Winter Sniper 06 The Raate Road, page 1
part #6 of Winter Sniper Series
The Raate Road
By James Mullins
©2023 James Mullins Published By: Longinus Publishing
All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced in any form, in whole or in part, without written permission from the author.
This is a work of fiction. All characters and events portrayed in this book are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously.
ASIN: B0C8XYQQJJ
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Epilogue
Afterword
Chapter 1
Nearly Midnight, Finnish 9th Division HQ,
Three Kilometers South of Suomassalmi, Central Finland
January 1st, 1940
Colonel Hjalmar Siilasvuo peered down at the map spread across the campaign table in front of him. The well-worn wooden table, its faded gray paint chipped in places, occupied the central position in the 9th Division’s headquarters large tent. He placed his index finger on a small wooden tile that represented Task Force Mandelin on the map. The tile sat just to the north of the village of Hauklia, which lay near the Raate Road.
A long string of tiles spread across the Raate road representing the estimated location of the Soviet 44th Division’s various units. The line of tiles ended a dozen centimeters shy of the village of Suomassalmi on the map. That precious space, which looked so small on the map, represented the four kilometers that separated the now destroyed Soviet 163rd Division from the force sent to rescue them. A force now in need of rescue itself.
Each of the tiles, which represented a battalion sized formation of the Soviet 44th Motorized Rifle Division, resembled a snake when viewed as a whole. The colonel smiled as he thought about the analogy. It is indeed a snake come to strike at the heart of our nation and inject the poison of Bolshevism into its healthy body.
The colonel smiled ruefully as he thought about the cancer that had consumed their large neighbor. Regaining his focus, Siilasvuo’s gaze returned to the tile representing Task Force Mandelin. On the opposite side of the Raate road, sat another tile representing a Finnish unit, Task Force Makiniemi.
“I know it looks impossible, but it’s not. In fact, these are the best odds we’ve had against the 44th since Vinogradov crossed the border. Remember what Renning’s company alone managed to accomplish while we were finishing off the 163rd?” Major Valli asked Siilasvuo.
“Yes, but it nearly destroyed the company,” Siilasvuo countered.
“True,” Major Valli said. “But it proved how unprepared the Ukrainians that comprise most of the fighting men of the 44th are to fight under these conditions. They are poorly led, lack the proper clothing for the conditions and are bewildered by the terrain. These men grew up on the vast flatlands of the steppe. They don’t know how to deal with trees.”
“You’re right, of course. Our frozen primordial forests are a far cry from the flat steppes just north of the Black Sea. Their homeland enjoys much warmer sunshine and moderate temperatures in January than our humble little slice of the world,” Colonel Siilasvuo replied. He turned to the enlisted man manning the radio set and said, “Corporal Wirta, signal Lieutenant Colonels Mandelin and Makiniemi to attack.”
“Immediately, colonel,” Wirta replied.
Wirta picked up the microphone that lay on the campaign table. In addition to the mic, the table held a large radio set. Like the radio table’s counterpart that sat in the middle of the tent next to the wood-burning stove, its gray coat of paint had seen better days. The corporal keyed the mic, and said, “Mandelin and Makiniemi you may tickle Stalin’s balls.”
Valli rolled his eyes. “Do all our codes and passwords have to involve perverse statements?”
Siilasvuo smiled and said, “No, but it amuses the men and therefore increases morale. In addition, I like to imagine the faces of the Soviet radio operators listening in on our conversations turning crimson when they hear the words.”
“Can you imagine one of those commissars asking what was just said and the poor bastard manning the radio repeating it?” Valli asked.
“Do you think the operator would tell the truth?” Siilasvuo asked in curiosity.
“Hard to say. I imagine it must be a really tough decision. Lie about what was said and risk getting shot or tell the commissar the truth and risk getting shot,” Valli said.
Siilasvuo briefly chuckled then changed the subject. “I wish I could be there on the front lines leading the men.”
Major Valli put a hand on the colonel’s shoulder and said, “I’m afraid we are long past those days my friend. Fighting is better left to younger men.”
Siilasvuo looked down at himself. His trim muscular form was apparent even through the uniform he wore. His gaze then shifted to Major Valli’s less than perfect form, which showed evidence of the major’s penchant for the good life and said, “Speak for yourself, I’m still the same weight I was during the Great War. Not all of us have overly indulged in the finer things life has to offer.”
Valli rubbed his balding head as he smiled and said, “You have to live for today, as you are not guaranteed a tomorrow.”
The colonel’s gaze shifted to the map, and he sighed wistfully. “I wonder how they are doing?”
“I’m sure they are doing just fine. The 44th would probably be very difficult to deal with out on a flat plain with all those tanks, but here they are like confused little ducks too afraid to move,” Valli replied.
