The 'Battle of Kuhmo' was a series of skirmishes fought between Soviet and Finnish forces within the context of the 'Talvisota' winter war and took place near the town of Kuhmo in the eastern central part of Finland as the Soviet 54^th Division was encircled but able to hold out until the end of the war (28 January/13 March 1940).

By taking and holding central and northern Finland, the Soviet leadership saw the opportunity to seize the entire Finnish state and cut off the logistical links with its neighbours. In order to support the advance of the 163^rd Division and 44^th Motorised Division on Oulu on the north-eastern coast of the Gulf of Bothnia, thereby cutting Finland in Half, the 54^th Division was to advance farther to the south on the left flank of the 163^rd Division and 44^th Motorised Division in order to cut any routes for Finnish reinforcements advancing to the north from the Finnish heartland via Kuhmo toward Suomussalmi.

After crossing the border from Repola, the 54^th Division advanced on Kuhmo. The Finnish army had only small border units stationed in this area, as a Soviet offensive in northern Finland had not been expected. On 3 December 1939, the Finnish high command was therefore compelled to despatch one regiment from its reserve to slow the advance of the Soviet division. By the start of 1940, the Soviet formation’s leading units had moved to positions within 9.33 miles (15 km) of Kuhmo. There, the Soviet division was for the most parts spared any attacks by the outnumbered Finns, and the divisional commander, Kombrig Nikolai A. Gusevsky, took advantage of this pause to fortify his division’s positions and even had a makeshift airfield built on a frozen lake. The division was in the form of an elongated column along the road to Kuhmo from the east.

After the 163^rd Division and 44^th Motorised Division had been defeated farther to the north in the 'Battle of Suomussalmi', Sotamarsalkka C. G. E. Mannerheim, the Finnish commander-in-chief, ordered the movement of units from Suomussalmi toward Kuhmo. Eversto Hjalmar Siilasvuo’s 9^th Divisioona reached Kuhmo but was outnumbered by the Soviet division, and was by this time short of ammunition and artillery. Despite this fact, on 28 January 1940, the Finnish forces launched a counterattack. Operating on skis from the forest, as they had done in the 'Battle of Suomussalmi', the Finns succeeded in cutting off the Soviet division and dividing it into three mottis (encirclements). The Finns made effective use of Soviet anti-tank guns at Suomussalmi to repel Soviet tank-supported counterattacks, but a stalemate seemed inevitable.

The Soviets tried to relieve the surrounded units with a newly created 1,800-man ski brigade and the 23^rd Division, but were unsuccessful. The 54^th Division was kept supplied to adequate levels by the Soviet air forces so that it was able to maintain its resistance until the armistice that ended the 'Talvisota' on 13 March 1940.

The Finnish losses in the 'Battle of Kuhmo' were 1,340 men killed, 3,123 wounded and 132 missing, while those of the Soviets were 2,118 men killed, 3,732 wounded and 573 missing. The bodies of 720 Soviet soldiers were found in the area where Polkovnik Dolin’s ski brigade had fought.

The Finns had managed to block the Soviet advance, but their hope of being able to gain a quick repeat their success of the 'Battle of Suomussalmi' and the 'Battle of the Raate Road', in order then to be able to transfer the 9^th Division to the crucial sector of the Karelian isthmus, had been thwarted by the determined Soviet resistance.