Reborn South Africa as a police officer

Chapter 2136 The only war in the whole winter

After the outbreak of the European War, many German companies like the Munich Ocean Shipping Company were forced to close down.

Of course, there were more people who made war fortunes. Krupp took the ride of Germany's economic take-off to complete a gorgeous turn, tied all his wealth to the German Third Reich, and returned to the top.

After the annexation of Poland, Germany did not take any further action except for sporadic confrontations with the Royal Navy at sea throughout last winter.

The first attack was Russia.

Russia struck late and became the biggest beneficiary of the outbreak in Europe.

After joining forces with Germany to carve up Poland, Russia targeted Finland.

Before the last world war, Finland was part of Russia.

In 1809, the Finnish War broke out between Sweden and Russia. Russia won the final victory and obtained a large amount of territory from Sweden. Russia established the Grand Duchy of Finland as a buffer state between Russia and Sweden. The then Tsar Alexander I gave the Grand Duchy of Finland quite a high degree of autonomy rights, which lays a hidden danger for Finland's future independence.

In 1917, the Finnish Senate took advantage of the drastic changes in Russia to declare independence, and then civil war broke out in Finland.

The short and bloody civil war ended in victory for the Whites, backed by Germany.

Just a few months later, Germany announced its surrender, and Finland once again broke away from German control and truly became an independent country.

In February 1920, during the Soviet-Polish War, Finland took the opportunity to sign the Treaty of Tartu with Russia to determine the border between the two countries. Finland achieved a very favorable result. Le) only 2 km.

Since then, Finland has maintained good relations with Western countries. Until the outbreak of the European War, Britain and Germany were helping Finland to train troops. Britain also provided Finland with equipment worth 2.11 million Finnmarks, and the Germans helped the Finns build a large number of Airport.

With the help of Britain and Germany, Finland built a solid Mannerheim Line on the Russian-Finnish border.

The Mannerheim Line of Defense is named after the Finnish commander-in-chief Mannerheim. It consists of three defensive zones with a depth of about 90 kilometers.

All defense zones rely on natural obstacles such as swamps and lakes. There are 670 permanent launch fortifications and civil and wooden firepower points, and nearly 800 underground bunkers, which are connected by trenches and traffic trenches.

A security zone with a depth of 20 to 60 kilometers is set up in front of the main defense zone. Anti-tank and anti-infantry mines, anti-tank piles, anti-tank ditches and anti-tank cliffs are widely set up in front of and within the main defense zone.

Did you see that in the introduction above, the words "anti-tank" appeared many times.

For Russian tank units, the operational environment of the Mannerheim Line was very unfavorable.

At the same time as the partition of Poland, Russia began to build up troops on the Russian-Finnish border.

到1939年年底，俄罗斯在边界附近共集中了4个集团军，18个步兵师、1个坦克军、4个坦克旅以及约1000余辆坦克、800多架飞机，总兵力30万人。

Before October 39, Finland had only 10 standing troops.

After Russia began to gather its troops, Finland announced a national general mobilization, expanding its troops to 12.7, forming 5 armies, 9 infantry divisions, 1 cavalry brigade and some independent border guards.

In addition to the regular army, Finland also has 30 reserve personnel, 10 reserve "civilian guards" and 10 women's service teams.

Finland in 1939 had a total population of only 440 million.

Russia at this time had a total population of 1.6 million.

The huge gap in population made all parties pessimistic about the prospect of the Russo-Finnish war.

In terms of weapons and equipment, Finland is seriously short of anti-tank guns and ammunition and fuel. Before the war broke out, there were only about 100 anti-tank guns in Finland, and the ammunition was only enough for 2 months and 3 weeks. There are 30 bombers, 56 fighters and 59 reconnaissance planes.

Just looking at the data on paper, no matter how you look at it, Finland can't win.

So the Russians were full of confidence. On October 10, they took the initiative to invite the Finns to St. Petersburg for negotiations and put forward harsh conditions to the Finns.

Russia hopes to sign a mutual assistance treaty with Finland to jointly defend the Gulf of Finland.

At the same time, Finland is required to move the border between Russia and Finland on the Karelian Isthmus to the north by 40 kilometers, and to cede several islands in the Gulf of Finland and the Finnish territory on the Rybach Peninsula to Russia.

At the same time, the Hanko Peninsula will be leased to Russia at the cost of 800 million Finnish marks per year for a period of 30 years.

In order to compensate for the loss of Finland's territory, Russia expressed its willingness to give Finland the land northwest of Lake Onega twice the area ceded by Finland.

The first few items are easy to say, the Hanko Peninsula is a natural barrier for Finland to defend against Russia.

Russia's request to lease the Hanko peninsula made Finland suspicious of the Russians' motives.

The negotiations broke down, and Russia couldn't wait to create the "Manila Incident", claiming that the Finnish army shelled the Manila village and caused the death of Russian soldiers, demanding an apology from the Finnish government and withdrawing the army 20 to 25 kilometers.

