Talk:Winter War

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winter details

I changed the conversion of celcius to fahrenheit. -104 degrees fahrenheit is in fact -75 degrees C, whereas -40C is, oddly enough, -40F. Small point in case the moderators get stressed at my editing.

Contents

[edit] Stalin quote

I vaguely remember my dad or a teacher telling me that in referring to this war, Stalin said something along the lines of:

"Today was a good day in war. 100,000 Russians died, 10,000 Fins died. Ha, ha, ha... pretty soon no more Fins!"

Again that's a vague recollection... anyone have the real quote? Do you guys think a quote similar to this actually exists? David Bergan 05:22, 12 January 2007 (UTC)

Most likely such a quote doesn't exist. With respect, Ko Soi IX 10:29, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
Most likely it DOES! That is VERY Stalin-esque. John 03:05, 16 May 2007 (UTC)
You are so misinformed about Stalin :)
Oh really? Then prove such a statement wouldNOT have been in his nature, the same man who said something like "The death of one man is a tragedy, the death of one million is a statistic." I believe you are the misinformed one, or at least some naive supporter of him or one of those brainwashed modern russians who still view Stalin as a "great patriot" regardless od the horrible things he did. Oh and please sign your comments next time, coward.

John 18:27, 13 June 2007 (UTC)

Stalin didn't say that. Erich Maria Remarque did. Ko Soi IX (talk) 04:07, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Winter War:Finland's Concessions

The aforementioned map is not accurate. The Salla territory was in fact twice as large as depicted on the map. The map needs revising. Landau7 17:44, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] inconsistency (300 man unit loses 800 men)

The Finnish "Kontula detachment" (a unit of 300 men (?) ) lost an amazing 800 men during their actions, according to the article. What were the actual numbers?

--Kim Bruning 16:47, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

Kontula detachment stopped the Soviets, but it was 9th division which cut it into pieces and destroyed them, so there is no inconsistencies. --Whiskey 19:16, 25 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Numbers of Soviet POW

The figures of Soviet POW is based on Soviet figures. Who at best could be misgudied. Acording to official Finnish source 5600 Soviet soldiers where captured during the war. An intresting fact is that after the war when Finland turned over the the POW back to Soviet no one has ever heard of them, and they disepperd without a trace.--83.254.193.197 18:16, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

source for this fact? 70.49.116.115 08:44, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Some one who knows the script, please help clean this up

Seems like the graphic table is messy quite a bit when I get in today. Any writer who knows what to do, please help. (May 17, 2007)

[edit] Photo of the monument

Please, insert in this article my photo commons:Image:The monument to deceaseds in Soviet-Finnish War (Saint Petersburg).jpg -- 11:25, 14 August 2007 (UTC) ru:Участник:Sergey kudryavtsev


[edit] Fighting

The section on the fighting desperately needs to be expanded. Now the article mostly concentrates on intentions and consequences. Colchicum 12:12, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Introduction

This aricle claims in the end of introduction:

"The Winter War was a military disaster for the Soviet Union. However, Stalin did learn from this fiasco and realized that political control over the Red Army was no longer feasible.[citation needed] After the Winter War, the Kremlin initiated the process of reinstating qualified officers and modernizing its forces, a crucial decision that enabled the Soviets to eventually resist the German invasion."
Is that justified by any reliable sources? If not, this probably should be excluded.Biophys 14:54, 21 August 2007 (UTC)
It is justified. Sourcing it is of course needed, the statements are very strong. --Drieakko 15:11, 21 August 2007 (UTC)
So, it would be interesting to look at the sources. As far as I know, some of these statements are questionable, whereas the statement about "political control over the Red Army no longer feasible" is simply wrong. This political control was in force during all existence of the Soviet Union.Biophys 17:35, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Do we really need this many "citation needed tags" In some places they're very useless, like it is common knowledge that USSR was expelled from the League of Nations due to the war of aggression. We could put those tags after every sentence in Wikipedia, so should we spare them for the most questionable claims? --Pudeo⺮ 22:11, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Hi Pudeo. I think the tags (or, better, references instead of them) are really necessary. They are not intended to question validity of the article. Rather, I'd like to see it improved further. The article is quite ok from my point of view (albeit far from comprehensive as of now). However, the problem is that the expulsion of the USSR from the League of Nation etc. is not necessarily a common knowledge for those who are not familiar with this particular field of knowledge, i.e. essentially for the target audience of encyclopedias (Also note that some unorthodox views exist, however strange: [1]). Unfortunately, I am pretty sure that many (most?) Wikipedia readers have never heard of this war at all. And in any case it would be very useful (and certainly not harmful) to have a reference to the official decision etc. So I would strongly suggest to reference the article more extensively (at least from Vehviläinen, Van Dyke and official documents available online). Also, the better the article is referenced, the less it is prone to vandalism and POV-pushing, which wouldn't be totally unexpected for such a topic. Colchicum 20:08, 25 August 2007 (UTC)
I strongly disagree, as I said, we could put those tags after every sentence in Wikipedia. But please go ahead and put the unreferenced template at the top of the article if you like. I know they were added in good faith, but the article looks messy. --Pudeo⺮ 12:04, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't think introduction is the correct section for this:

"Soviet Union had just recently seen a drastic purge in 1937 that had crippled the Red Army, reducing its morale and efficiency just before the German invasion.[10] With up to 50% of army officers executed, including the vast majority of the highest ranking officers, the result was that the Red Army officer corps in 1939 had many inexperienced senior officers."

