The Winter War: A Soviet Failure

In the midst of WWII, Stalin decided to invade the small nation of Finland. It did not go the way he wanted it to. This is the story of the quagmire of 1939 that often isn't talked about between the Fins and the Russians.

Music:
Russian Slapstick by Hakan Erikson
Dramatic Orchestral Strings by Gavin Luke
Winds of Winter by Yi Natiro

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[knowledgehusk]

Apologies about the couple weeks without a video. Christmas time is here and I've also been busy with my own AlternateHistoryHub stuff. If you want to help out the channel, it's now kinda obligatory to like and comment because the analytics do indeed like that. Thanks guys. More content weekly now that the holidays are over. -Cody

[richbrownsberger]

Russia: **invades Finland**
Finland:hipity hopity get off my property

[Logarithm]

So you're saying that one guy, got 0.44% of the kills in that war. That's nuts.

[johnpaulsylvester]

“Patrick! Are you okay?”

“FINLAND!!!”

[davidperrier]

Knowledgehub - "Finns were trained from a young age to...."
Me - "Kill Russians?"
Knowledgehub - "ski"
Me - "Oh, of course"

[TelephoneToughGuy]

Out of all the countries that USSR bordered in Europe at the start of WWII, Finland was the only one that did not become part of the eastern bloc. Respect

[jessemanotus]

A large group of Russian soldiers in the border area in 1939 are moving down a road when they hear a voice call from behind a small hill:
"One Finnish soldier is better than ten Russian".

The Russian commander quickly orders 10 of his best men over the hill where Upon a gun-battle breaks out and continues for a few minutes, then silence.
The voice once again calls out: "One Finn is better than one hundred Russian."

Furious, the Russian commander sends his next best 100 troops over the hill and instantly a huge gun fight commences. After 10 minutes of battle, again Silence.
The calm Finnish voice calls out again: "One Finn is better than one thousand Russians".

The enraged Russian commander musters 1000 fighters and sends them to the other side of the hill.
Rifle fire, machine guns, grenades, rockets and cannon fire ring out as a terrible battle is fought...
Then silence.

Eventually one badly wounded Russian fighter crawls back over the hill and with his dying words tells his commander,
"Don't send any more men...it's a trap. There's two of them."

[dominicperez]

Now I imagine a ski-riding Finn shooting a machine gun.

[Fubasta]

Side note about Molotov Cocktail, it was called that because the Russians were dropping bombs on Finland claiming they were food (Molotov's Bread Baskets). The Molotov Cocktail was just a drink to go with the food.

[PrehistoricLEGO]

They basically out-wintered the Soviets with snipers and skis

[Aleksi__]

It's funny how in all ww2 documentaries they say "russians greatest ally... winter" and look what happened here😂

[oldmanlogan]

I traveled to Finland last year and visited the Military history museum on Suomelina. Never imagined it had such a badass military background, it was very cool ( no pun intended).

[tonycj]

It's actually quite surprising that the Russians wouldn't know how to fight a winter war. They basically traveled a few miles away from home.

[timurtheterrible]

You forgot something Cody,
The Finns eventually allied with the Nazis, BECAUSE they wanted to attack the Soviet Union in return. So not only did Stalin, fail at protecting Stalingrad through the Winter War, he also MADE the Finns allied to the Nazis, the very thing he tried to defend against. Thanks, Stalin
EDIT: Leningrad, not Stalingrad. I fucked up on that one.
EDIT 2: This comment’s replies are a shitshow, in part because of some of my replies to others. Sorry for any brash replies I made to any of you.

[josephstalin]

All I can say is that I was lagging the whole match.

[kevinp]

Winter war joke:
Finnish boi: hey stalin wanna hear a joke?
Stalin: yeah sure bruv

Finnish boi: Helsinki

Stalin: I don't get it...

Finnish boi: AND YOU NEVER WILL!

[PitFriend]

The White Death was a true badass. He was only stopped when he was finally shot in the head by an anti-tank rifle. An oversized rifle designed to shoot holes in armored vehicles. Not even this killed him, he eventually recovered but only after Finland had surrendered.

[cjstanky]

Russian quote about the end of the winter war, we only gained enough land from the war to bury our dead

[mountain_seeker]

Well it's safe to say, the soviets in this case were Finnished.

[tommyvercetti]

I know they were the "bad guys" here but man, I feel bad for the Soviets. Imagine being assagined to a dumbass officer that just sends you and the other soldiers to certain death like he was playing Age of Empires soldiers instead of real ones :/