This request was again rejected by Finland.

Thus began the Russo-Finnish War.

On November 11, 30 Russian troops invaded Finland, and the Finnish capital Helsinki was bombed by the Russian Air Force that day.

With the jewels of the Polish campaign ahead, there was reason to believe that Russia was capable of ending the war by 1940.

The subsequent development of the war was surprising.

During the Polish campaign, Russia launched an attack on Poland on September 9, and the war ended on October 17, less than 10 days after Russia invaded Poland.

Measured by the speed at which Russia invaded Poland, it only took half a month for Russia to annex Finland.

On the day when the war broke out on November 11, the Russian army had already arrived at the predetermined combat position and launched an attack on the Mannerheim line of defense.

Half a month has passed, and the Russian attack has made no progress.

A month passed and the Russians couldn't move an inch.

Two months have passed. Except for achieving the intended goal on the northern front, Russia's offensives on other fronts have all failed, and they have been disastrous. In the northeastern area of ​​Lake Ladoga alone, two Russian divisions were all wiped out.

Since Napoleon attacked Russia in 1812, there has been a saying in Europe that when attacking Russia in winter, the biggest enemy is the weather.

Russia ignores that Finland is also an arctic country, one-third of its land is in the arctic circle, and it also has the bonus of weather BUFF.

In the past two months, almost all European countries have participated in the Russo-Finnish War.

In the process of Russia's partition of Poland with Germany, the two countries showed amazing tacit understanding, so that after the outbreak of the Russo-Finnish War, Britain and France chose to support Finland and Russia in order to contain Russia's expansion.

If Britain and France want to support Finland, they need the cooperation of Norway and Sweden, the other two polar countries.

Especially Sweden, Britain and France's aid to Finland must go through Sweden.

Germany once again showed an amazing tacit understanding with Russia.

Sweden was not at war at this time.

From the very beginning of the war, Germany issued a warning to the Swedish government. If the Swedish government allowed British and French supplies and personnel to transit, Germany would immediately launch an attack on Sweden.

The British and French allied forces really wanted to enter Finland.

However, the purpose of the British government and the French government is not to defend Finland, but to occupy the iron mines in northern Norway and cut off Germany's resource supply.

In the process of restoring Germany's strength, the role of Norwegian iron ore cannot be underestimated. Iron ore is related to the lifeline of Germany. Britain and France hope to cut off the supply of iron ore to Germany.

Mustache knew the purpose of the British and French coalition forces.

Therefore, the threat that Mustache gave Sweden was not to help Russia, but to protect its own source of iron ore supply.

Sweden is in a dilemma.

Look at the strong Germans and Russians, and then look at the magical sit-in war on the Western Front.

Sweden decided to be completely neutral. While cutting off supplies to Finland, it refused to allow the Anglo-French coalition forces to pass through Sweden.

At this time, the Finns finally understood that the fate of Finland has never been controlled by the Finns.

It is unrealistic to continue fighting. Although Finland won the first stage of the war, the domestic material reserves have been completely exhausted. The Russians are gathering more troops and preparing to launch a larger-scale attack on Finland. The Finns can no longer hold on .

Russians likewise sit on wax.

The performance of the Russian army in the first stage of the Russo-Finnish War was really bad. Not only did the British and French allied forces look down on it, but even the Germans began to doubt the strength of the Russians, which also planted the root of the mustache's attack on Russia.

Looking back now, the reason why the Russians attacked Poland so smoothly was because the Polish army had lost all their troops in the war against Germany. The Russians did not encounter any decent resistance after they invaded Poland. Offensive, rather the Russians are on the march.

Now that the Russians are attacking Finland independently, the real combat effectiveness is finally exposed.

So when Finland said it wanted to negotiate, the Russians were ecstatic.

Sometimes, benefits that cannot be obtained on the battlefield can really be realized through negotiation.

On March 3, Finland and Russia, under the mediation of Sweden, signed the "Peace Agreement" in St. Petersburg.

In this agreement, Finland lost Karelia, including Finland's second largest city, Vyborg. This area has 10% of Finland's arable land, 1/5 of industrial output value, 22 residents, accounting for the total population of Finland 2% lost their homes and were deported.

The Russians are victorious. Such examples are extremely rare. The last one seems to be the Sino-French war.

Although the scale of the Russo-Finnish War was small, its impact was extremely far-reaching.

Relations between Germany and Russia changed after the Russo-Finnish War.

Germany also gained a deeper understanding of the appeasement policies of Britain and France through the Russo-Finnish War.

Russia paid a heavy price. In addition to the loss of the army, the League of Nations determined that Russia was an invader in the Russo-Finnish War and removed Russia from the list on January 1.

Well, for the League of Nations, Russia doesn't care at all.

Since the outbreak of the World War, the League of Nations has become a decoration and completely useless.

And a letter from the fat bald head to Xiao Huzi at the end of February made Xiao Huzi completely firm in his determination.

(End of this chapter)