Throughout this Autumn and Winter Russia’s leader Boris Putin has been threatening the Ukraine with invasion to prevent any further Western incursion to the ex-Soviet republic. The USA and UK have responded with supplying weapons and supplies to the steppe nation and the newspapers daily report on the potential war without mentioning that only one country has invaded a country in the winter.
The 1939-1940 Winter War between the USSR and Finland was a disaster from the first step over the Arctic frontier. Stalin’s troops fought for three months without any success and signed a truce in March.
Lesson learned by the Axis command.
Nothing and the Japanese seized the distant Aleutian Island of Attu from the US after the naval debacle of Midway. Their soldiers suffered from the cold and deprivations of an army trapped in a distant land.
Winters are much better suited to sieges and retreats.
The Nazi defeat at Stalingrad and Napoleon’s Retreat from Moscow.
Only 15,000 Wehrmacht Soldaten returned to Germany aftEr World War II and only 1500 troops survived the horrible march to the safety of Poland.
War this winter?
I doubt it.
Spring?
No one wants a war, except the Pentago who have never backed away from a war they sought to lose.