Continuation War, day by day.

[Schroeder]

Originally Posted by Dowly

Post #543 updated with colorized photo of Lieutenant Rimpinen.

Now I get why Obama was the first president of color.

[Dowly]

Originally Posted by Schroeder

Now I get why Obama was the first president of color.

Well d'uh!

[Dowly]

9 February 1944

After a long debate, Finland decides to send J.K. Paasikivi to Stockholm to learn more about Soviet Union's peace proposal.

Due to heightened enemy air activity, schools are closed in Viipuri.

Finnish daily losses: 15

***

10 February 1944

About 150 enemy planes hit Kotka. Seven people are killed.

Finnish daily losses: 16

***

11 February 1944

Aunus Group: "At 07.00 our strike team attacked a enemy base SE of Lake Sotjärvi. Three bunkers, one living dug-out and 25 enemies we destroyed, two of which were officers. Two prisoners were taken who told they were from 4./IR 1226. During the operation, enemy launched a counter-attack which was repulsed. Our losses 13 wounded."

Finnish daily losses: 15

***

12 February 1944

J.K. Paasikivi arrives at Stockholm.

14.D/Rukajärvi: "Our platoon size patrol was ambushed at 09.30 near Nuokkijärvi by a strong enemy unit (~200 men). One officer, two NCOs and ten men are missing."

Finnish daily losses: 21

***

13 February 1944

Maaselkä Group: "Our patrol was ambushed around 12.30 near Lake Jolmajärvi. Captain Mikkonen and three other men were left mortally wounded on the field. Sixth Division's Jäeger Company is missin one NCO and two men."

14.D/Rukajärvi: "One officer and one NCO have returned from yesterday's patrol. Another patrol found one NCO and 5 men, all wounded, around the area. Five men still missing."

Finnish daily losses: 19

***

14 February 1944

No entry.

Finnish daily losses: 9

***

15 February 1944

Karelian Isthmus: "Two attacks against our bases near Ohta road and in the Loikkarinnotko area repulsed."

Finnish daily losses: 20

[Dowly]

16 February 1944

J.K. Paasikivi meets Soviet Ambassador Aleksandra Kollontai in Stockholm.
The prerequisites for opening peace talks are as follows: 1940 Moscow Treaty stays in effect, Finland has to sever ties with Germany and all Germans in Finland have to be interned. Question of war reparations and Petsamo are negotiable.

Hitler orders Åland Islands and Suursaari to be manned in case Finland makes separate peace. (Tanne West, Tanne Ost)

Second large scale aerial bombing rocks Helsinki. Twenty-five are killed in the bombings by approximately 420 Soviet planes.

Karelian Isthmus: "In yesterday's attacks at Ohta road and Loikkarinnotko area, the enemy lost at least 45 dead."

Finnish daily losses: 14


Sauna warming up in Kollaa.

***

17 February 1944

Maaselkä Group: "At 10.57 enemy artillery opened fire on our positions west of Maaselkä station. During the bombardment, a company size unit advanced towards the trenches, but were quickly thrown back with smallarms fire. Enemy casualties at least 30 dead."

Finnish daily losses: 20


Building on fire in Helsinki following last night's bombings. (Erottajankatu 2)

***

18 February 1944

No entry.

Finnish daily losses: 15

***

19 February 1944

Maaselkä Group is renamed to II Army Corps from 24.2. onwards.

Schools are closed in cities on the Southern coast of Finland.

Germany makes clear that Finland's separate peace would be seen as a 'betrayal'.

Finnish daily losses: 18


Motor sled. (Petroskoi)

***

20 February 1944

No entry.

Finnish daily losses: 18

***

21 February 1944

Over 40 planes bomb Oulu. Four are killed and 20 wounded.

Finnish daily losses: 12

***

22 February 1944

Over 100 planes try to bomb Turku, but due to anti-aircraft fire and bad weather only 15 bombs fall on the city.

Finnish daily losses: 27

[Schroeder]

Originally Posted by Dowly

16 February 1944

Second large scale aerial bombing rocks Helsinki. Twenty-five are killed in the bombings by approximately 420 Soviet planes.

25 fatalities in a 420 plane air raid? Either the soviets didn't know how to release their bombs on target or you must have had a very good air raid protection system for your civilians.

[Dowly]

Originally Posted by Schroeder

25 fatalities in a 420 plane air raid? Either the soviets didn't know how to release their bombs on target or you must have had a very good air raid protection system for your civilians.

