RAGGED SOVIET ARMY

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20132, 29 December 1939, Page 7

RAGGED SOVIET ARMY

HUNGRY AND DIRTY PROBLEM FOR FINNS MASSES OF -PRISONERS LONDON, Dec. 21. The Finns are confronted with an unexpected problem which in the past fortnight has reached startling proportions—namely, how to deal with the masses of Russian prisoners. The Finnish Army is generally well equipped and well fed, but it cannot spare clothes, food and accommodation for another miniature army, noi provide the necessary guards, doctors and nurses to attend them. Finnish officers are trying to persuade the prisoners—variously estimated between 20,000 and 30.Q00—to return to the Soviet lines, i'hey mostly refuse, saying: “We would rather you shot us here.’’ Weak From Exposure

Many, when captured, were so weak from exposure, frost-bite and disease, that they had .to be carried on stretchers behind the Finnish lines. Hundreds of prisoners declared tha. they had not eaten for four days. Some were so begrimed with dirt that the Finns at .first thought the} had been camouflaged for a night attack, and several were so stiff with cold that they had not rcc'overec after a two days’ steam bath. The Finnish medical and hospital arrangements are severely overtaxed by the inrush of prisoners, but the barest humanity prevents their leaving their bedraggled enemies to perish in the snow of no man’s land. Few Worth Questioning

Few of the prisoners are worth questioning. They are mostly illiterate and inarticulate, are not aware why they are fighting, and can give n<. information except of their own hardships. When war broke out the Finns lacked uniforms, but even their emergency equipment was incomparably superior to the Russians’ ragged ser vice dress. The story of the Russians sending women ahead of the troops to explode mines is explained by the fact that many of the Russian prisoners were wearing skirts over their threadbare uniforms against the Arctic cold.