Bombing of Helsinki in World War II
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The capital of Finland, Helsinki was bombed several times during the second World War. Between 1939-1945 Finland fought three wars, two against the Soviet Union and one against Germany. The largest raids were the three raids in February 1944, which have been called the Great raids against Helsinki.
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[edit] Helsinki's air defense
In the autumn of 1939, Helsinki was protected by the 1st Anti Aircraft Regiment consisting of four heavy anti-aircraft batteries with 3-4 guns, one light anti-aircraft battery and one anti-aircraft machine gun company The Helsinki air defense was significantly strengthened from spring 1943 under the lead of Colonel Pekka Jokipaltio. During the Continuation War Germany provided two early warning radars and four gun laying radars to Helsinki, eighteen of the very effective German heavy 88 mm AA guns were also placed in Helsinki. The new six-gun batteries were grouped at Lauttasaari, Käpylä and in Santahamina. By February 1944 Helsinki was protected by 13 heavy and light AA-batteries.There were 77 heavy AA-guns, some 40 lighter AA-guns, 36 search lights, 18 acoustic locators and 6 radars.
The air defense command system was based on the German system and was quite effective and the personnel had also been trained in Germany. Due to the manpower required at the fronts, the air defense used 14-16 year old boys to man the guns and young girls of the Lotta Svärd organization manned the search lights.
The Germans had also moved a night fighter unit to Helsinki in 1944 and the German night fighter direction vessel Togo cruised between Tallinn and Helsinki.
Colonel Jokipaltio had also developed a special type of barrage, where several batteries fired a wall of flak in front of the approaching bombers, trying to scare the bombers to drop their loads too early and turn away.
[edit] The Soviet long distance bomb group (ADD)
The bombing of Finland was most of the time conducted by the long-range bombing and reconnaissance group of the Soviet Air Force (VVS), called the ADD - Aviatsiya Dalnego Deystviya. This group was directly subordinated the Soviet High Command. During the February bombings the ADD had been reinforced with other units. The command of ADD was Marshal Aleksandr Golovanov. Bombing raids were also sometimes done by the VVS and the BF (Baltic Fleet air group).
The Soviet bomber fleet was very diverse. The majority of the aircraft were twin-engined Ilyushin-4-, Lisunov Li-2, North American B-25 and Douglas A-20 bombers. The B-25s and the A-20s had been supplied to the Soviet Union as Lend Lease material from the United States. The Lisunov Li-2 was a Soviet bomber version of the American C-47 Dakota. There were also some heavy quad-engine bombers participating in the bombings, e.g. the Pe-8.
[edit] Civil defense
Already before the war, Helsinki had quite an extensive civil defense system. By a city decree of 1934, shelters had begun being constructed in all high-rise building basements. These were merely rooms where the walls had been reinforced to withstand close bomb explosions. All hoses also had to have a protection supervisor, who wasn't allowed to belong to the reserve or the army, usually it was someone who wasn't fit for service or one who was too old for service. This person was to see that all persons of the house med it to the shelter in an orderly fashion.
There were a few larger shelters within the mountain, but it was not possible to fit all the citizens of Helsinki into these. Some hospitals were also equipped with shelters withing the mountains where they could move their patients during air raids, others, for instance the Children's hospital was moved outside the city. One hospital was in its entity within the mountain, under the Finnish Red Cross building.
[edit] Winter War
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Three hours after Soviet forces had crossed the borders, and started the Winter War, the bombing of Helsinki begun. The most intensive bomb raids were during the first few days. 97 people died during the Winter War bombings of Helsinki and 260 were wounded. 55 buildings were destroyed.
The Soviet bombings created harsh foreign reactions. The American President Roosevelt asked the Soviets not to bomb Finnish cities. Molotov replied to Roosevelt: "Soviet aircraft has not been bombing cities, but airfields, you can't see that from 8,000 kilometers away in America."
[edit] Continuation War
Helsinki fared somewhat easier during the Continuation War since Soviet bombers mainly focused on the Germans in the Baltic states. Helsinki was bombed 39 times during the Continuation War, 245 people were killed and 646 wounded, the majority in the three big raids of 1944.
[edit] The great raids of February 1944
In February 1944, the Soviet Union launched three massive bombing raids against Helsinki. The aim was to break the Finnish fighting spirit and force the Finns to the peace table. The raids were conducted on the nights between 6–7, 16-17 and 26-27 of February. Josef Stalin had obtained British and American support for this measure at the Tehran in 1943. In this manner they hoped to force the Finns to break the bonds with Germany and agree to peace with the Soviet Union.
2,121 bomber approaches were counted in the three raids of February 1944, these dropped more than 16,000 bombs against Helsinki. 34,200 shots were fired against the bombers with heavy AA-artillery, 12,900 shots with light AA-artillery. The Finns managed to lure the pathfinders by lit fires on the islands outside the city, leading the pathfinders to believe that it was the city. Only 530 bombs fell within the city itself. The majority of the population of Helsinki had also left the city and the casualty figures were quite low compared to other bombed cities of the period.
22-25 bombers were destroyed by AA fire, four were shot down by German night fighters.
[edit] The first great raid: 6–7 February
The first bombing night was the most destructive.