While Helsinki and many other European cities endured bombing raids throughout the Second World War, the Finnish capital fared better than many of them thanks to the efficiency of its anti-aircraft and deception measures. Only 5% of the bombs fell within the city, and some of these fell in uninhabited park areas causing no damage. Some 2,000 bombers participated in the three great raids on the city and dropped some 2,600 tons of bombs. Of the 146 who died, six were soldiers; 356 were wounded. 109 buildings were destroyed. 300 were damaged by shrapnel and 111 were set on fire. The Soviet Air Force lost 25 aircraft.

After the war, the Allied Control Commission led by Soviet General Andrei Zhdanov came to Helsinki. Zhdanov was perplexed by the limited damage the city had sustained. The Soviet leadership thought that they had destroyed the city completely and that it was these bombings that had forced the Finns to the peace table.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombin...n_World_War_II


The following about Finnish response is also an interesting bit I wasn't aware of:

The Finnish Air Force responded to the air raids with series of night infiltration bombings of ADD airfields near Leningrad. Finnish bombers – Junkers Ju 88s, Bristol Blenheims, and Dornier Do 17s - either tailed or in some cases even joined formation with returning Soviet bombers over the Gulf of Finland and followed these to their bases. Once most Soviet bombers had landed the Finnish bombers approached to bomb both the landed and still landing Soviet bombers and then escaped in the ensuing confusion. The first major night infiltration bombing took place on 9 March 1944 and they lasted until May 1944. Soviet casualties from these raids could not be estimated reliably.

[Schroeder]

Thanks.


I believe the Luftwaffe also used that tactic with either captured enemy aircraft or just their own bombers. I believe to recall at least one event where a German He 177 heavy bomber followed allied bombers to their base and then either struck itself or called in their position. But I'm not 100% sure of that anymore.

[Dowly]

Originally Posted by Schroeder

I believe the Luftwaffe also used that tactic with either captured enemy aircraft or just their own bombers. I believe to recall at least one event where a German He 177 heavy bomber followed allied bombers to their base and then either struck itself or called in their position. But I'm not 100% sure of that anymore.

If you find something about it, throw me a link!

[Schroeder]

Originally Posted by Dowly

If you find something about it, throw me a link!

So far I only found something about captured bombers. It's in German though. Here is the link:
http://www.luftarchiv.de/index.htm?/beute/usa/


About half way through that article you get to:
"Nachdem ausreichend Daten über die einzelnen Flugzeugmuster ermittelt worden waren, sollen Beutebomber von Zeit zu Zeit in gegnerische Formationen eingeschleust worden sein, um auf diese Weise mehr Informationen über Aufbau, Bewegungsabläufe und Schwachstellen der verschiedenen alliierten Flugformationen zu erlangen. Solche Annäherungen wurden von der USAAF seit April 1943 registriert. Im Laufe der nächsten fünf Monate sollen insgesamt 25 Fälle von amerikanischer Seite an der West- und Südfront festgestellt worden sein. Die verdächtigen Maschinen hätten stets den gleichen Schutzanstrich und die farbigen Markierungen getragen wie die regulären USAAF Bomber. Normalerweise wären diese Flugzeuge allein geflogen, auch wenn vereinzelt Zweier - und Dreier - Gruppen beobachtet worden wären. Die Meldung über eine Formation sogar aus insgesamt neun dieser Bomber, die am 26. Juli 1943 gemeldet worden war, wurde später dahingehend korrigiert, dass es sich nur um eine Maschine in einer Neuner - Formation gehandelt habe. Neben der Beobachtung des einzelnen Bomberverbandes und seiner Bewegung wurden diese Beutebomber teilweise auch zur Heranführung der Abfangjäger genutzt. Die Jäger der Luftwaffe, die einen solchen begleiteten Bomberverband angriffen, mussten über das Vorhandensein und die Position eines eigenen Flugzeuge informiert gewesen sein und griffen diese Maschinen nicht an. Ein Umstand der es den anderen USAAF Besatzungen ermöglichte, die als Shadows (Schatten) bezeichneten Maschinen zu identifizieren. Waren die deutschen Maschinen den alliierten Bomberverbänden zunächst nur in einiger Entfernung gefolgt, so kamen sie den Verbänden im Laufe der Zeit immer näher. Teilweise sollen sie sich sogar in den beobachteten Verband eingegliedert haben. Normalerweise blieben sie nur bis zur Kanalküste bei oder in dem beobachteten Verband. Einige sollen aber bis zu den Landeplätzen in England mitgeflogen und dann erst umgekehrt sein."


