Page 414 - Le Operazioni Interforze e Multinazionali nella Storia Militare - ACTA Tomo I

414 XXXIX Congresso della CommIssIone InternazIonale dI storIa mIlItare • CIHm

The Emergence of Joint and Combined Approaches in Finnish
Operations during the Continuation War (1942 and 1944)

Pasi TUUnAInEn

Introduction
fter the Winter War (1939–1940) Finland was caught between Germany and the
A Soviet Union. In 1941 the Finnish Army joined Operation Barbarossa in an at-
tempt to reclaim land annexed by the Soviet Union. During what is known as the Con-
tinuation War (1941–1944) the Finns conducted many operations in co-operation with
the Germans, particularly in the northern part of their country where one Finnish Army
corps was attached to the German Mountain Army. In and around the southern half of
1
Finland, the Finnish military leadership was in complete charge of operations.
In World War II the Finnish military almost never took a joint approach. Repre-
sentatives of the different services often deemed that co-ordination was secured through
negotiations and pre-agreements between higher echelons of command. There was no
2
tradition of integrating the various services into a single unified command.
Nevertheless, this paper will examine the planning and execution of operations com-
parable to joint and combined activities in the areas near Leningrad (the Karelian Isth-
mus and the adjacent bodies of water). With awareness of the dangers of anachronism,
three cases from 1942 and 1944 will be examined, tracing various features of Finnish
military history in World War II that have later been characteristic for joint and combined
operations. The research is based on official military archival sources (such as planning
documents, orders, various reports, correspondence, and war-time diaries) deposited at
the Finnish National Archives, Kansallisarkisto (hereafter cited as KA), memoirs, other
participant accounts, interviews, and scholarship.

Case 1: The “Semi- Joint” Suursaari (Hogland) Operation in March 1942
The island of Suursaari was of strategic importance since it is situated in the middle
of the Gulf of Finland, at its widest point. The island changed owners several times. The
Finns lost it in 1939, but reclaimed it in March 1942, thus restricting the Soviet Fleet to
the eastern area of the Gulf and enabling the Finns to protect their vital sea lanes.
3

1 Olli Vehviläinen, Finland in the Second World War: Between Germany and Russia (Chippenham: Palgrave,
2002), chapter 6; Pasi Tuunainen, “The Finnish Army at War: Operations and Soldiers, 1939–45”. In: Finland
in World War II: History, Memory, Interpretations, eds. Tiina Kinnunen & Ville Kivimäki (Leiden: Brill,
2012), 153–159.
2 Jukka Mälkki, ”Tulevaisuus on ’joint’”. Kylkirauta n:o 4/2010, 11.
3 Niilo Lappalainen, Suursaari toisessa maailmansodassa (Juva: WSOY, 1987), 7–8. For the planning
documents pertaining to the Suursaari operation 1942 see Itä-Suomenlahden Rannikkoprikaatin Esikunnan
arkisto, T 19574/24, KA.