davebender
1st Lieutenant
Germany had no disputes with Switzerland and (contrary to wartime propaganda) Germany did not invade friendly nations for the purpose of acquiring additional territory.
1942: The perfect fighter for the Finnish Front?
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Germany certainly had no quaims about invading friendly countries that were just in the way, or had anything else they wanted Such as Denmark, Belgium, Holland, Norway. Luxenberg.
I agree that P-47 would not have been a right plane to FAF. In fact IMHO one of the worst possible, it would not have been able to use most of Finnish military a/fs.
As Dave wrote the material situation of Finnish military was fairly abysmal. Even training had suffered because of lack of funding. But Finland was rather poor country and most of available money was used to improve social and economic conditions of the people, so motivation was generally high and that was the key to the successful defense during the Winter War combined with tactics well suited to the environment and usually good relations between officers and men.
The pre-war conscript based standing army consisted of 3 divisions and one cavalry brigade, so the backbone of the field army (altogether 10 divisions, the cav. br. and a couple dozen independent battalions plus later formed 2 very hastily trained militia divisions) were the reservists. But some improvements should have been done before the war, IMHO the following would have had critical importance: enough ammo for the 420 field guns and also for the mortars, maybe 10 more batteries of medium and heavy field arty (that would have doubled the number of those), a dozen more heavy and 40mm AA batteries, a couple hundred more A/T guns (we had appr. 100 when the war broke out), several hundred A/T rifles (that would have been possible without protracted quarrel about the caliber inside leadership of the infantry branch, at least several dozen could have been ready early in the war) and more radios. And FAF very probably could have got a couple sqns of Hawk 75As in early 1939 by a purchase financed by US Government loan, but Finnish Social Democrats and the head of the Bank of Finland torpedoed that scheme.
Juha
As Dave wrote the material situation of Finnish military was fairly abysmal. Even training had suffered because of lack of funding. But Finland was rather poor country and most of available money was used to improve social and economic conditions of the people, so motivation was generally high and that was the key to the successful defense during the Winter War combined with tactics well suited to the environment and usually good relations between officers and men.
The pre-war conscript based standing army consisted of 3 divisions and one cavalry brigade, so the backbone of the field army (altogether 10 divisions, the cav. br. and a couple dozen independent battalions plus later formed 2 very hastily trained militia divisions) were the reservists. But some improvements should have been done before the war, IMHO the following would have had critical importance: enough ammo for the 420 field guns and also for the mortars, maybe 10 more batteries of medium and heavy field arty (that would have doubled the number of those), a dozen more heavy and 40mm AA batteries, a couple hundred more A/T guns (we had appr. 100 when the war broke out), several hundred A/T rifles (that would have been possible without protracted quarrel about the caliber inside leadership of the infantry branch, at least several dozen could have been ready early in the war) and more radios. And FAF very probably could have got a couple sqns of Hawk 75As in early 1939 by a purchase financed by US Government loan, but Finnish Social Democrats and the head of the Bank of Finland torpedoed that scheme.
Juha
The Basket
Senior Master Sergeant
- 3,712
- Jun 27, 2007
Hawker Hurricane.
The Finns were good but the Soviets were rubbish. It helps if the enemy your facing even with crushing superiority is incompetent.
The Finns were good but the Soviets were rubbish. It helps if the enemy your facing even with crushing superiority is incompetent.
Finns were not fond with Hurricane, we had appr. 10 of them but it was one of the least succesful fighters in FAF service.
While Soviets were fairly incompetent at the beginning of the Winter War, they were fairly fast learners. That didn't have so much effect in northern part of the front because winter fighting in heavily forested areas was/is very demanding as Germans learned in 41-42 or US troops in 44-45 in Hürtingen Forest, Reichswald in 45 wasn't exactly a walkover for CW troops either. But in the Karelian Isthmus Soviet leadership was sensible enough to stop the major ops for a month for retrain its troops for bunker bursting and for better coordination between different branches. In the air Soviet speedly adopted droptanks for their fighters so that they could give much better support to their bombers and also were able to interdict much deeper the FAF a/fs.
