Talvela at Vyborg — 17 February

Vyborg (Viipuri in Finnish) is Finland's second city: 80,000 inhabitants in 1939, an industrial centre (paper mills, an oil refinery), a commercial port on the Gulf of Finland, and the chief citadel of Swedish-Finnish culture. Its fall would mean complete military collapse.

After the breakthrough at Lähde and the disintegration of the Finnish 3rd Division, Mannerheim entrusts the defence of the Vyborg sector to Major-General Paavo Talvela, aged 43 — a veteran of Tolvajärvi and already a national hero. Talvela has only 28,000 men at his disposal — the remnants of the 23rd Division, the 5th Regiment and the reconstituted Lähde Brigade — together with 60 guns and 12 tanks wrested from the 44th Division at Raate. Facing him stands the Soviet 7th Army, refurbished by Timoshenko, which musters 180,000 men, 500 tanks and 2,000 guns.

From 17 to 28 February the 7th Army gradually forces the intermediate line. On 1 March 1940 comes the first attack on Vyborg's northern suburbs. On 5 March the Soviets enter the medieval citadel of Vyborg (a symbolic site, founded in 1293 by the Swedes). On 8 March Vyborg Castle falls — the first major historic building lost.

Talvela must decide how the city is to be defended.