How Soviet tanks ended up in the Finnish army: a story about the T-28
One of those tanks, which had a very ambiguous fate, can be considered the Soviet T-28. This is a 25-ton three-tower combat vehicle, which belonged to the breakthrough tanks.
Produced in the USSR in the pre-war period - from 1933 to 1940. The completion of the operation of the T-28 tanks in the Soviet troops dates back to 1944, but there was a country where these tanks continued to carry out the tasks assigned by the command to the crews until the early 1950s. And this country was Finland.
How did these tanks end up on the territory of a state with which the USSR was at war - first during the Soviet-Finnish war, and then during the Great Patriotic War? The answer is simple: T-28 tanks were captured for the Finns. Sources say that in total, the Finnish tankers got 12 Soviet armored vehicles, some of which they slightly modified, based on their own considerations.
Historians are still arguing about whether the T-28 was among those Soviet tanks that were captured by the Germans during the Second World War. On this score, the answer is given by images with the symbols of Nazi Germany on Soviet tanks. At the same time, it is assumed that we are talking about only one T-28 tank, which was at the disposal of the German troops.
The Diodand channel tells about the T-28, including the trophy tank that the Finns have. The author notes that "the Finns appreciated this tank, as they encountered it for the first time during the Winter War." The judgment is somewhat controversial, since the Finns at that time had to value any tank, because their own industry for creating suitable armored vehicles in Finland simply did not exist.
The article tells about how Soviet tanks ended up in the Finnish army, how the Finns commissioned Soviet tanks, how they were exploited, why the T-28 was called the "Post Train".
- Wikipedia / SA-kuva-MTV3
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