Finland: Every Step Paid With Blood

[CSL_GG]

November 15th, 1939

While war has been raging to the south of Finland for over two months Finland has so far stayed out of the war, preferring to stay neutral. Unknown to the Finns however Adolf Hitler has signed away the country to the Soviets in the Molotov-Ribbentrop agreement and after repeated demands of territorial annexations of Viipuri, Sortavala and Petsamo the Russians have finally demanded for the last time. Our non-aggression pact has been broken and even now the first Soviet planes fly over the Finnish nation bent on bringing war to the nation.

Finland, November 15th, 1939. War has come to the country and despite preperations it may not be enough to stop the Russian Bear

To an outside observor it would seem to be a lopsided battle - a David and Goliath battle if there ever was one. The Soviet Union can boast almost two hundred front line combat divisions while in comparsion the Finns have only seventeen in total. Many hold little hope for a Finnish victory, indeed many might predict a collapse of the nation within weeks, however at the helm of the nations defense is Mannerheim who has long prepared for the oncoming threat. A string of defensive positions has already been completed from Viipuri in the south, across Lake Lagoda and north into the hinterlands around Joensuu. Furthermore the weater will be with Finland, the troops are well prepared for winter and boast some of the finest cold weather gear on the face of the earth. Long have the citizen soldiers of the nation practiced their skills in the snows of Finland's interior and many have become marksmen in their own right. While these seventeen division will be up against Army Corps as much as six times their size, many have been given additional Anti-Tank and Artillery Brigades from which to augment their power. If the Soviet must invade then they shall pay for every step in blood.

A Finnish soldier watches the Russian border from his position, ready to fend off the first Russian advances

Let them come, for they will suffer for their foolishness.​

 

[CSL_GG]

December 12th, 1939
27 Days Into War

The initial days of the war were not to be known as ones involving much land combat. Instead on both sides of the border armies repositioned themselves in a bid to reinforce weak positions and seeking to exploit the enemies own weaknesses. Finnish units would strike first with two bold raids across the Soviet border near Kandalaksja in a bid to disorganize the nearby enemy forces and marginally succeeded in the effort. Unfortunetly for them however the move prompted a massive redeployment of Soviet forces north and the Soviet presence in the area expanded from three divisions to an estimated dozen.

A more active front in the first month of the war was that of the aerial theater. By the second day of the war the small Finnish airforce - not more then two dozen vintage planes had been swept from the sky and Soviet bombers were given free reign over the entirety of Finland. Initially bombing raids were small with no more then twenty of thirty planes participating in any one sortie and with only a dozen or so of those missions a day. For the first three weeks these raids centered upon the reserve infantry divison in Mikkeli under Major General Airo. After lossing nearly three dozen of the small Russian bombers and several of the larger two engine DB-3's the Russians changed targets to the Mannerheim line. Over the course of the first week in December the sorties began to pick up pace and strength culminating in a massive December 12th raid against several portions of the Mannerheim line in Sortavala near the command post of Field Marshall Mannerheim himself.

On December 12th, 1939 the Russians launched the largest bombing raid of the war so far. Unfortunetly for them it did little to harm the Finnish units and the raid suffered in excess of one dozen aircraft losses - all of which were reclaimed by Finn units.

The Russians however were unexpectedly aiding the Finns. While the bombing may have killed dozens over the course of the first few weeks it did little to disorganize any of the front line divisions and did even less damage to the Mannerheim fortifications. Instead anti-aircraft fire by Finnish guns shot down several dozen aircraft and as a testament to the ingenuity of the Finnish army most of these planes were reclaimed by the army to be used as scrap metal and more importantly offered a source of additional armlaments such as aircraft mounted machine guns.

Early on in the Winter War many downed Russian bombers were found and used to fuel Finnish industry.

Despite the concentration of heavy bombings, by mid-December the face of the war had chanced by nothing at all. The pre-war borders were still intact and no Russians had entered Finland. Many on the frontlines began to wonder when the war was going to become a war.
​

 

[unmerged(11610)]

Finland AAR, GREAT! You beat me on this, I was also planning to start as Finland. Well, I still have enough work to do with my current Germany AAR. And I will start 1936 Finland AAR probably next time. Meanwhile I will closely look how you can manage with 1939 campaign.

Nice story! I'm very interested to hear how this campaign will go. Good luck!

 

[unmerged(33990)]

Ah, intresting!

Did you know that during the aerial raids some soviet planes were shot down with rifle-caliber weapons?

