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Praetorium Honoris

Sunday, February 13, 2022

Motti - The Attack of the 44th Stalls

(Source)
Puzanov, Kharzin, and Strelnikov were moving in what they thought was the direction of Suomussalmi where they assumed that the Soviet 163rd Rifle Division was still fighting. Little did they know that the 163rd had already been destroyed by the Finns. Their own division, the 44th, was in danger of being destroyed itself.

Finnish attacks all along the Raate Road had broken the 44th into small pockets, or motti as the Finns called them. They had left their lieutenant, Pashin, and a small group of men, including the battalion commissar, Konnikov, about five hundred meters to their rear. The lieutenant was gathering more men to continue on, Puzanov had volunteered to scout ahead, then report back. But things were going badly, Puzanov was sure that he was lost and Strelnikov was having trouble keeping up.

"Boleslaw Stepanovich, you must try to keep up. If you stop moving you could freeze to death." Puzanov was urging them on but he had a bad feeling about this, his first "command." It was only him and these two men, but the lieutenant had entrusted them to him.

"Seryozha, give me just a minute, my thighs feel like they are on fire. I just need to sit for a moment, catch my breath." As Strelnikov said that, he sat heavily onto a snow bank.

"Ah, I already feel better, just give me a moment."

Kharzin looked at Strelnikov, then at Puzanov, whispering he said, "Seryozha, why is Strelnikov slurring his words?"

Ignoring Kharzin, Puzanov knelt down next to Strelnikov, "You must continue on, you will die here if you do not."

"Boleslaw Stepanovich, wake up, don't sleep, don't ..."

"What is the matter with him, Seryozha?"

"He is dead, the cold has killed him. Tell me, Sasha, can you feel your toes?"

Kharzin looked at Puzanov for a moment, then said, "Yes, they hurt but I can still wiggle them and feel them."

"All right, we must get back to the lieutenant, there is no way forward. That way," he said as he gestured up the road, "there is only the white death."


Pashin fired at another muzzle flash in the dark. He had picked up one of the men's rifles, his pistol was useless at anything beyond a few meters. After he fired, working the bolt to load another round, he noticed something odd. It took him a moment to realize what it was, the Maxim gun had stopped firing.

"Lera, go back and see what's happened with the Maxim."

Commissar Konnikov sat there staring at Pashin, "Me?" The idea of him moving from this cover appalled him.

"Who else can I send? Now go, before the Finns start firing again." The Finns in the woods would fire, then shift positions, giving the surrounded Russians only fleeting targets.

"Comrade, I think I am better used here, with the command group ..." Konnikov didn't want to go, that much was obvious.

"Lera, I need you to find out why the Maxim has stopped, I can't go, do you think that fool of a gunner will listen to one of the private soldiers? I think not. If that gun doesn't begin firing soon, the Finns can rush us, then it's over."

Konnikov sat for another moment, then blurted out "Proklyat'ye!¹" as he crawled out of the shell hole they were in. He vanished in the direction of the Maxim, a flurry of shots from the woods chased him.

Krasnoarmeyets Pyotr Aleskeevich Tsiryulnikov muttered, "I thought the commissars did not believe in God, Tovarishch Leytenant."

Pashin grinned and said, "Don't you know, Pyotr Aleskeevich? There are no atheists in foxholes."


Konnikov had nearly pissed himself when he heard the hiss of a rifle bullet near his ear. He got lower and crawled faster, muttering imprecations against the Red Army, the Party, even Stalin himself. Eventually he arrived at the Maxim's position, the man who had been the gunner lay dead in the bottom of the hole, the other two men sat stupidly next to their gun.

"Comrades, why aren't you firing the gun?"

One of the men turned and looked at Konnikov, "The water is gone, Dudek always said not to fire the gun if it had no water."

"Who the Hell is Dudek?" Konnikov asked.

The man simply pointed to the corpse.

"Damn it! You," he said pointing to the man who had answered his question, "scoop up some snow." As he ordered that, Konnikov began to undo the "tractor cap" on the top of the water jacket, turning to the second man he said, "prepare a belt!"

"What is your name Comrade?" Konnikov asked the man with the snow.

"Pavlov, Comrade Commissar!"

"Keep stuffing snow into that hole, the heat from the barrel will melt it fast, keep the snow coming or the barrel will overheat, then the Finns will come for you. Do you understand Pavlov?"

"Da, da."

Turning to the other man, who said that his name was Bezrodny, he grabbed the ammunition belt he offered and loaded the gun. Konnikov was surprised that he remembered how. As he cocked the gun, Pavlov was still stuffing snow into the water jacket, he heard Bezrodny moan.

