this wasn't necessarily a "Russian" winter, but a Baltic one. I.e. even the Sibirian units suffered, since they were used to the dry cold you get in an inland climate. In Finland, by the Baltic, they encountered a wet cold, which seeps in.
The Mannerheim Line was a pretty decent piece of fortification, but for the Soviets to run into it in such a fashion as to generate the kind of slaughter it did, they really did have to do it idiot-style. Finnish gunners were suffering breakdowns after spending hours day after day just machinegunning human waves.
That the armoured columns would be stoppable wasn't immediately apparent. It took a couple of weeks for the Finns to find their feet, realise that the Soviets weren't exactly blitzing ahead on those forest roads, and then start to hit them, realize they were doing well, and emboldened by their success go in for it in earnest.
So on balance the Finns were very adroit in their choice of tactics and ground, tailored to what was after all rather limited means. But what was decisive for bloodying the Soviets to the extent they did, would seem to have been Soviet mistakes.
Once commanders like Timoshenko and Shaposhnikov got on the job, and the Soviets tooled up properly, the jig was up for the Finns.
Verbose
Deity
The numbers don't seem to be verifiable beyond a certain point.
Found this, at best I guess:
Finland/Killed 23 576/Wounded 43 557/Missing 3 273
Sovjet (officially)/Killed 132 747/Wounded 158 863/Missing -
Sovjet (Finnish estimate at the time)/Killed 200 000/Wounded 600 000/Missing -
Sovjet (German estimate at the time)/Killed 273 000/Wounded 720 000/Missing -
Sovjet (Russian estimate in 1992)/Killed 131 000/Wounded 325 000/Missing -
I'd go for the Russian 1992 estimate.
..which, it's important to note, the Finns duly noted, and so cut their losses.
Cheezy the Wiz
Socialist In A Hurry
Timoshenko wasn't a spectacularly brilliant commander, either, which should give you some idea of how horrible the command was before him *cough Voroshilov cough*, who happened to be one of the culprits in the failure of the Polish-Soviet War twenty years before. Klim was good at one thing and one thing only: sycophancy.
Hmm.. this deserves perhaps some emphasis: Finnish tactics were different on the Karelian Isthmus and at the north side of Ladoga.
Mannerheim expected Russians to attack on the isthmus, so it was well fortified. North from Ladoga transportation and supply was harder, and that's why no attack there was expected. When Russians however did attack there, Finns exploited this with their ski troops.
Now that I looked the picture of the OP again, it amazes me, how there could have been 400 000 lost Russians. How many Russians could have just escaped or really get lost? The rest of them would have to be corpses, and that would make the amount of dead at least twice as big.
You're probably right.
Mannerheim expected Russians to attack on the isthmus, so it was well fortified. North from Ladoga transportation and supply was harder, and that's why no attack there was expected. When Russians however did attack there, Finns exploited this with their ski troops.
Now that I looked the picture of the OP again, it amazes me, how there could have been 400 000 lost Russians. How many Russians could have just escaped or really get lost? The rest of them would have to be corpses, and that would make the amount of dead at least twice as big.
You're probably right.
I hear there are lots of swamps and peat bogs north of Ladoga...
Verbose
Deity
Well, I've seen interviews with Finnish veterans who in the spring of 1940 were detailed to do the cleam up at Soumussalmi and along Raate road. With the dead Societ soldiers thawing out en masse, that was apparently an exceedingly nasty job.
Dragonlord
Fantasy Warlord
Skimming this thread, I'm surprised the Finnish 'Motti tactics' haven't been further explored. Look it up on Wiki some time.
Basically, the Russian forces were forced to keep in column to the roads through the winter woods. Just imagine it: nothing but woods and snow drifts right next to the road, no way to leave the road without skis or snowshoes - and you have neither. Now someone blocks the road at the head of the column and then, for good measure, does the same at the back. You're in a column and can neither move forward nor back. Now those pesky Finns cut your column into bits - attacking one section at a time while the other sections wait helplessly for their turn. Not to mention that you're freezing your butt off all the while....
Scary stuff!
