[chris]

Good post!

[PTSD Is My Life]

Awespme post, I have always had a great interest in the First World War and the sheer grit and determination not yeild land has always struck a chord with me and it comes down hard men fighting equally hard men.

The Finnish Campaign is in my eyes equal to the brutallity of the trench warfare of WW1 with the added horrendous cold weather and the huge numbers of Russian soldiers and the major difference was the use of tank units from the onset.

Just how the Finns held out is a military question today and is in certain circles used as a reference as to what sheer determination and belief in what your fighting for and clever manouvering of men actually "multiplied" the effect of their small forces leading the Russians to believe that there where up to 4 or 5 times the number of men.
This helped to stop the Russians on quite a few occassions from attacking as they thought there where too many men for their untrained or fresh from training troops to tackle.

There are a few incidents again refered to in the militarty about force multiplication where two men pulled a horse carts with dead horses heads on their backs and spoke clearly (voices travel a long way in the cold and over snow) asking if this was the say 24 Group and the other would answer "no, this is 10 Group you need to keep going past 12, 14, 16, 18, 19 20 and 22 group and they digging in the last of the mortar pits or oil filled cooking pit for the ruskies (petrol and diesel oil mixed - diesel goes waxy in extreme cold and has a kind of napalm effect on skin when burning) and they would convince the Russians that certain areas where covered in them and the troops where terrified of them and despite orders would funnel into tight Finnish killing zones to avoid the non existant traps.
They where able to do this as each man had a voice and nothing was disreguarded without consideration as a man from the front knows 10 times more than a General at the rear. The men would often stay in the trenches for 3 times their shift times saying vocal goodbyes and pretending to have left only a skeleton staff whereas there was infact 1 and a half as many men as would be expected so the Russians would attack the weak area only to find it heavily defended and they thought that if this is skeleton manning how many troops are there when fully manned. Likewise when leaving for rest they would say greetings and ask how the last 12 -24 hours have been when they where really leaving. The forward listening posts of the Russians would send a message back that the Finns where back up to strength and attacks would be moved to area's that where apparently down to ske;eton manning and so the deception went on. This plan apparently came from a farmer who used to protect his sheep by tieiing cans and thin strips of wood that could slap against each other to string in the wooded edge of his farm and tie the ends to his dogs who would stir upon sensing anything getting close from the woods and the cans and wood strips would bang, rattle & knock against each other thus giving the appearance of the tree line being occupied by many people and or dogs and giving the farmer warning his livestock may be in danger....clever man and a lot of the Finns where hunters and almost all had rifle training.

[Oswald2001]

Nazis vs Commies = Sunni vs Shia

[PTSD Is My Life]

Originally Posted by Oswald2001 ↗

Nazis vs Commies = Sunni vs Shia

Not quite the same as the ideology and beliefs are polar opposites with "nazi" or Third Riech and the Communist BUT your pretty much spot on with the thinly veiled mistrust and often outright hatred for each other!!

Religion and politics meeeeh they both end in the common man being persecuted and killed!

[Christian-M]

Tough motherfuckers.

[ak74]

Originally Posted by Oswald2001 ↗

Nazis vs Commies = Sunni vs Shia

i was thinking only the other day how i was turning more for the shias,,

[hellgate9876]

Anyone for a round of Call of Duty ghosts multiplayer.

[Spiffyfable]

That looks Fucking Cold

[pacha1]

Originally Posted by Necrosis ↗

14th picture from the bottom shows the desperation of a soviet partisan patrol that was cut off from the supplies, 2 members of the team killed 3rd soldier of their group and ate him.

nope. that picture shows the aftermath of skinning alive as a torture

[William May]

The Finns are the only people in history to battle the Soviets to a halt. They lost some territory, but eventually Stalin gave up because the cost was too high. They just obliterated the Soviet armies. The man behind their defenses was named Mannerheim. He is still a hero to them today.