Finnish SISSI Philosophy

Site Brothers.....

I have heard of the reputation of the Finn soldier, and have read that their philosophy of war is based on the concept of SISU (hope I have spelt this correctly).....I have also read a description of this philosphy in wargamer literature as

"A type of rugged individualism that does not shy away from threats."

A wargame I used to play called SQUAD LEADER featured the troops of Finland as a seperate entity, with their own rules. They were they only squad level unit in the system that could achieve "self-rally". Squads were in a state that was determined by their MORALE....either good (face up) or BROKEN. Broken squads would seek cover, and required an officer or NCO to RALLY them to functioning status. Finnish squads could do this WITHOUT the aid of an officer or NCO, and their morale level was set at ELITE level (squad morale ranged from 5(green or reservist), 6 (untried or poorly equipped....or American squads with a known propensity for moving away from the bangs), 7 (the regular troops and the standard morale level for forces at the level of the Germans, which the system was based around, and 8(for elite or highly trained and motivated troops, like SS, Russians with good training ie. Siberians)...

A basic Finnish Squad morale was set at this level, and the SISSI SKI TROOPS were the most awesome and deadly soldiers that the system had to offer.

What can you tell me of this?...I have always wanted to know exactly what this SISSI philosophy involved, and exactly why these soldiers were rated the very best in the system......It was said that it was "a pity that these boys were not around at Stalingrad."

Please do tell.....I am all ears....

 

Sissi philosophy hmm...

Well, those guys were volunteered to do sissi job during ww2. They were picked by their physical and mental abilities and were trained very hard.

Each man knew how to treat a wounded, how to transmit with radio "kyynel", how to survive in nature more than one night ;-) as trips were usually few weeks long.
They were behind enemy lines knowing that Finnish army didn't help them if they were caught. So basically tough guys.

They were/are sissigroups, even today Finns love their stories about their fights and sabotage trips to railways etc. They are very famous. As they should be

That is it in a nutshell. It is hard to write as a Finn, maybe someone foreign may enlight us more heh

 

Higge, I do hope so....this is an aspect of the Finnish war on the Arctic/Eastern front that could do with a perspective from the VICTIMS of the Sissi, as much as the participants themselves. Russians are on record as describing these ski equipped troops as "Ghosts", appearing out of snow storms from nowhere, wreaking absolute HAVOC by the very surprise and shock of their appearence, and dissappearing just as quickly, carting their wounded and dead with them, and leaving very little trace of the fact that they were there at all....

I cannot help thinking that the Russian's looked at Finnish tactics and equipment when planning their own operations in winter temperatures....SIBERIANS had an operational similarity that produced many similar comments from their German opponents....The Finns, I firmly believe, taught the Russians a lesson or two during the Winter War, and the Russians were smart enough to take notice of it all, and apply these lessons....

The implications are such that, we can rightfully suppose that had the Soviets not fought the Winter War, that these operational and tactical lessons would not have been learnt in time for their 1941 Winter Counteroffensive.....failure in front of MOSCOW WOULD have spelt instant DOOM for the Stalin regime.....

This places the Finnish Winter War in such an important position vis-vis the Russian performance, that an entire volume could probably be written of the effects alone...

And another thing......IF the Russians were not beaten so badly in Finland, the GERMANS MAY have come to the conclusion that they were NOT so easy to beat....remember what Hitler said in his Directive for "Fall Barbarossa"..

"We have only to kick in the door, and the whole rotten structure will come crashing down..."

This places the Winter War as probably THE MOST IMPORTANT SUB-CONFLICT of WW2, or even, the conflict whose results had the MOST FAR REACHING EFFECTS ON the Russian Front, making it, THE most important conflict of WW2....

At least, this is exactly what I will be saying when I get around to REWRITING the history of WW2....

WHO says revision is a dirty word in history....Gotthard Heinrici, are you looking at this?

 

You are right about Russians learning a lesson in Winter War.
They were in war but they never thought that enemy would flank in their sides!
That was a most important thing Finns did in Raate for example.
Those ghosts came, shoot, and disappear. But Russians stayed in the roads, they didn't even secured woods.

And as many veterans said when war started again in 1941 "be careful, Russians now have skills to ski and go off the roads". How right they were.

I know Gothard is very busy in his work but he'll be here.