Kirill Meretskov
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Kirill Afanasievich Meretskov was a Soviet military commander. Having joined the Communist Party in 1917, he served in the Red Army from 1920. During the Winter War of 1939–1940 against Finland, he had the task of penetrating the Mannerheim Line as commander of the 7th Army. He was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union shortly afterwards.
Meretskov in 1945
Meretskov, after landing at the Khvoynaya airfield, 1942
Operation Iskra, January 1943
Meretskov (left) with Marshals Rodion Malinovsky (center) and Aleksandr Vasilevsky, at an airfield in Dalian, China
Winter War
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The Winter War was a war between the Soviet Union and Finland. It began with a Soviet invasion of Finland on 30 November 1939, three months after the outbreak of World War II, and ended three and a half months later with the Moscow Peace Treaty on 13 March 1940. Despite superior military strength, especially in tanks and aircraft, the Soviet Union suffered severe losses and initially made little headway. The League of Nations deemed the attack illegal and expelled the Soviet Union from its organization.
A Finnish Maxim M/09-21 machine gun crew during the Winter War
The Soviet–Finnish Non-Aggression Pact was signed by Aarno Yrjö-Koskinen and Maxim Litvinov in Moscow 1932.
Finnish soldiers gather breakfast from a field kitchen during "additional refresher training" at the Karelian Isthmus, on 10 October 1939.
29 November 1939, foreign journalists at Mainila, where a border incident between Finland and the Soviet Union escalated into the Winter War.