Please remove the part or move it into more preferrable section. The article should be NPOW so if you add text such as that one you should write about the purges and reduced efficiency of the crippled Finnish Army aswell. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.165.128.200 (talk) 20:10, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

"the purges and reduced efficiency of the crippled Finnish Army aswell. " What do you mean by this? There wasnt purges in Finland during 1930s.Korppi76 —Preceding comment was added at 10:39, 29 May 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Timetable for foreign help

"The estimates of how long the enemy could have been held in these kinds of retreat-and-stand operations varied from a few days to a couple of months, most averaging around a few weeks, too little time for any foreign help to make a difference."

The highlighted text seems to be controversal in Kurt's opinion, so I explain why it is included.

Two to four weeks were an estimate by Marshall Mannerheim in the beginning of March, and he presented it to the government. British and French governments were promising help, but when asked more closely what kind of help they would give the numbers started to dwindle and the forces would arrive near the end of April. Sweden had announced that it cannot give more men and material, so it is logistically impossible to transport necessary amount of troops and their material to Finland in two weeks. Even today, with the help of modern aircrafts, it takes several weeks to transport necessary troops on location even across friendly waters and airspace.

There is an example during the Winter War of high priority material delivery from Britain to Finland, but even thought it consisted only few rail cars, it took several days to travel from Narvik to Tornio.

Kurt, could you please explain how it is feasible to presume that Britain and France could have transferred enough men and material to Finland in two weeks? --Whiskey 10:03, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Casus belli?

Casus belli is "justification for acts of war", Shelling of Mainila was exactly that for Winter War. Nowhere is stated that it can not be staged, and in this case it actualy was. So what is wrong with putting it into infobox?--Staberinde 11:08, 13 October 2007 (UTC)

Because it was not an actual event? The casus belli could as well be "Soviet propaganda", because Shelling of Mainila is exactly that, and did not happen in reality, thus can't be justification for war. I'd say it's very confusing, as it would inform a bit more careless reader that USSR had actually a reason to attack. --Pudeo⺮ 15:44, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
Actualy war can be(and in this case was) justified with something that never happened. Although I guess it may indeed confuse average reader.--Staberinde 15:51, 15 October 2007 (UTC)
"it would inform a bit more careless reader that USSR had actually a reason to attack." The USSR did have a reason to attack. They had tried to get what they wanted and thought they needed to defend themselves against Germany through negotiations. Finland kept saying no to anything of consequence and in the political climate of 1939, the leaders of the USSR may well have seen no other alternative than to take what they want by force. Backing down would have shown weakness, something they could not afford at that time. Things didn't go as planned, but hopefully no-one imagines that the USSR bullied and then attacked Finland because they had nothing better to do. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.81.166.62 (talk) 10:10, 17 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Weather update

It was not -40 C during the winter war more like -20 at tops. Read more here: http://www.winterwar.com/other/weather.htm#avg3940 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 88.195.85.77 (talk) 13:58, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

You've interpreted the information wrongly, those figures are monthly averages --Darkwand (talk) 09:35, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

-40?! Do you think Finland fought in Siberia or something? (that was what mad dictator Stalin planned for Finns btw: take Finland and deport Finns to Siberia) Not for so many months ago it said in Finnish newspapers that the -40 C thing was a myth. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.102.43.193 (talk) 11:31, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
I've seen it get down to -40 in Tampere. I've been outdoors in it. I was wearing two pairs of socks and three pairs of underwear at the time... --Stlemur (talk) 11:53, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
Winter 1939-40 was one of the coldest recorded in Finnish history. Durin those days -40 wasnt rare. Especially on the eastern Finland climate is much colder than on coastal area where temperature seldom dips under -20. I live in central Finland and i can remember some 2-3 week periods with temperature continuously lower than -30 and even colder. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Leksus (talk • contribs) 20:16, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] evil and mad

I rephrased those sentence because it 1. made the article sound non-objective and 2. because nobody referred to any sources regarding the state of mind of Stalin. I also erased the "innocent" Finns phrase because of similar reasons as well as it makes no sense to say innocent about something when one doesn't explain why the Finns are innocent in this particular case, as the reason for the war was yet to be explained. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Wikihun84 (talk • contribs) 03:16, 23 December 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Åland Defence Plan