The first bombs fell at 7.23 pm. Some 350 bombs fell within the city and approximately 2,500 bombs outside Helsinki. The total amount of bombs dropped (included the ones that fell into the sea) amounted to some 6,990. Approximately 730 bomber aircraft participated in the raid. The bombers arrived in two waves: 6 February 6.51–9:40 pm and 7 February 0.57–4.57 am.
The defense fired 122 barrages, the light AA-artillery 2 745 shots and the heavy AA-artillery 7 719 shots. Finland had no own night fighters at this time.
Some 100 persons were killed and 300 were damaged. More than 160 houses were damaged. The AA defenses had given some false alarms the previous days which had lowered the people's will to take the warning serious.
[edit] The second great raid: 16–17 February
Since Tallinn had been bombed heavily and intelligence pointed out that a raid might be coming the Helsinki air defense took some active measures.
After the first raid, a German night fighter group of 12 Messerschmitt Bf 109G-6 fighters with special night fighting equipment were transferred to the Helsinki-Malmi Airport from the Estonian front. These managed to shoot down six bombers during the following two raids. The anti-aircraft batteries managed to down two bombers and fired 184 barrages. The heavy AA fired 12,238 shots and the light AAA 5,709 shots.
Most of the population of Helsinki had voluntarily moved to the countryside and the remaining ones were prepared to take shelter at first warning. This lowered casualties figures significantly.
This time 383 bombers participated. 4,317 bombs fell on the city, the sea and in the surrounding area. Only some 100 bombs fell within the city. The warning was sounded at 8.12 pm and the bombers approached again in two waves: 16 February 8.12–11.10 pm and 11.45 pm-5.49 am on 17 February. The first wave tried to make concentrate the bombing by approaching from different directions. In the second wave, the aircraft came in smaller groups from the east. The Finnish intelligence had intercepted messages one hour and 40 minutes before the raid and warned the air defense, who had time to prepare. The air defense sounded the warning 49 minutes before the raid. The radars picked up the first aircraft 34 minutes before the beginning of the bombings.
This time casualty figures were much lower: 25 died and 29 were injured. 27 buildings were destroyed and 53 were damaged.
[edit] The third great raid: 26–27 February
On the evening of February 26, a single Soviet reconnaissance aircraft was spotted over the city. It was a foreteller of the coming attack. The weather was clear, which helped the attackers. Again the Finnish Radio intelligence intercepted messages of the fore coming raid, this time 1 hour and 28 minutes before the bombing would commence - although the Soviets tried to uphold radio silence.
Five minutes later, the air surveillance grid, manned by Lotta Svärd-auxiliaries warned of approaching bombers. A silent alarm was sounded in the city in good time before the raid. Street lights were turned off, trams and trains were stopped and radio transmissions seized. In this manner, the enemy had more difficult to find its goal. All the citizens also knew that they had to take cover.
The first bombers were picked up by Finnish radar 25 minutes before they would arrive to Helsinki, at approximately 6.30 pm. A few minutes later, the night fighters took off and flew to their pre-agreed positions. The AA-artillery had also been alarmed. The air raid warning was sounded at 6.45 pm. AA-batteries opened up fire at 6.53 pm. At 7.07 pm the first bombs started to fall.
This last great raid differed from the two previous ones. The battle lasted for some 11 hours and was divided into three different phases: the first one was in the evening and lasted for four hours and concentrated the attacks against the city, the second one was mainly focusing on the defending AA-artillery, but to little success, the last wave hoped to finally flatten the city, but the majority of the aircraft turned away when met with fierce anti-aircraft barrages and night fighters. The danger is over alarm was finally sounded at about 6.30 in the morning of February 27.
The damages were again quite limited, despite that this had been the most massive raid. 21 people were killed and 35 wounded, 59 buildings were destroyed and 135 damaged.
The heavy anti-aircraft artillery fired 14,240 shots and the light AA-artillery 4,432 shots. Nine Soviet bombers were downed.
This time 896 bombers participated in the raid on Helsinki. They dropped 5,182 bombs of which only 290 fell on the city itself.
[edit] The damage of the great raids
Thanks to the efficiency of the anti-aircraft and the bluffing measures damage was limited. Only 5 % of the bombs fell on the city and some of these in parks. Some 2 000 bombers participated in the three great raids on Helsinki and dropped some 2,600 tons of bombs. 146 died, of these 6 soldiers, and 356 were wounded. 109 buildings were destroyed. Some 300 buildings were damaged by shrapnel and 111 were ignited by the bombs. The attacker lost 25 aircraft.
Dresden was bombed on 13-15 February 1945 by 1,320 bombers and these dropped 3,900 tons of bombs, this was almost the same size as the Helsinki raid. However, over 40,000 people were killed in Dresden (some sources claim 200,000) and the city was almost completely destroyed.
After the war, the Allied Control Commission arrived to the city. It was led by general Andrei Zhdanov. He was perplexed seeing the little damage on the city. The Soviet leadership had believed that they had destroyed the city completely and that it was these bombings that had forced the Finns to the peace table.
[edit] See also
[edit] Sources
- Martti Helminen, Aslak Lukander: Helsingin suurpommitukset helmikuussa 1944, 2004, WSOY, ISBN 951-0-28823-3