Good tactics by the Finns, but I agree with others here that it was mostly inept Soviet leadership - any halfway competent officer with access to a map should have seen their columns' vulnerability on those roads.... heck, maybe they should just have asked a sergeant, or did Stalin purge those too?
Oh, I know the conflict was incredibly one-sided. There's many great jokes about the conflict I've heard from my sole Finnish friend, usually involving one or two Finns successfully wiping out entire Russian armies. I just meant the OP's picture is higher than any estimate I've ever seen.
Traitorfish
The Tighnahulish Kid
For those unaware, this chap was an assuming farmer named Simo Häyhä, and where he walked, Russians died.
^^ Because of soldiers like this midget ^^
So propose an alternative approach. The only viable one I can see would have been "wait for goddamn summer" but I think that was fairly outside their discretion.
Is not sucking at logistics, strategy and tactics an alternative approach? Because the Russkies seemed to do well enough with that particular approach in places like, oh, Manchuria.
Dragonlord
Fantasy Warlord
Several possibilities suggest themselves, even to an armchair general like myself
.Against the Mannerheim Line, use Sturmtruppen tactics like those developed at the end of WWI, instead of just throwing men at the machine guns.
Regarding the roads through the wilderness, protect your flanks with your own skirmishers on skis - it's not as if the Russians didn't have their own ski troops, as they showed against the Germans shortly after. Unless they trained their ski troops on the Finnish example, don't know about that...
Alternatively, advance more slowly while developing defences on your flanks, on a somewhat broader front.
Just sending a single column along a road while leaving the flanks totally unsecured is rank stupidity and/or arrogance - I'm sure any cadet would know better!
One reason for poor tactics of Russians might have been that less straightforward action would be seen as politically suspicious.
No doubt there was lots of corpses, but what I thought was this: If there were 400 000 lost, most (almost all) of them were probably dead. That would make about 600 000 dead. How could it be possible that the amount of the dead would be estimated 220 000 then? Unless they really were swallowed by the swamps
Are you or your parents Finnish by any chance? You seem to know pretty much about Finnish history, and if I remember correctly you liked Mika Waltari too. (Hope you don't mind asking)
No doubt there was lots of corpses, but what I thought was this: If there were 400 000 lost, most (almost all) of them were probably dead. That would make about 600 000 dead. How could it be possible that the amount of the dead would be estimated 220 000 then? Unless they really were swallowed by the swamps
Are you or your parents Finnish by any chance? You seem to know pretty much about Finnish history, and if I remember correctly you liked Mika Waltari too. (Hope you don't mind asking)
Verbose
Deity
Don't mind the question at all!
But no, no Finnish ancestry (at least not for several centuries). I'm just interested. And one of the perks of being Swedish is that a shedloead of material on things Finnish are after all readily available at least in Swedish translation.
Actually as a general Swedish historical exercise it is always useful to up until 1809 remember that the history includes Finland as well. Somehow the amputation back then was successfully survived to the extent that a lot of Swedes then plum forgot Finland was ever part of the package. Meaning today professional historians tend to make a fair bit of concentrated effort of hammering home the intertwining of Swedish and Finnish history. And it spills over after 1809 as well.
Verbose
Deity
Quite.Several possibilities suggest themselves, even to an armchair general like myself
Against the Mannerheim Line, use Sturmtruppen tactics like those developed at the end of WWI, instead of just throwing men at the machine guns.
Regarding the roads through the wilderness, protect your flanks with your own skirmishers on skis - it's not as if the Russians didn't have their own ski troops, as they showed against the Germans shortly after. Unless they trained their ski troops on the Finnish example, don't know about that...
Alternatively, advance more slowly while developing defences on your flanks, on a somewhat broader front.
Just sending a single column along a road while leaving the flanks totally unsecured is rank stupidity and/or arrogance - I'm sure any cadet would know better!
It's hard to spot ways the Finns could have improved their performance, they did quite well given their means. But being less hamfisted than the Soviets at the time shouldn't bo too hard.
Though the thing about sending single columns of armoured vehicles into Finnish forests is that at the time it was pretty much the way to get armour into Finland. It's not good tank country. Sure you should protect your flanks if you do, but the question might be asked if not using some other kinds of units might not be more advisable in the first place?
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