One thing that i notice is not in the article is the Åland defence plan, the plan was a joint venture between Finland and Sweden where both sides would send troops to guard the island from invasion as well as deploying a number of minefields in it's surrounding waters. The Swedish govenrnment backed down from the plan as hostilities broke out and all that was implemented where a coordianted effort to mine the watest leading past Åland and up into the gulf of botnia. The fact that military cooperation ahd occured in this matter not only formed bonds between the Swedish and Finnish oficer corps it most likely led the Finnish side to expect more from Sweden then what was given. --Darkwand (talk) 22:49, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Stalin was a DICTATOR

And Finland was innocent. If you can prove me wrong i will NEVER edit anything again. And thats NOT pushing the POV. If you need POV watch RUSSIA TODAY TV channel! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.102.43.193 (talk) 10:12, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

A better pastime would be translation from fi:Talvisota. --Vuo (talk) 10:15, 9 January 2008 (UTC)
Nah, continue editing, but instead of Wikipedia you should take a look at Encyclopedia Dramatica. :) Suva Чего? 13:53, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] 2nd Finnish film based on the Winter War other than Talvisota (film)

This was made after Talvisota but I can't recall the name of it. Does anyone know? --BrokenSphereMsg me 16:56, 9 January 2008 (UTC)


Must be "Tali-Ihantala 1944" where Finland, Germany, Sweden and Norway joined forces and killed every f*cking Russian war criminal that mad insane dictator STALIN sent once and for all. Those ruthless Russkie thieves stole the Karelia from Finland. Give it back you vodka drinking bastards or there will be trouble. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.102.43.193 (talk) 03:28, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
Wrong war. --Whiskey (talk) 11:48, 12 January 2008 (UTC)
Karelians and other Finns payed tribute to Novgorod the Great. Give back Helsingfors, you stubborn brave people, or we'll do nothing about it and continue trade and other mutually beneficial things. Ko Soi IX (talk) 04:14, 23 January 2008 (UTC)
To brokensphere: I think you mean film: Ambush! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.102.43.193 (talk) 20:14, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Soviet Casualties and Krivosheev

Krivosheev is cited improperly (or from an earlier edition). The number for total irrecoverable losses for the Soviets (inlcuding KIA, MIA, dead of other causes) is not 226,875 dead or missing, it's 126,875 (http://www.soldat.ru/doc/casualties/book/total.html). I will alter the infobox accordingly. With respect, Ko Soi IX (talk) 21:00, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately some joker keeps to changing the number, I've changed it back couple of times already, despite the given source. --Whiskey (talk) 12:10, 21 January 2008 (UTC)
In documentary "Fire and ice" Nikita said that as much as 1 million red bandits died! (youtube)

[edit] Fire and ice documentary, STALIN killed 90% of his generals and 80% of his colonels

Shouldnt this important fact be mentioned about insane mad dictator STALIN? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.102.43.193 (talk) 20:02, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Swedish name

The name in Swedish is relevant, as a large minority in Finland speaks Swedish and because 8 260 Swedes participated voluntarily. In addition Sweden provided foster homes for large numbers of Finnish children.--itpastorn (talk) 19:25, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Keep comments in English

A couple of edits have been explained in Russian. Keep in mind that this is not the Russian edition of WP!--itpastorn (talk) 19:25, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Great Article.

Simply the best War Related article in the wikipedia despites some bias but its a A class for me. Best wishes Miguel. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.62.146.244 (talk) 19:27, 12 February 2008 (UTC)


[edit] Pyrrhic victory?

It is listed at Pyrrhic victory article as such and it have already been discussed there as well. If it can not remain in here, it should be removed from there as well. I just found it quite confusing that one article is saying it is such and the article itself is saying something else. Thank you. 88.113.64.234 (talk) 00:20, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Refimprove please

Most sections are entirely or partially unsourced. --SABEREXCALIBUR! 14:12, 21 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Victory

Regarding this edit, what Grand strategy are you referring to, Kizor? I would sincerely like to see the documents which show the Soviet Union using its entire economic resources and man-power to fight Finland. Regards, Bogdan що? 14:44, 18 May 2008 (UTC)

To the best of my possibly flawed understanding, something doesn't need to happen on a grand strategic level in order to affect things that do. That is, the attack on Pearl Harbor did not involve Japan's entire economic resources and man-power, either, but it was still a part of - and a failure in - the grand strategy of World War Two. Someone seasoned in military theory could likely think circles around me, so yell at me if you disagree. --Kizor 13:49, 22 May 2008 (UTC)
So what affect did the war with Finland have on the Soviet Union - on a grand strategic level? And where was the failure? Bogdan що? 02:12, 27 May 2008 (UTC)


[edit] volunteers

I think that the nationality and numbers of volunteers sent by other nations should be added into the infobox, otherwise for someone with lack of skill in the subject might think it was only finnish soldiers or finnish related offsprings from other nations that volunteerd. - Halmstad (talk) 12:54, 6 June 2008 (UTC)