JV
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I put the Fw 190. It had a powerful, damage tolerant radial engine. Firepower was excellent, control at high speed was very good, specially longitudinal, making it very suitable to conduct hit and run attacks. Fighter-bomber variants could have been obtained, making logistics simplified and eliminating obsolete aircraft like the Blenheim. It could have been used effectively until 1945.
I doubt the Finns were not interested in the Fw 190. I think there was something that prevented them from acquire it.
I doubt the Finns were not interested in the Fw 190. I think there was something that prevented them from acquire it.
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bobbysocks
Chief Master Sergeant
as for the ground war. what i recall from what i read back in the late 80s was the soviet philosophy was based on the old theory of a soldier delivering overwhelming firepower by a well aimed shot. the invading russian army had mostly Mosin-Nagant rifles and carried on conventional tactics. while the finns were smart enough to know they could not go head to head with the soviets on the ground or in the air and developed tactics that would bring them the greatest success. they ran a lot of guerrilla warfare tactics used the suomi m31 sub machine gun with it to good result. in the up close ambush tactics the smaller caliber and high rate of fire sub machine gun made its point. the finns kept themselves moble with smaller harassing units on skis. it seems the russians learned from that experience...look at the suomi m31 and then the ppsh41.
as for the best ac for the finns....since anything from the us and uk are pretty well out of the question i would stick with the 109s. at that point they were on par or better than anything the vvs was able to field iin numbers and the finns did like them. after flying fokkers and buffalos they loved the 109s. i dont know how the macchi series would have done in that environment...
hitler did have plans to invade switzerland...operation tannenbaum. 3 things really kept that from happening, the swiss were the ones back rolling the german war effort.....hitler was anxious to get the invasion of russia going....and a lot of the german generals who had pilfered gold and money had deposits in those swiss banks thus they werent too keen on invading their piggy bank. where else would have have to launder their plunder?
actually i picked the 109s because the finns would have got more bang for the buck. more 109s than most other ac for the same price. it was alreaedy in production and thethus being able to field more ac that were top of the line. it would have been interesting to see if heinkel would have been able to pursue sales there and maybe sell them He-100s or something else. i doubt though that with the competition for power plants and other resources he would have been free to do so. and the cost of tooling up for a limited run of 100 planes or less would have been prohibitive. but had he...maybe one of the "planes that didnt make it" would have been able to perform well there.
as for the best ac for the finns....since anything from the us and uk are pretty well out of the question i would stick with the 109s. at that point they were on par or better than anything the vvs was able to field iin numbers and the finns did like them. after flying fokkers and buffalos they loved the 109s. i dont know how the macchi series would have done in that environment...
hitler did have plans to invade switzerland...operation tannenbaum. 3 things really kept that from happening, the swiss were the ones back rolling the german war effort.....hitler was anxious to get the invasion of russia going....and a lot of the german generals who had pilfered gold and money had deposits in those swiss banks thus they werent too keen on invading their piggy bank. where else would have have to launder their plunder?
actually i picked the 109s because the finns would have got more bang for the buck. more 109s than most other ac for the same price. it was alreaedy in production and thethus being able to field more ac that were top of the line. it would have been interesting to see if heinkel would have been able to pursue sales there and maybe sell them He-100s or something else. i doubt though that with the competition for power plants and other resources he would have been free to do so. and the cost of tooling up for a limited run of 100 planes or less would have been prohibitive. but had he...maybe one of the "planes that didnt make it" would have been able to perform well there.
