Word: isthmus
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...heavy artillery and airplanes that bombarded the Finnish lines day and night, the Russians threw fresh troops and tanks against the vital Summa sector, where the villages of Summa and Kamara guarded the road and railroad to Viipuri (see map}. Simultaneously they attacked in the middle of the isthmus, trying to force the defiles between the chain of isthmus lakes and encircle Lake Muolaa. This action, if successful, would flank the defenders of Summa. At the same time the Russians hit both ends of the Mannerheim Line, along the Taipale River on the east and, on the west, across...
14th Day. The drive showed no sign of abating. The Russians pushed on past Summa, heading toward Kämärä on the railroad. Hand-to-hand fighting was general throughout the isthmus, but except in the Summa wedge the Russians made no gains. Russians trying to advance over the ice toward Koivisto were blasted by the Finnish guns of that fortress. Tanks plunged through the shell-shattered ice. So fierce was the shelling that the Finns' gun-bores wore...
When the Russians first tried to walk into Finland, across the Karelian Isthmus and around the shores of Lake Laatokka, the Finns described the troops they slaughtered as cannon fodder. When Russia's thrusts across Finland's narrow waist bogged down, then turned into the rout of Suomussalmi, the Finns contemptuously pointed out that the drives had been haphazardly planned, poorly supplied. But when, last fortnight, Russia began pounding away on all fronts, there was every indication that this mightiest offensive of the war had been carefully planned, was well supplied, and employed seasoned Red Army troops...
...Russians tried and failed to push on to Hoyhenjarvi) down through the Salla and Suomussalmi sectors (where the Finns stopped them before they got going) and the new front at Kuhmo (where the Finns beat them back with heavy losses) to the shores of Lake Laatokka and the Karelian Isthmus, the Russians attacked simultaneously. The Finns were in their tightest spot since the war began...
...eight hours one night shells rained on the Finnish defense works while the Finns burrowed into their underground shelters. As dawn broke the barrage stopped and silence hung over the isthmus...