Finland proved to be an entirely different adversary than Poland did for the Soviet forces. It was like fighting 10 badgers instead of 50 rats. The battle got off to a shittacular start when a Finnish plane successfully destroyed three Russian ammo trucks, thoroughly ruining what had been looking like a solid 122mm howitzer party just getting under way.
Completely incapable of minding their own business, the Finnish air force then attacked several of Musti's BT tanks dug in for defense:
The Soviets committed all forces to defense, apart from the newly-refit tankette company. 16 T-27s and 3 OT-27s set off in search of the enemy in the southern sector and quickly found a Finnish rifle company sneaking through the woods. After thoroughly Swiss-cheesing the Finns with MG fire and toasting a couple with the flame tankettes, the T-27 company harassed rear Finnish positions with some success for the rest of the battle.
von Mudra's 45mm AT gun battery had a field day, knocking out six Vickers 6s tanks that attempted to take a small village. Two guns were eventually put out of action by 76mm field howitzers.
Major LHeureux's conscripts were having a great fucking time in the woods playing with pine cones and having snowball fights, and they were doing an excellent job holding the crossroads northwest of the village until the Finns showed up. Armed only with a nugget and two grenades, the conscripts inflicted some light casualties on the invading Finnish jaeger company but at the end of the battle the only hope for LHeureux's men was to pray the Finns didn't want any land 200 Russian peasants had shit their pants on.
The toughest part of the fighting was the fact that every Finnish soldier seemed to have a weapon that could destroy Soviet armor. Molotovs, flamethrowers, satchel charges, and God knows what else. A T-26 would hold a bridgehead and keep three Finnish squads pinned, but there was always a fourth ready to satchel it and several Russian tanks were lost, including a rare (for WinSPWW2) deturreter:
The fighting was so fierce that only Kaptain Homer Jays recce squadron suffered no casualties. Fuchs' paratrooper company fought well and lost only a couple of men, but Hjaldrgud's ski company was completely wiped out: only 12 men out of 145 survived the battle. Afterdune's infantry platoon defended the mortar batteries nicely alongside Kalkalash' Cossacks, who also suffered only light casualties. Tankbuster cruised around the battle alone in his shiny new SU-6, but he will have to wait another day to kill his first enemy tank as only soon-to-be-catfood infantry crossed his path.
Though only four of the dozen victory hexes fell into Finnish hands, routs were common amongst the mostly green and low-morale Soviet forces. However, as before in Poland, the Soviet meat shield battalion hung around long enough to earn their fourth straight draw to start the campaign. The biggest fuckup was using artillery in direct fire roles: though more effective when firing at Finnish forces they physically saw rather than bombarding coordinates given by recce units, they were vulnerable in their forward positions and most artillery pieces were blasted to smithereens.
But the roughest is still to come. After the battle, Soviet command ordered an immediate counter-attack to recover the lost ground. Without time to refit and resupply, and with no chance of repairing vehicles or drafting more men into the fight, the Soviets will have to attack Finnish positions immediately. With only couple infantry companies capable of fighting and just 3 tanks (1 x T-26, 2 x T-35) available for the attack, who the fuck knows what could happen. Defeat seems likely with such a bruised force, and if the Soviet HQ unit is destroyed the campaign would be over after just 5 of 200 battles. On the other hand, the Finns are hurting too and a patient, clever attack on their positions might just bring the first, sweetest taste of victory.
Will the Soviets get the shit kicked out of them, or will they splash about happily in the brains of their enemies? Time will tell..