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Shortround6
Major General
There was another reason the Germans didn't invade Switzerland, The gain would not have been worth the cost. Switzerland had no natural resources, like coal, iron or nickel. At best it offered a bit of hydro-power. As for the cost??? every able bodied man between about 18 and 55 was either in the service or in the reserve ( and able bodied meant that if one leg was an inch shorter than the other you were a military clerk, not excused) and ALL men in the reserve kept their military rifle at home with a supply of ammunition. No quick strike at a few arsenals to seize the small arms. The Germans could have defeated Switzerland, that is not in question. The question was at what cost, The mountainous terrain being a defenders dream and an attackers nightmare. Throw in that target shooting was practically a national sport and there was a lot bigger down side than just some German generals bank deposits. How many divisions got stuck in Yugoslavia for the duration of the war? How many would it take to keep Switzerland under control?
The Basket
Senior Master Sergeant
- 3,712
- Jun 27, 2007
I am surprised that the Hurricane was unpopular as a rugged relative high performance machine which could be fixed up in the field plus wide track undercarriage and benign handling it would be perfect even in 1942 against some of the weaker Soviet aircraft.
Britain supported Finland....well kind of....in the early part of the Soviet aggression and so a few Hurricanes as tokens of alliance wouldnt be too far fetched.
When I mentioned Soviet incompetence that was the first months of the invasion....not the later years. The Finns were able to inflict massive casualties on a hugely superior force.
Britain supported Finland....well kind of....in the early part of the Soviet aggression and so a few Hurricanes as tokens of alliance wouldnt be too far fetched.
When I mentioned Soviet incompetence that was the first months of the invasion....not the later years. The Finns were able to inflict massive casualties on a hugely superior force.
yulzari
Staff Sergeant
If the Germans put pressure on the French could French fighter production have been diverted usefully to Finland?
The Germans were certainly parsimonious with their equipment support to their Finnish allies so if they could get someone else to do it at no cost to the Germans then the Finns might have got more that way.
The Germans were certainly parsimonious with their equipment support to their Finnish allies so if they could get someone else to do it at no cost to the Germans then the Finns might have got more that way.
Germany wasn't letting those Frence factories go unused, they were using all their production themselves.
One reason was that we didn't have 100 oct fuel, but generally Hurricanes were fairly unloved here, except the Soviet ones, at least pilots of one Brewster Model 239 flight thought that Hurri was easier opponent than I-153 or I-16.
We got from UK also Gladiators and Blenheims and at least 100 Boys A/T rifles, uniforms etc.
I was also speaking on the Winter War (30 Nov 39 - 13 March 40)
Juha
In fact in both armies the TOE of a rifle platoon gave it usually 4 automatic weapons, the only exception was those Soviet platoons which were armed with automatic rifles. In Soviet platoon there were 4 Degtrajev light mgs ( a bit like Bren but witha a 47 rounds flat magazine) and in Finnish platoon 2 Lahti-Saloranta lmgs (a bit like Bren but with a 20 rounds curved magazine under the gun) and 2 Suomi smgs. Now Degtrajev was clearly better gun than L-S and soviet rifles were better than the majority of Finnish ones. Both armies used mainly rifles based on old Tsarist army's Mosin-Nagant M/91 rifle but the Soviets had more modern ones, many Finnish rifles were still repaired old M/91s. And Soviets had some numbers of semi-automatic and automatic rifles, so a Soviet squad had more firepower than a Finnish one. During the war Finns got more smgs and in some units and so the situation got more balanced. Guerrilla tactcs were useful N of Lake Ladoga were there was more room to manoeuvre but the main front in the Karelia Isthmus was too narrow for that kind of war and there war was more like WWI style material combat where Soviet overwhelming superiority in all categories was in the end too much for the Finns. Especially the Soviet superiority in artillery and tanks was crucial especially because Finns had too little ammo for their few guns and we especially suffered from the lack of medium artillery. Most of our artillery was those left behind by the Russians in 1918. And we had at the beginning of the war only appr. 100 A/T guns and 2 - 3 A/T rifles when Soviets began with appr. 1800 tanks and in the end had some 3800 tanks committed.
Juha
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bobbysocks
Chief Master Sergeant
thank you juha...the article i read was quite some time ago and i was trying to rely on my memory.
