| Petsamo-Kirkenes, the Planning Phase
By Mike Bennighof, Ph.D.
October 2007
For over two years, the front on the coast of the Arctic Ocean remained relatively quiet. Both the Germans and the Soviets replaced their formations there, but neither pressed an offensive after a Soviet effort failed in the spring of 1942. That all changed in September 1944, when Finland asked for an armistice and left the German Twentieth Mountain Army ripe for destruction.
The German move toward the crucial Arctic port of Murmansk began in late June 1941, when two mountain divisions advanced through the lunar landscape of the coastal tundra. Heavy fighting ensued, and along the Litsa River the drive stalled. There both sides pretty much stood pat, as the troops erected elaborate shelters and fought to keep their sanity. A Soviet attempt to drive the Germans back in 1942 also met with failure in the harsh weather and terrain of the Arctic coast.
By 1944, the front had become a backwater. Soviet power had grown to such an extent that the loss of Murmansk would have been a problem for the Red Army, but not the disaster it would have proven in 1941 or 1942. The Soviet 14th Army, commanded by Lt. Gen. V.I. Shcherbakov since March 1942, faced Lt. Gen. Ferdinand Jodl's German XIX Mountain Corps. Each numbered two or three divisions throughout the "backwater" period, and neither made threatening moves against the other.
For quite some time, the Germans had viewed Finland had been seen as a shaky co-belligerent (as Finns are quick to point out over 60 years later, Germany and Finland were never formal allies). In the fall of 1943 planning began for a withdrawal from the Litsa to a narrow position in northern Norway at Lyngen Fjord that could be held by a minimal force.
The Germans reacted to the Finnish armistice with considerable lethargy, only slowly removing the massive dumps of supplies they had built up behind their lines. While the Finnish nickel mines near Petsamo were considered vital in the war's early years (for example, bullets not coated with nickel will melt in flight) by 1944 Germany had stockpiled several years' worth and it was felt that withdrawal from Finland would not hurt the German war economy. German reluctance to pull back appears to have been the result of simple inertia: the troops and staff had been posted to a quiet front for over two years, had grown comfortable there, and were in no hurry to leave it for an uncertain future that might include transfer to a "hot" front.
In their armistice, the Finns had promised to drive the Germans out, but did not want to engage in actual hostilities. For most of September they conducted exercises designed to re-assure the Soviets that they were pressuring the Germans to leave, but the Soviets grew restless as the Germans did not seem to be leaving and informed the Finns that if they did not eject their erstwhile friends, the Red Army would be more than happy to help do so.
The Soviets built up their forces throughout September. Late in the month open fighting broke out between the Germans and the Finns, and the German retreat from their positions in central Finland picked up speed. Seeing the opportunity to cut off the German divisions coming up from the south as well as establish themselves in Norway, the Soviets increased their planning tempo. On the 29th approval came from Moscow for 14th Army's operational plan to seize Petsamo and the Norwegian port of Kirkenes.
For over two years the Germans had been digging in along the Litsa River, and had built a line of trenches and bunkers on the western bank with very comfortable barracks behind them — Finnish firms had even sold doors, bedframes and windows to the troops. The German XIX Mountain Corps' 6th Mountain Division held positions on the left flank, and the 2nd Mountain Division on the right.
Sixth Mountain Division held a continuous line right on the river, and to help man its positions had the 388th Infantry Regiment attached. Second Mountain Division's front curled back to the southwest from the river, and instead of a continuous line its troops occupied heavily fortified strongpoints. Concrete and steel bunkers were sited on key hilltops and ringed with trenches and barded wire. The division's right flank hung open; corps commander Jodl claimed the terrain was impassable (as the younger brother of Army chief of operations Alfred Jodl, he could afford such stupidity). Division commander Han Degen was less sure and held the "Norway" Bicycle Brigade as a maneuver reserve behind his lines.
On the Arctic coastline, the Gen. Adrian van der Hoop's scratch division group held the neck of the Fisher Peninsula. This group's 193rd Infantry Regiment had been re-assigned to 6th Mountain Division, leaving it with three battalions of the 503rd Air Force Field Regiment, a company of 2nd Mountain Division's 55th Anti-Tank Battalion, and some "alarm" units. Like other Air Force units the 503rd had been inducted into the Army in November 1943, but retained its Air Force officers and was considered a third-line unit at best.
To the west of van der Hoop's positions, the 210th Coastal Division also came under XIX Mountain Corps command. It had a weak coastal artillery regiment, eight Navy coast defense batteries and five fortress battalions.
The corps' real combat power lay in the two mountain divisions. Each had two mountain infantry regiments plus engineer, anti-tank and bicycle battalions, and an artillery regiment (officially armed mostly with 75mm mountain guns, but the gunners had added a number of former Soviet pieces abandoned in the 1941 campaign). Both divisions reported strength levels over 90 percent, unusually high totals for the German Army in late 1944.