Siilasvuo opened his mouth to reply when the radio set suddenly crackled to life. The two officers’ gaze shifted to the radio which sat in the corner of the tent opposite the entrance flap. Corporal Wirta, the operator, sat in a folding campaign chair as he leaned forward. Wirta held a pencil and notebook in his hands ready to record what was about to be said. The two officers heard what to them sounded virtually unintelligible but to a trained ear like Wirta’s was as clear as the words being spoken by the officers just a few meters away.
When the transmission ended, Wirta kept scribbling notes into his notepad. “Well?” Siilasvuo demanded impatiently.
Corporal Wirta stood and turned toward the colonel. “That was an update from Task Force Mandelin. They have succeeded in capturing a section of the road but have now come under heavy counterattack.”
Valli slapped Siilasvuo on the back and said, “There, see. Nothing to worry about; Mandelin has already captured his objective.”
“Yes, but can he hold it?” Siilasvuo said.
“He’ll hold,” Valli reassured the colonel.
“I don’t share your confidence, major. Let’s do what we can to bolster their firepower.” Colonel Siilasvuo said. “Corporal Wirta, signal the artillery, I want six of our eight guns transferred to Task Force Mandelin’s section of the road.”
“Yes, sir,” Corporal Wirta replied.
Siilasvuo’s gaze fell to the wooden counter to the south of the village of Hauklia which represented Task Force Makiniemi. “What’s going on with you?”
The colonel closed his eyes and imagined what the men of Task Force Makiniemi must be going through. He envisioned Finnish men on skis launching themselves at the Soviets on the road blazing away with their Suomi submachine guns. He smiled at the vision of his brave men pushing their way through the enemy as they battled their way onto the road.
Suddenly, a tremendous explosion tore a large hole in the Finnish line flinging bodies and pieces of bodies in all directions. He looked from his men to an approaching Soviet KV-1 heavy tank, the barrel of its main gun still smoking from the high explosive shell it had just fired. The other Finnish attackers turned and launched themselves at the tank, only to be mowed down by the metal monstrosity’s coaxial machine gun. No! Siilasvuo screamed in his mind.
The colonel was pulled from his vision as the radio once again crackled to life. Wirta dutifully wrote down the transmission. This time Siilasvuo, fearing the worst, didn’t rush him to make his report. Finally, the corporal turned to Siilasvuo and said, “I have a report from Task Force Makiniemi, colonel.”
Siilasvuo looked up at the ceiling of the tent and took a deep breath. Please God.
The colonel exhaled sharply. “Go on.”
“Makiniemi fought their way onto the road but were then beset upon by enemy tanks,” Wirta said.
“And they’ve been pushed back into the forest with heavy casualties,” Siilasvuo finished.
“No, sir. Well, they did take some casualties, but they were able to disable the attacking tanks and secure the road,” Wirta said.
Siilasvuo once again looked up at the tent’s ceili
The colonel turned to Wirta and said “Signal Mandelin and Makiniemi to secure their foothold on the road. Once they are dug in, they are to signal us and prepare for phase two, widening the distance between the two Soviet forces they have just torn asunder.”
Chapter 2
Dawn, Three Kilometers South of Suomassalmi, Central Finland
January 2nd, 1940
Hale and Leo were awoken by the sound of the train’s screeching brakes as it began to slow to a stop. The newly commissioned lieutenant gazed out the window at the gray overcast skies and the snow-covered trees that dotted the land. “The trees are different here,” Hale remarked.
“They look smaller,” Leo agreed.
“Seems to be a lot more fir trees and fewer birch,” Hale said. “I’ve never been this far from home. I don’t know the terrain. Am I going to be any good up here?”
Leo placed a reassuring hand on Hale’s shoulder. “Trees are trees and snow is snow. You’ll be fine.”
Hale smiled at Leo. The smile did not reach his eyes. I couldn’t beat him on my home turf, how am I going to defeat Kuznetsov in this place? I miss Karelia already, he thought in dismay.
Hale looked back out the window and saw several figures waiting for the train’s arrival. A grizzly bear of a man with sergeant’s stripes stood with his arms folded. His thick skull was framed with short iron gray hair. He scowled at the train as if its mere presence offended him somehow. The air was so frigid that a faint cloud of steam slowly wafted upward off the top of the man’s uncovered head. Nearby, an attractive woman with raven black hair and hazel eyes, obviously a nurse, chatted with a middle-aged major.
The nurse wore a white wool overcoat and a white fur hat. She looked like she belonged on the streets of Helsinki, not in this remote forest a hundred kilometers away from the nearest settlement that could be called a town.
The major wore a gray uniform cut from the same fabric as Hale’s new one. His thinning blond hair, absent of gray, indicated that he was in his forties. His ample midsection hung over his belt suggesting that he lived a little too well before the war.
Hale and Leo rose from their seats, put on their coats, and picked up their packs and slipped them onto their backs. They grabbed their rifles and headed for the passenger car’s door. The pair opened the door and stepped outside the train into the icy morning air. The stunningly cold air hit the two men like a physical force. “This place is even colder than home,” Hale observed.
Leo shrugged. “Once you get past ten degrees below zero it hardly matters. Your piss will freeze before it hits the ground regardless.”
