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social divisions, awoke the admiration of the whole world and made the Winter War a myth of the Finnish national identity. One of the most memorable episodes of the Winter War was the Battle of Suomussalmi: two Soviet divisions were divided, encircled and destroyed by two Finnish brigades equipped with skis and white camouflage. With this victory, the Finns foiled the Soviet attempt to break Finland in two and cut off communications with Sweden. In early February 1940, after a period of military reorganisation, the Soviets launched a powerful offensive on the Karelian Isthmus. The so-called Mannerheim defence line was broken in several places and when the Red Army reached the outskirts of Viipuri – without the prospect of immediate reinforcements from abroad – Finland was forced to accept the Moscow’s peace terms. The Soviet Union had in fact abandoned the historical fiction of the Terijoki Government and engaged in negotiations with the legitimate government of Finland through the Soviet ambassador to Stockholm. With the Peace of Moscow, signed on 13 March 1940, Finland ceded to the Soviet Union almost all the Finnish Karelia, some islands in the Gulf of Finland, a part of the Salla region and the Finnish part of Rybachy Peninsula on the Arctic. On the Hanko Peninsula, leased for 30 years, a Soviet naval base was to be established. Finland lost about a tenth of its territory and about 12% of its production capacity. Approximately 420,000 inhabitants abandoned the ceded areas and had to be relocated within the new border.
Map of Finland’s areas ceded to the Soviet Union after the Winter War (1940). Author: Jniemenmaa (2005).