Retreat into the Storm

(Source)

Kersantti Kaino Tuomola told his section, "All right boys, pack it up. We're falling back."

The youngest man, Vilhelm Nurmi, asked, "Where to?"

Tuomola pointed to the northwest, "That way, seems that the Russkis are willing to continue to throw bodies at our lines, regardless of cost. Our neighbors have fallen back, so our positions here are untenable."

Nurmi looked puzzled but before he could ask the question, Aleksis Leppänen answered, "Untenable, means we can't stay here, the boys on our left flank got their asses kicked, so we have to run. Understand, Nurmi, or do you want a picture?"

"Enough Aleksis, not all of us went to university. But yes, Vilhelm, what Aleksis says is true. Our left flank is in the air, it's like someone left the back door open, so we pull back."

Ustin Rodionovich Kazankov had found himself leading three more men in addition to Kolobkov and Bezrodny. He had come across them cowering in a ruined Finnish dugout and simply told them to follow. They did, much to Kazankov's surprise. He had yet to learn their names but as they followed him willingly enough, that could be dealt with later.

At the second Finnish defense line Kazankov had the men take cover in a trench while he tried to figure out what he was supposed to do next. Soviet society didn't encourage initiative but he knew that he should do something, even if it was just to look for an officer to tell them what to do.

One of the new men looked in his direction, "Tovarishch Komandir! What is our mission?"

Kazankov looked at the man for a moment, then said, "I'm no commander, just a Red Army Man like yourself, what's your name laddie? In fact, all of you, who are you?"

One by one, the three men identified themselves, Kazankov realized he probably wouldn't remember their names after a few minutes, but the one who spoke out, Kusma Zakharovich Beriya, he'd probably remember, provided he wasn't killed in the next day or so. As for Vladimir Antonovich Dudin and Valerian Dmitrievich Berezhnoy, they looked sufficiently terrified that he doubted they would present any problems.

"All right then, we're going to stay right here until someone comes along who can tell us what to do. We could keep charging ahead and probably fall into some Finnish ambush, anybody want that?"

All the men shook their heads, no one had any immediate wish to die. Kazankov figured that that was good, these boys weren't stupid.

The wind was rising and the snow was falling harder. The men were hunched over, leaning into the wind, Tuomola was beginning to worry. One of the men, Juhani Lahti, had already nearly wandered off the trail. If he hadn't noticed him, Lahti would have probably been there until spring. It wasn't only the Russians who froze to death in this weather.

"Kersantti, how much longer?" Otso Venäläinen had to shout to be heard over the wind. "We're going to start losing people if we keep marching into this blizzard."

"I know, but we have to stay with the column. I have no idea how close the Russkis are, and where would we stop? It's death to stop, we have to keep moving!"

Tuomola saw a man stagger, then drop to his knees. He hurried over to the man, he didn't recognize him, someone from another squad. As he shook the man by the shoulders, there was no response.

He stood back and watched helplessly as the soldier fell forward onto his face. Death from either exposure or sheer exhaustion, Tuomola guessed it didn't really matter.

Dead was dead, no matter how it happened.

Kapitan Ivan Filippovich Telitsyn and his orderly, Krasnoarmeyets Maxim Romanovich Grushanin jumped into a trench where there were six men huddled against the elements.

"Who is in charge here?" he barked at them.

One of them, a rather large man with the look of a veteran soldier about him, spoke up, "I guess that would be me, Tovarishch Kapitan. Krasnoarmeyets Ustin Rodionovich Kazankov and five other survivors from the 44th."

"Where is the rest of your unit?"

"I don't know Tovarishch Kapitan, we assaulted the Finnish position some kilometers back, we lost a lot of the boys coming across no man's land. We stopped here, awaiting orders."

"Good, come with me, we need to continue the pursuit."

"Tovarisch Kapitan, into this snow?" Grushanin protested, his captain was already lost, they should have contacted the main body of the battalion an hour ago.

Telitsyn looked over the lip of the trench, visibility was down to mere meters. He also had no idea where he was, nodding, he said, "Well, you are right once again Maks. We shall wait here until the storm lifts. At least we're out of the wind."

Kazankov looked at his men and shook his head, he didn't like this new officer, he seemed the type to get men killed.

Tuomola and his men finally caught up to the tail end of the column. They had halted while the officers decided what to do. One of them, a major, came up to them.

"How far behind are the Russians?"

"I don't know sir, but we haven't seen anyone since the storm worsened. Perhaps they have halted, waiting for the wind to die down."

"And you are?"

"Kersantti Kaino Tuomola of Separate Battalion 8, Sir!"

"Find someplace out of the wind, we too shall wait for the wind to die down. We're losing too many men to the elements as it is, we shall wait."

As Russians, Finns, and a number of foreign volunteers continued to fight and die, both from combat and the elements, the Finnish government put out peace feelers. The army was on the brink of shattering from the continuous Soviet pressure, bombs were falling on Helsinki, and anticipated help from the West was nothing but talk.

Time to quit before Finland was swept under by the Soviet's massive advantage in numbers.