Before Hale could reply the sergeant started screaming at a group of privates that were streaming from a third-class car further back from the train’s engine. Hale, now an officer, had been allotted a seat in first class. Upon boarding in Mikkeli, when the conductor tried to send Leo to second class, where the NCO’s rode, Hale told the conductor that he required Leo to stay with him so they could plan. The old man had smiled knowingly and moved on.
The pair stopped and observed the sergeant as he screamed at the privates still on the train. “You bunch better start moving your asses off that train. If any of you are still on it in sixty seconds you had best be fast, otherwise I’m going to plant my boot in your ass!”
Leo laughed as the privates hastened their efforts to debark the train. “Damn sure don’t miss those days.”
The attractive nurse stopped chatting with the major and called to the nurses as they exited the first-class car one by one.
The major glanced over at Hale and asked, “Lieutenant Karhonen?”
Hale snapped to attention. “Yes, sir!”
Major Valli chuckled., “No need for that crap here.”
“Sir?” Hale said.
“Drop the discipline and stop calling me sir. If that Russian sniper is about, you’ll get me killed,” Valli said.
“My apologies,” Hale said.
Valli slapped Hale’s back and said, “Hurry up and kill the bastard so you can stand at attention and kiss my ass all you want.”
Leo laughed. The major whirled around to face him. “What’s so funny?”
Valli’s eyes fell to Leo’s stripes, and he said, “Sergeant,” in an admonishing tone.
“You, major,” Leo replied.
Valli grinned. “At least one of you has a sense of humor. Come with me. Colonel Siilasvuo would like to speak with you.”
“What about our horses?” Hale asked.
“They will be taken care of until you need them,” Valli replied.
“How far do we have to go?” Hale asked.
“Not far. Division HQ is just over that rise on the other side of the medical tents,” the major replied
As they walked the major asked, “So how goes the war in Karelia?”
“We’re holding at the Mannerheim Line.” Hale paused. “For now.”
“What kind of casualties are we taking?” the major inquired.
“When we fight them in small groups and use the terrain to our advantage, hardly any. The untrained Soviet conscripts are bewildered by the wilderness. The poor bastards defending the Mannerheim Line have it much tougher,” Hale said.
“How so?” Valli asked.
“For starters they can catch artillery shells by the bucket full,” Leo said.
“Not only is the Soviet artillery relentless. We watched an entire regiment get smashed in a fruitless counterattack,” Hale said.
“Seems odd that we would leave the cover of those very expensive defenses we spent half our annual military budget building for the last ten years to launch an attack,” Valli observed.
“Colonel Isakson thought a counterattack would breakthrough after his brigade repulsed and shattered two entire divisions,” Leo said.
“What happened to the counterattack?” Valli asked.
“The Soviets had set a trap. We nearly lost the entire regiment in a matter of minutes” Leo replied.
“Summer of cunts,” Valli said. “We’ve suffered nothing like the casualties you’ve described here.”
“Oh? How come?” Leo asked.
“Because the Soviets in this sector are completely daft,” Major Valli replied.
“What are they doing that makes you think that?” Hale asked.
“Well first off the brilliant general of the first division they sent in, the 163rd decided to divide his troops,” Valli said.
“That’s dumb,” Leo said.
The major continued. “Oh, that’s not the half of it. They were sent in with inadequate gear to deal with the cold and little in the way of food.”
“That’s crazy,” Leo said.
“Oh, it gets better. To rescue the morons that we surrounded in Suomassalmi, they sent in a second division, the 44th. The 44th is a fully mechanized division,” Valli said.
“That doesn’t sound stupid,” Hale said.
“Oh, it would have been the perfect thing to do if we were in some other part of Europe that had roads,” the major said.
Surprised, Hale asked, “There aren’t any roads in this part of the country?”
Major Valli smiled. “Technically, there are roads here, but I wouldn’t describe them as such. They’re little more than game trails with the occasional piece of gravel that has been swallowed up by the mud and vomited back up. Assuming of course the road isn’t so frozen that you would need a pickaxe to breach the surface.”
“It never ceases to amaze me how dumb the Russians can be,” Leo said.
“Had some prior experience with them?” the major asked.
Leo nodded. “Twenty years ago, when I was young and stupid myself, I had the misfortune of fighting with those idiots in the Great War.”
“Against the Germans?” Valli asked.
“Yeah,” Leo said.
“You’re lucky to be alive. The primary Russian strategy for the Great War was to throw as many bodies at the Germans as possible in the hopes that they had more bodies than the Germans had bullets. The Germans always had more bullets. How did you manage to survive?” Valli said.
“I convinced my lieutenant that he needed a sniper to sit back and pick off targets during attacks. That kept me safe while his other men died in droves conducting stupid and pointless frontal assaults,” Leo said.
The major opened his mouth to reply when a man in a half-buttoned uniform who was flanked by a woman and a man in a lab coat came into view at the top of the rise they were approaching. “Pekka?” Hale asked.