"The ghosts Comrade Commissar, the ghosts are coming!" The man crossed himself. Much to Konnikov's astonishment.

Shaking his head, Konnikov barked, "Keep the ammunition coming, Bezrodny, or you will have more than ghosts to worry about!"

Sure enough, Konnikov looked up and there they were, Finns in white, on skis, gliding out of the forest like so many wraiths from a fever-dream. Swallowing hard, Konnikov swung the gun in that direction.


Pashin saw the Finns coming, he knew that if Konnikov didn't get the gun firing, they were doomed. As he loaded his last clip, he sighted down the barrel and hissed to the men with him, "Wait until they are close ..."

Then Pashin heard the Maxim begin to chatter. Watching, he saw a number of the white clad Finns topple over, the rest sought cover wherever they could. Many skied back to the trees, not all of them made it.

A desultory fire was kept up by both sides throughout the night. The Finns couldn't advance, the Russians were pinned in place. Eventually, when the cold held the battlefield in its icy grip, the firing stopped. The Finns, those who survived, had disappeared into the night.

Pashin looked around the position, his runner, Leonid Victorovich Bebchuk, still aimed his rifle, but at some point in the night the cold had taken him. His eyes were glassy orbs in his frozen face.

Ivan Konstantinovich Sayankin, his orderly, sat motionless, a rifle bullet had burrowed into his head and ended his life. He looked surprised, as if something unexpected had befallen him.

During the night Puzanov and his one remaining man, Kharzin, had joined them in the shell hole. They were still there as morning crept over the horizon. Pashin realized that with the way ahead completely blocked, and the pressure starting to close the road here, he had no other option but to fall back

Of his small command group, only three men other than himself survived. When the dawn began to lighten the horizon to the east, Pashin led his surviving men back to where the Maxim was.

The gun had kept the Finns at bay, it had fallen silent shortly after the last Finns had withdrawn. Though single rifle shots kept coming in at random, Pashin assumed these were meant to keep them awake. He realized that Konnikov had overcome his cowardice and had, perhaps, saved all of them.

When they arrived at the gun, they found one man slumped over the water jacket, a second lay beside the gun, still holding a belt of ammunition as if to feed the gun. The third man slumped over the back of the gun, thumbs still on the trigger, was Batal'onnyy Komissar Valerian Vitalievich Konnikov. All three men had frozen to death in the extreme cold.

"Well, I'll be damned." Puzanov muttered.

"So will we all unless we keep moving, let's go lads, we must leave this place."

Pashin led the remnants of his company back down the Raate Road. This battle was over.




¹ Goddammit!

36 comments:

  1. Sometimes the real enemy is Mother Nature.

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  2. Finding another quilt after reading this segment Sarge.

    I suspect most people - including me - do not really grasp in our modern world what a challenge the untamed environment actually is. We bundle up in modern fabrics or simply go inside to avoid the extremes. In reality, that is largely a 20th century invention. Prior to that, the weather and climate was not something to be taken lightly.

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    1. I see people today, who think nothing of driving on bitter cold, snowy days wearing nothing more than a light jacket. "I'll be in my car, then in the office all day, why do I need a heavy coat?" I always ask them "What if your car breaks down and you have to walk?"

      They look at me as if I have two heads ...

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    2. Or the folks who wore flip-flops in the summer, walk far in those if the car breaks down? Oh, the cellphone.....what if no service/dead battery? Too many people think that Man is King everywhere.

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    3. I'm quite risk-averse, which is why I have a couple bottles of water in my trunk, along with an extra coat, and an umbrella. I suppose it's also why I have other items that held my peace of mind like life insurance and long-term care insurance. Expensive? Yes. Are those trunk items possibly useless? Also yes. But not if you need them.

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    4. Nylon12 - "Be prepared," it's not just for Boy Scouts.

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    5. Tuna - You won't need them until you do, then you really, really, really need them.

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    6. (Don McCollor)...Harder is deciding not to travel when conditions are marginal (not quite bad enough not to, but not very good). Better to be thought a fool for staying home than sitting stuck somewhere knowing you were a fool...

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    7. (Don McCollor)..Found it! "Sixteen Hours Behind The White Wall". PBS doc about the 1984 ND/MN blizzard. Slow, but chilling. You can die out there.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rkTpR9GhYhU

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    8. Been in a couple in my day. No fun at all.

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  3. I really don't miss the cold, if I never see a negative again it will be alright with me.

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    1. It's what I like about Rhode Island on the coast, I still get the cold, but not the minus temperatures of further north. Though to be honest, it did dip below zero this year. But not for long.

