{"id":1703,"date":"2017-11-24T18:14:15","date_gmt":"2017-11-24T16:14:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/live-talvisota.digiasites.com\/?page_id=1703"},"modified":"2018-04-26T09:06:39","modified_gmt":"2018-04-26T06:06:39","slug":"motti-battles-in-the-kuhmo-area-1940","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/talvisota.fi\/en\/battles\/north-finland-group\/motti-battles-in-the-kuhmo-area-1940\/","title":{"rendered":"Motti battles in the Kuhmo area 1940"},"content":{"rendered":"

Relocation of the 9th Division from Suomussalmi to the Kuhmo area<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Edited map from the work Raunio, Ari, Sotatoimet \u2013 Suomen sotien 1939\u221245 kulku kartoin (Military Operations \u2013 The Course of Finnish Wars in 1939\u201345 with Maps), 3rd edition, Karttakeskus 2013.<\/em><\/p>\n

At the end of January, the majority of Siilasvuo\u2019s division (9th D), which had fought successfully in Suomussalmi, was transferred to the Kuhmo area. All the troops deployed in the area were subordinated to the command of the division\u2019s commander, Colonel Hjalmar Siilasvuo<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Siilasvuo\u2019s division had two infantry regiments (65th IR and 27th IR) which had been relocated from Suomussalmi, Brigade Vuokko, which was a little under a regiment in strength, and Group Ilom\u00e4ki, which consisted of a few battalions, at its disposal.<\/p>\n

On 29 January, the division launched its attack to destroy the Soviet mountain division (54th MountD) that had placed itself in an advance formation. The attack did not achieve its main goal. The fighting continued until the end of the war.<\/p>\n

Motti battles continued until the end of the war<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Edited map from the work Raunio, Ari, Sotatoimet \u2013 Suomen sotien 1939\u221245 kulku kartoin (Military Operations \u2013 The Course of Finnish Wars in 1939\u201345 with Maps), 3rd edition, Karttakeskus 2013.<\/em><\/p>\n

With its attack, Siilasvuo\u2019s division (9th D) succeeded in cutting off the enemy division\u2019s (54th MountD) road connection to the east through Kilpel\u00e4nkangas and in dividing the enemy troops into several pockets, known in Finnish as mottis. The battles to destroy the mottis continued until the end of the war.<\/p>\n

The hardest motti battles were fought against the triple motti of Luelahti. The Soviet troops trapped in mottis in the Luelahti area included a mountain rifle regiment (118th MountRR), the commander of the mountain division, Brigade Commander Nikolay A. Gusevsky<\/a>, and the division\u2019s headquarters, among others.<\/p>\n

The Finns succeeded in capturing two of the three mottis before the end of the war. Out of the other larger mottis, the Finns were only able to capture the motti of Reuhkavaara.<\/p>\n

Enemy forces trying to come to the trapped soldiers\u2019 assistance were stopped in Kilpel\u00e4nkangas<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Soldiers of the Kuhmo area in a trench. The time and place are unknown. SA-kuva.<\/em><\/p>\n

The 9th Army tried to open a road connection to the division trapped in a motti by launching attacks from the direction of Repola (Reboly). The hardest battles fought to repel these attacks took place in Kilpel\u00e4nkangas. Siilasvuo\u2019s troops were forced to abandon the area at the beginning of March. The Finns held their subsequent defensive positions in the L\u00f6yt\u00f6vaara area until the end of the war.<\/p>\n

Destruction of Dolin\u2019s ski brigade<\/strong><\/p>\n

In February, the 9th Army deployed Dolin\u2019s ski brigade (SkiBde), which had the strength of approximately three battalions, through forests to assist the army\u2019s mountain battalion (54th MountD), which was trapped in mottis. It was destroyed by Finnish forces in the Vetko area before it managed to make contact with any of the mottis.<\/p>\n

Ari Raunio<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Relocation of the 9th Division from Suomussalmi to the Kuhmo area Edited map from the work Raunio, Ari, Sotatoimet \u2013 Suomen sotien 1939\u221245 kulku kartoin (Military Operations \u2013 The Course of Finnish Wars in 1939\u201345 with Maps), 3rd edition, Karttakeskus 2013. At the end of January, the majority of Siilasvuo\u2019s division (9th D), which had […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":938,"parent":1691,"menu_order":4,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"custom-templates\/child-level.php","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1703","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/talvisota.fi\/api\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1703","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/talvisota.fi\/api\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/talvisota.fi\/api\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/talvisota.fi\/api\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/talvisota.fi\/api\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1703"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/talvisota.fi\/api\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1703\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2946,"href":"https:\/\/talvisota.fi\/api\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1703\/revisions\/2946"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/talvisota.fi\/api\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1691"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/talvisota.fi\/api\/wp\/v2\/media\/938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/talvisota.fi\/api\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1703"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}