Chapter 339: Soviet-Finnish War (8)

In fact, before the war started, Boris Mikhailovich Shaposhnikov of the General Staff of the Soviet Red Army was ordered to draw up a combat plan. His plan objectively considered the combat capabilities of the Finnish army and the special conditions of the battlefield, and made a correct estimate of the war, believing that the war would last for several months (based on the war situation in the original time and space, it is not difficult to see that this chief of staff was quite foresighted and strategic).

Unfortunately, as the saying goes, good medicine tastes bitter, and such a plan did not suit Stalin's mind. He believed that the powerful Soviet Union should defeat the weak Finland in a shorter time. So the Soviet Union replaced the commander of the Leningrad Military District, Meretskov, as the commander-in-chief of the front line. In order to take over Finland as soon as possible, it even made partial mobilization, with a total of 425,640 soldiers, 2,876 various artillery and mortars, 2,289 tanks and 2,446 aircraft.

The combat sequence was commanded by the Leningrad Military District, which was under the command of the Seventh Army, the Eighth Army, the Ninth Army, and the Fourteenth Army. The battle plan is as follows:

The 7th Army will attack northward along the west bank of Lake Ladoga from the north of Leningrad, break through the Mannheim Line of Finland, capture the second largest city in Finland, Hviipuri, and advance to the capital Helsinki on the third day after the offensive was launched.

The 8th Army will be deployed on the east bank of Lake Ladoga, with the task of pinning down Finnish forces from the flank and assisting the 7th Army.

In central Finland, the 9th Army will be deployed, with the task of dividing the troops into two routes, the left route directly to Oulu and the right route directly to Kemi; divide Finland in half and cut off land transportation with Sweden.

In the Lapland direction, the 14th Army will be deployed, attacking the Petsamo area westward from Murmansk, then heading south 500 kilometers along the Arctic Highway, and then attacking westward to the Swedish border.

This battle plan seemed perfect on paper. The Red Army, with its advantages in numbers and equipment, could attack in different directions and cut Finland into several pieces, so that the front and rear could not respond to each other. Even if the Finnish army, which was at an absolute disadvantage in numbers, was prepared, they could not deploy along the long border. The Red Army's advance should be unstoppable. The Soviet leadership was full of confidence. The Deputy Defense Minister instructed the artillery units to prepare only twelve days of ammunition, and a military band leading the parade into Helsinki was ready.

But now the air force has suffered a big loss, and the ground forces can't wait to rush up. The 35th Light Tank Brigade rushed to the front. The entire tank brigade was equipped with 136 T-26s, 10 KhT-26s, 3 ST-26s, 10 BA-10s, and 10 BA-20s, a total of 149 tanks.

The T26 in the original time and space was used on a large scale three times before World War II, in the Spanish Civil War, Nomonhan and the Soviet-Finnish War. In these wars, the T26 can be said to have completed the tasks it was supposed to complete; such as suppressing the enemy's light tanks, breaking through the weak defense lines, and quickly interweaving and encircling the enemy infantry. What it could not accomplish was to conquer the enemy's strong defense lines, especially the defense lines with enhanced anti-tank firepower; in fact, this is also normal, after all, it is a light tank, even the light tanks of Germany and the United States cannot do this.

The actual combat losses of the T26 are indeed relatively large. This is not because the overall design has a big flaw, but because of some simplifications of the T26 by the Soviet Union. For a light tank like the T26, its armor can basically only defend against a little light weapons. In order to improve its battlefield survivability, it can only work hard in two aspects, one is mobility, and the other is good observation ability. High mobility can reduce being hit, and a good field of vision can better detect threats and dodge. The T26 has good mobility and is very fast, but the command tower has been cancelled, which greatly reduces the observation ability of the commander. In addition, the commander of the T26 also serves as the gunner, and has almost no time to observe the surroundings during combat, so it is easy to be attacked by fire from the side and rear. In addition, the fire control ability of the T26 is not very good, and the precision shooting ability is insufficient. It is said that it can only achieve a relatively high hit rate within 300 meters. Such a close distance is too dangerous for the weak armor of the T26.

The T26 actually represents the consistent characteristics of Soviet tanks: good armor, fast speed, emphasis on firepower, but poor observation ability and shooting accuracy, and poor ergonomics.

When it was less than four kilometers away from the Finnish defense line, there was a loud "boom", and the leading T26 instantly exploded into a pile of fire.

"Anti-tank mines!" Brigade Commander Ogurtsov exclaimed.

Military fans all know that the thickness of tank armor is different in different positions.

The most vulnerable position on the battlefield is the front armor, followed by the side armor, and the top and bottom are least likely to be attacked. When designing tanks, all countries will thicken the vulnerable parts of the tank, following the principle that "thickness is proportional to the probability of being attacked." As for the reason, everyone should understand that it is to use the smallest weight to build a tank with the strongest protection.

And anti-tank mines are a weapon that perfectly captures the weakness of tanks. In 1916, the world's first tank entered the war stage. Due to the lack of restraining weapons, tanks were rampant on the battlefield. In order to deal with tanks, Germany, Britain's opponent at the time, converted artillery shells into mines specifically for tanks in 1918.

This is the earliest anti-track mine.

Anti-track mines, as the name suggests, are specifically used to blow up tank tracks. This type of mine must be pressed by a tank to detonate.

After that, anti-bottom armor mines appeared one after another (the main attack target of anti-track mines is the tracks, while anti-bottom armor mines mainly perform "belly-breaking" surgery on tanks, killing the crew members inside the vehicle); anti-track and anti-bottom armor dual-purpose mines, which have a more comprehensive attack direction; anti-side armor mines (this mine is developed with reference to anti-tank rocket launchers. In wartime, it is generally installed on both sides of the road where the tanks are to pass. Sensors such as infrared or millimeter-wave radars are used to locate the tanks. As long as a tank passes by, it will be detected by the sensor and the mine will be detonated to penetrate the side armor of the tank. Of course, there were no such advanced mines during World War II)

Now seeing that the T-26 was directly blown into a pile of fire, Ogurtsov knew that the other side had buried a powerful anti-bottom armor mine. Although he wanted other tanks to be careful of the mines on the ground, that was impossible. The buried mines would not be marked on the ground. He could only pray that the density of mines would not be too large, so that they could rush to the Finnish defense line with less losses.

Unfortunately, things were not as simple as imagined. The tanks that rushed forward hit mines one after another and exploded. After losing more than 30 tanks at once, the brigade commander Ogurtsov was forced to issue an order to stop advancing.

The density of the anti-tank mines was too high. If they rushed forward blindly, they would be completely wiped out.