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  4. The environment is always a factor, regardless. Living outdoors for extended periods can be difficult even with good gear. Tactical considerations often mean you can't use that gear. Die one way or another is sometimes the "choice"; the Zampolit finally did one worthy thing.
    Boat Guy

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    1. The Zampolit worried too much about combat and let his fear drive him. Once he had something to focus on, the fear, while it didn't go away, was suppressed long enough for him to be useful.

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  5. It appears that the corpses in the photograph have been stripped of their footwear. Here in Pennsylvania when I deer hunt my feet get cold first. Chemical toe warmers help, but if something is going to send me home it's cold feet. No pun intended.

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    1. The Russians issued felt boots, they were highly prized.

      And yes, cold feet, once that happens that's all I can think about, getting them warm again!

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    2. For very good reason you go into survival mode when your feet are too cold. Same with hands and face. Brrr.

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    3. Those are the first indicators that you're in trouble!

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  6. Crusty Old TV Tech here. Went and looked up a Google Maps road view of the Suomussalmi to Raate road (modern Finnish 912/9125). The terrain and forest reminded me a lot of TX 147 between Zavalla and the junction with TX 163, around Lake Sam Rayburn. Traipsed through those East Texas woods a lot, in the spring and fall. Far north end of the "Big Thicket", transitioning into the Piney Woods. Can not imagine running a sucessful military offensive in those woods at -20 or so F and in 2-3 feet of snow, against native defenders. What in the devil were the Soviets thinking?

    I wonder what sort of comm the Finns had. Being defense, they still had landlines, probably with one time pad encryption. Might have had some short range HF gear available, they did have pretty good indigenous radio production going. Mobility on skis made "runners" much more useful as a comm means for the Finns, too. The Soviets were behind on comm early in the war IIRC, until Lend-Lease brought them Canadian and US produced British gear. I'll bet for them, it was runners and at best, old field telephones at Division level maybe.

    The Zampolits ending up manning an MG, that was an unexpected twist.

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    1. Crusty correction...TX 103, vice 163.

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    2. Interesting point about the comms, I need to do more research on that.

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    3. (Don McCollor)...For short term tactical communication, an uncommon language probably is as good as a code. By the time the enemy figures out what the language is and finds someone who can understand it, the situation would be over and the information useless. The Lapp Sami language would have been good.

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    4. Not sure comms played that much of a role in such a short war.

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  7. So much for the vaunted Russian ability to dress and survive in the cold.

    I wonder, often, how Napoleon or Hitler would have fared in their incursions into Mother Russia if they hadn't done either during really cold winters.

    And I wonder how many Russians died during WWII because their winter gear wasn't up to the conditions.

    Mother Nature is not very kind, not at all.

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    1. Mother Nature can be a real ...

      I better watch myself, it's snowing outside.

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    2. Crusty Old TV Tech here. Even with top notch winter gear, you'll die without enough fuel (both human and fire type). Gotta have the rations sufficient to keep body heat up or insulation does no good. Ditto water, that cold dry air just sucks the water right out of the old lungs. With fire fuel, you can have water if you have snow/ice. I suspect both running out of metabolic fuel, and dehydration were at play in the Soviet campaign in Finland. Logistics is king in war.

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    3. Those who know, understand logistics.

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  8. So: Valerian son of Vitaly finally became a man in the eyes of G-d and man - not all of us are granted that blessing; the chance to defend one's honor and one's men. He can argue the right and wrong of of his actions and prior beliefs with the Gatekeeper upon his arrival.

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  9. Sarge, I'll be the first to admit that my knowledge of Russia & Russians is much less than my familiarity with other cultures. in "Pyotr Aleskeevich Tsiryulnikov", was 'Aleskeeich' meant to be the patronymic? Pyotr, son of Aleskee? I have of course heard the name 'Alexy/Alexiy', perhaps 'Aleksee', but 'Aleskee' is a new one to me. You're likely far more familiar with them than I am.
    Good story--and it all makes me shiver, 'cause I hate snow, and cold in all its forms!
    --Tennessee Budd

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    1. Aleskeevich is the patronymic and it is an actual Russian name. There are some decent random name generators online which I use. When in doubt about a name, I search for it online, usually spot on.

      Snowed here today but as the temperature hovered around freezing, it wasn't all that bad. Of course, if you're used to warmer climes ...

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    2. Thanks for the explanation! I learned something.
      As for the cold, I have numerous expletives.....
      --TB

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    3. Temperature yesterday had a high of around 20, today 40. 60 by the weekend!

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