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The Mannerheim Line (Finnish: Mannerheim-linja, Swedish: Mannerheimlinjen) was a defensive fortification line on the Karelian Isthmus built by Finland against the Soviet Union. While this was never an officially designated name, during the Winter War it became known as the Mannerheim Line, after Finnish Army's then commander-in-chief Field ...
By 6 December, all of the Finnish covering forces had withdrawn to the Mannerheim Line. The Red Army began its first major attack against the Line in Taipale – the area between the shore of Lake Ladoga, the Taipale river and the Suvanto waterway. Along the Suvanto sector, the Finns had a slight advantage of elevation and dry ground to dig into.
Position of Taipale at eastern end of Mannerheim Line. The Battle of Taipale was a series of battles fought during the Winter War between Finland and Soviet Union from 6 to 27 December 1939. The battles were part of a Soviet campaign to penetrate the Finnish Mannerheim Line in the Karelian Isthmus region to open a route into southern Finland ...
[19] [20] After Sweden lost Finland to the Russian Empire in 1809, Mannerheim's great-grandfather, Count Carl Erik Mannerheim (1759–1837), son of the Commandant Johan Augustin Mannerheim, [21] [22] became the first head of the executive of the newly-autonomous Grand Duchy of Finland, an office that preceded that of the contemporary Prime ...
This time, the main instigator of the Winter War was presented as Nazi Germany. According to this view, Finns had sold their country to Hitler, and had been planning an attack against the Soviet Union for years. Furthermore, Soviet historians argued that the Mannerheim Line was built on Germany's initiative and using its experts. [36]
For over ten days the line held every position. On 11 February, the Soviets began their major assault. On 12 February, a minor breach in the Finnish lines in the Lähde sector led to disaster. By that time, so many breaches had occurred in the Mannerheim Line that the reports concerning them were virtually disregarded. The following morning, a ...
Finland had constructed a defensive line in the 1920s and 1930s, the so-called Mannerheim Line. In 1939, the Soviet Union invaded Finland, starting the Winter War, with the goal of annexing Finland. [20] [21] The Soviets failed to achieve this objective, and fighting ended in March 1940 with the signing of the Moscow Peace Treaty.
In February 1940, a Soviet offensive broke through the Mannerheim Line on the Karelian Isthmus, which exhausted Finnish defenses and forced the country's government to accept peace negotiations on Soviet terms. As the news that Finland might be forced to cede its sovereignty to the Soviet Union, public opinion in France and Britain, which ...