Vyborg–Petrozavodsk offensive
1944 military operation
The Vyborg–Petrozavodsk offensive or Karelian offensive was a strategic operation by the Soviet Leningrad and Karelian Fronts against Finland on the Karelian Isthmus and East Karelia fronts of the Continuation War, on the Eastern Front of World War II. The Soviet forces captured East Karelia and Vyborg/Viipuri. After that, however, the fighting reached a stalemate.
The operations of the strategic offensive can be divided into the following offensives:
Viipuri (10–20 June) by the Leningrad Front
Virojoki-Lappeenranta (21 June – 15 July) by the Leningrad Front
Koivisto landing (20–25 June) by the Baltic Fleet
Svir–Petrozavodsk (21 June – 9 August) by the Karelian Front
Tuloksa landing (23–27 June) by the Soviet Ladoga Flotilla
Background
In January 1944, Soviet forces raised the Siege of Leningrad and drove the German Army Group North back to the Narva-Lake Ilmen-Pskov line. Finland had conducted peace negotiations intermittently during 1943–1944 with the Western Allies and the USSR, but no agreement had been reached. Finland asked for peace conditions again in February, but the Finnish Parliament (Eduskunta) considered the terms received impossible to fulfill. After Finland had rejected these peace conditions, and Germany halted the Soviet advance, the Stavka (Main Command of the Armed Forces of the Soviet Union) started to prepare for an offensive to force Finland's exit from the war.
The plan
In order to destroy the Finnish Army and to push Finland out of the war, the Stavka decided to conduct the Vyborg–Petrozavodsk offensive. The strategy called for a two-pronged offensive, one from Leningrad via Vyborg to the Kymi river, and the second across the Svir River through Petrozavodsk and Sortavala past the 1940 border, preparing for an advance deep into Finland. The plan called for the Finnish army to be destroyed on the Karelian Isthmus, and the remains blocked against the western shore of Lake Ladoga between the two assaults and Lake Saimaa.
The main strategic objectives of the offensive were to push Finnish forces away from the north of Leningrad, to drive Finland out of the war, and to create better conditions for a major offensive to the south against Germany.
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