Erkki -> RE: Soviets bomb Finnish airfields but Finns can't return the favor? (8/3/2011 10:46:12 AM)
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ORIGINAL: Jakerson Finnish Air force had not much bombing capability during WW2. Finland is small country that had no aviation industry of its own. Finland had no Ability to produce bomber planes what few planes Finland has were obsolete British bombers and bomber captured from Soviet Union. Finland had no spare parts to operate bomber planes repair or maintenance them. This means that Finnish bomber planes could not fly. Finland did not have trained bomber crews either most of Finnish bombers spend their time only in training. Most of the bomber planes from those few witches could fly only fly recon or ground support missions. Not until 1944 then Finnish bombers had some impact on progress of war when they bombed Soviet formations before that they did not affect course of war much. Sending individual bomber planes that could fly on suicide mission for bombing Soviet airfields would have been suicide mission and suicide missions were against the Finnish mentality and tactics. As very small country Finnish army respected individual soldier’s lives more than big countries and nobody was required to do missions that had very small chance of success and high rate of getting killed. This is reason why whatever small bomber resources Finland had were only used in training, recon and ground support. Simply not true. While the offensive air raids in 41-43 were rare, they were done, mainly against airfields and supply centers, especially in East Karelia. Bomber bases around Leningrad were attacked multiple times in 43 alone. The Leningrad strikes were AFAIK all night raids: the Soviets had no night interception capacity in the area. Offensive capacity of the bomber force was later increased when the 48 x Ju 88 A-4 bombers were bought from Germany, but they would see action mostly in ground support role in the Karelian Isthmus as well as reconnaissance aircraft both against the Soviets as well as the Germans. Ironically, those offensive night raids were usually flown as counter strikes against the Soviet bombers attacking Helsinki area, Kotka, Mikkeli etc. The Soviet bombers were caught in the landing at least twice. State Aircraft Factory, Valtion lentokonetehdas, produced as far as I know, at least 50 Blenheims and most of the trainers. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valtion_lentokonetehdas Night of the bombers: http://www.virtualpilots.fi/hist/WW2History-NightOfTheBombers.html Continuation War air war review by Olli Kivioja: http://www.virtualpilots.fi/hist/WW2History-AirWarofContinuationWar.html More related articles there: http://www.virtualpilots.fi/hist/
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