Second Mountain Division was a crack unit of the pre-war Austrian Army, seeing brief action in Poland and earning many honors at Trondheim and Narvik in 1940, but had lost much of its edge during the years since its last serious combat. Its sister unit, 3rd Mountain Division, had seen morale plummet when word came of the extermination of Jews undertaken in the occupied Soviet Union by German army as well as SS and "special" units. Once the Jews were finished, divisional scuttlebutt claimed, the Austrians would join the list for extinction — the assignment of Austria's best fighting men such a godforsaken theater could only be proof. Third Mountain finally had to be withdrawn from the Arctic, but disturbances shook 2nd Mountain Division as well. The unit was never the same afterward and its staff gained a quiet anti-Nazi reputation (while at home, Austrians took a role in the Holocaust all out of proportion to their share of the total German population).
Sixth Mountain Division had been formed in 1940 and fought in the Greek campaign before arriving on the Litsa in late 1941. Formed from cadres provided by the crack 3rd Mountain Division, it was not considered as good a unit as the 2nd. The two third-line divisions were not useful for anything other than holding prepared positions, and even this taxed their capabilities.
Unlike the rest of the Eastern Front, the German supply situation in the Arctic was excellent. XIX Mountain Corps sat at the very end of a long and tenuous supply chain — materiel came through Norway by train and coastal steamer, along the final leg via small, weakly defended convoys under constant attack by Allied aircraft and submarines. Yet for over two years, supply officers had hoarded all manner of ammunition, food and fuel. Depots bulged with delicacies like cognac, sardines and chocolate while the supply of artillery ammunition was for all practical purposes unlimited. If not overrun, the Germans could hold out for a very, very long time.
The Soviets brought considerable power to bear on the two mountain divisions and their motley collection of support units. Planning had begun as early as February, and through the summer engineers prepared bridges and roads for the upcoming attack. Serious reinforcements began to arrive in August.
On the Soviet right flank, the Pigarevich Group would demonstrate opposite 6th Mountain Division. These troops included the 2nd Fortified Region, 45th Rifle Division and 3rd Naval Rifle Brigade, all of which had arrived during the summer. To its left, 131st Rifle Corps would strike the "hinge" between the two mountain divisions. This corps had been activated during the summer when 14th Army started to receive reinforcements — its two divisions, 10th Guards Rifle and 14th Rifle, had been present since the start of the war and completely acclimated to the local conditions. Both were considered very good units. The corps also had the help of two tank regiments
Just to the left of 131st Rifle Corps, 99th Rifle Corps would strike 2nd Mountain Division's line with three rifle divisions that had been fighting in Karelia or near Leningrad until the summer — 114th, 368th and 65th Rifle Divisions. None were particularly distinguished, but they would be supported by a Guards tank brigade and a regiment of JSU-152 assault guns. While the five rifle divisions swarmed 2nd Mountain Division's lines, the two brigades of 126th Light Rifle Corps would filter around the Germans' open left flank and strike for the Arctic Highway west of Petsamo to cut off the entire enemy corps. These troops had pack horses and reindeer for transport, and the Soviet staff had particular confidence in 31st Ski Brigade for this task though 72nd Naval Rifle Brigade had been part of 14th Army since 1941 and was as experienced as any Red Army unit in Arctic conditions.
In the second wave, 14th Army had two rifle divisions of 31st Rifle Corps and two brigades of 127th Light Rifle Corps, all of which had fought in Karelia during the summer campaign. The rifle divisions would reinforce breakthroughs of the Soviet position, while the brigades followed the first wave to the Arctic coast. A late-arriving regiment of T-34/85 tanks was also in the army reserve.
To complete the operation, the 12th Naval Rifle Brigade (technically under the command of the Red Banner Arctic Fleet) would attack from the Fisher Peninsula against Division van der Hoop, while the fleet also made battalion-sized landings along the coast to disrupt German communications.
All told, most Soviet formations were at about 60 percent of their authorized strength, but all of them had either participated in the victorious summer campaign against the Finns or had spent the war in the Arctic. To offset the weakness in infantry, seventeen artillery and seven mortar regiments were attached from other armies of the Karelian Front, including a regiment armed with captured German 150mm guns. The Soviets had three regiments and two brigades of "Katyusha" rocket launchers, but the bulk of their artillery was relatively lightweight 76.2mm gun-howitzers or mortars — well-suited to the difficult terrain when they had to move forward, but not the best weapons to suppress the Germans' heavily fortified positions.
Despite a massive road-building program and heavy commitment of engineer and transport assets, the Soviet supply situation remained weak. Even firewood had to be trucked in to keep the troops from freezing, and the commitment of so many additional troops strained the system past the breaking point. The offensive would have to succeed immediately if at all.
The Soviet drive on Petsamo and Kirkenes forms the largest scenario in our Army of Lappland game. The German player has a strong position, but his forces are severely unbalanced — about half his troops are very good, and other half are simply terrible. The Soviet player must drive ahead relentlessly and take his or her objectives quickly — there's plenty of force available, but time is another issue. To our knowledge there's never been another game on this battle, and it's one of the most interesting of the Second World War.
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