 

[unmerged(38461)]

yes and the finnish people lighted bonfires in the forest of vuosaari about 30 km away from helsinkis centrum, so the stupid soviet pilots dropped the bombs in those forests, because in the night bombs are always dropped towards lights.

 

[unmerged(11447)]

Nicely done!

So are you doing the Winter War scenario, the 1939 scenario, or what?

 

[CSL_GG]

Nicely done!

So are you doing the Winter War scenario, the 1939 scenario, or what?

1936 Scenario, wanted to get the whole thing set up like I wanted.

 

[unmerged(17411)]

what i would like to know is where can i get that unit sprite graphic mod

once i have, i plan to modify it for my own uses so i can recognize the meaning of the symbols

-mellian

 

[Evans]

Go get 'em CSL!

 

[Moquel]

what i would like to know is where can i get that unit sprite graphic mod

once i have, i plan to modify it for my own uses so i can recognize the meaning of the symbols

-mellian

The more seasoned veterans among us refer to the mod as "Use Counters On"

That said, good luck with this CSL_GG, I'll be watching. I hope you can inspire me to give the finns a go for my next campagin

 

[Tim O]

1936 Scenario, wanted to get the whole thing set up like I wanted.

Any chance the Swedes will come to your aid?

 

[Evans]

I think there might be a chance....

 

[unmerged(38501)]

Just finished the 1936 Campaign myself... and was totally annihilated by Soviets in February 1939! Never won a single battle, even so every unit was at their max, Inf Div 39 in place and well dug-in such in a set-up very similar to the one pictured above. Soviets attacked from north straight to Oulu then south to Helsinki. Vipuri was bombed, but not attacked until it was completely surrounded.

Think game does not model supply restrictions for Soviet army striking with dozens of divisions from the arctic circle at Murmansk through the wilderness. It lets Soviets employ about 20 divisions even so no railways are available to supply a major offensive from the north.

A shame! In my point of view HOI II is geared to reflect war in well developed regions such as central europe, but not the wilderness of the north (or elsewhere?!). Any opposing views?

 

[TheDS]

I think I agree. My second game I tried as Finland, because in my first, they had joined the Axis and taken a bunch of Soviet territory, after surviving the Winter War, so I figured it wouldn't be too hard to beef up Finland, survive the Soviets long enough to get the peace, then join the Axis and get back what I lost, then turn my attentions west and settle those obnoxious, neutral-through-anything Swedes and Norwegians and restore Scandanavia to rightful rule by Finns.

Or something like that.

Well, I misunderstood the needs of victory conditions, since I hadn't really fought much of a war as Mexico, so I let the Soviets take some worthless ground, thinking I could defend the factories and such. Well, Move-is-Attack leaves something to be desired when you're trying to defend, because it's trivial for all enemy bordering troops to attack one place at once, then stop and attack another place. Basically, the same troops can be used to attack two or three different places in a single day; meanwhile, the Support Defenders doesn't seem to do a bloody thing; you'd think it would, maybe, let your neighboring troops, I don't know, support the defending troops?

So the Soviets pushed me back and back and I frantically threw troops into gaps, opening other gaps in the process, and then suddenly I find the Soviets have noticed these new gaps and I haven't stopped anyone. In only a couple months, I'm down to almost nothing, and the only successes I've had have been a small sub force keeping the Sovs from getting out of St. Petersburg to invade the coast. At last, I'm down to like 2 provinces, and the peace event triggers. Naturally, I accept, losing 2 provinces instead of the whole country, but a sizeable group of units was retreating into one of the provinces the Sovs took, and thus was trapped in a permanent retreat.

I have since learned, with a few more battles under my belt, that Move-is-Attack does INDEED suck, and we need to return to the tried and true method of Arrival-is-Attack, or we need to allow Support Defender to be as useful as Support Attacker, and force Moves-resulting-in-Attack to be forced-arrivals like retreats are forced-arrivals. Or something else, but the system as it is precludes having any fun as a large nation with way too many units to control.

 

[unmerged(29305)]

Nice AAR, so far.

*Subscribes*

 

[Rey]

Yeah, spank those communists down to stalingrad

 

[unmerged(17581)]

Good luck!

 

[unmerged(38771)]

I just started playin for Latvia, looks like it's gonna be even more difficult than Finland... The only thing is that I don't understand, why is my infantry unit called "Transportlidmasinu divizija", which means "Trasport-planes Division"?
They don't look like planes...

Oh, and good luck, if smth happens, as us for help