Google translate version with some sporadic corrections of mine (I'm lazy):

After sufficient data had been obtained on the individual aircraft, captured bombers from time to time were used to infiltrate opposing formations in order to gain more information about the structure, movements and vulnerabilities of the various Allied flight formations. Such approaches were registered by the USAAF since April 1943. Over the next five months, a total of 25 cases have been reported by the US on the western and southern fronts. The suspicious planes had always worn the same protective paint and color markings as the regular USAAF bombers. Normally, these planes would have flown alone, although sporadic groups of two and three were observed. The news of a formation even out of a total of nine of these bombers, which had been reported on 26 July 1943, was later corrected to the effect that it was only a machine in a nine - formation. In addition to the observation of the individual bomber units and its movement, these captured bombers were also sometimes used to guide in interceptors. The Luftwaffe fighters who attacked such an escorted bomber band had to be informed of the presence and location of their own aircraft and did not attack those aircraft. A circumstance that allowed the other USAAF crews to identify those aircraft that they called Shadows. While the German planes had only followed the Allied bomber formations at some distance, they gradually moved closer to the units over time. Partly, they are said to have even integrated into the observed formations. Normally they only stayed with them until reaching the channel coast. Some are said however to have stayed until the landing airfields in England were reached and only then returned.

[Dowly]

Danke.

[Georg Lassen]

Antiaircraft defense plans


The quite low number of casualties and destroyed buildings can in a great extent be accounted for the well-planned air-defense and the newly acquired radar installations. The commander for the Helsinki air defense was Lt. Col. Pekka Jokipaltio (1901-1977). The operative commander was Capt. Aake Pesonen (1914-1987).


The improvement of Helsinki air defence begun already in 1941. It was intensified in 1942, at the time when the Soviet strategic air forces (ADD, Авиация дальнего действия), directly under Stalin's command and led by Air Marshall Aleksandr Golovanov (1904-1975), had begun their bombing missions on Finnish cities.



The defensive tactics aimed at preventing the advancing bombers to drop their loads on the city area. For this purpose Capt. Pentti Paatero planned a set of defensive rings around Helsinki.



They all had the geographical center of the downtown city as the center point. At each evenly numbered distance in kilometers, up to 14 km from the center point, each ring was divided into 1-1.5 km wide arcs.

The barriers (columns) thus formed were given descriptive numbers.

Each column was then subdivided into slices of 200 m up to a height of 7,5 km.



For each one of these slices all relevant gunnery data was precalculated. A lot of mathematicians (Leo Sario, Pentti Laasonen, Kari Karhunen, Olli Lokki and others) and artillery experts were gathered to make these calculations. Later the German radars (then called Funkmässgerät), of which the Finns learned in 1942 and finally got in 1943, were playing a pivotal role in this.

In combat


In a combat situation, all batteries were simultaneously listening to the Air Defence HQ's telephone commands. When the target barrier (number, height) was given, each battery picked up their values from the books and, as the result of their concentrated barrage fires, a fire wall could be created in front of the bombers closing that barrier in the sky.


The sound locators listening the sky on Hogland Island gave the early warnings. The two far-range radars (known by a lady's name "Raija", very similar to the corresponding Germ. cover name Freya) disclosed the positions of approaching planes from a distance of 100 km and in combat situations more accurate positions were measured with four fire ranging radars ("Irja", Germ. Dora), which were transmitted to the command center.



During the first and most disastrous air raid, the German liaison officer Capt. Kurt Rheindorff directly called Reichs Marshall Herman Göring and requested fighter support. The request was accepted and in four days, before the second strike, a contingent of 12 Messerschmitt night fighters and their crews arrived at Malmi airport. This substantially helped the city defence.

The effect of growing experience, improving barrier fire and the effect of night fighters can be seen in maps showing a bomber or formation radar measured flight paths. Turning away meant also dropping the bombs outside the city. First raid (6 Febr.), third raid (26 Febr.) (Source: The 60th Anniversary Exhibition at the Helsinki Aviation Museum)

https://histdoc.net/lauttasaari/airraid.html

[Schroeder]

Kiitos.

[Georg Lassen]

Originally Posted by Schroeder

Kiitos.

Bitte schön.




Something that article did not mention is that for the last two raids the early warning was increased to hours in advance by Finnish SIGINT.


The night fighters where from I/JG 302, Bf-109 G6s.

[Dowly]

Thanks for the added info, the map especially is very interesting.

[Georg Lassen]

Last Finnish fighter ace Jaakko Hillo has passed away 22.2 at the age of 97 and joined the eternal flight.


Hillo scored 8 victories in the Continuation War flying mainly Curtiss Hawk 75 fighters.


After the war he flew for Aero/Finnair from where he retired.


Article in Finnish.




https://siivet.fi/ajankohtaista/viim...le-lennolleen/