Snow does not just chill an army — it stops it. Deep snow swallows boots to the knee, exhausts marching men, buries roads and bogs down vehicles, and the side that moves better through it holds a real advantage. The Germans learned this the hard way in the first Russian winter of 1941, caught without winter clothing or any way of crossing the snow while Soviet ski troops slipped around them. By later winters they had adapted, and this radio team shows it: snowshoes strapped over their boots to spread their weight and keep them atop the drifts rather than floundering through. It was a small piece of kit, but in a landscape where simply moving was half the battle, it could decide whether a team reached its position or froze short of it.

The Heritage Classics set has the radio operator bent under his backpack set — the Feldfunksprecher "b", antenna swaying, throat mike and headphones in place — a Gewehr 43 slung and his mate beside him carrying an MP40 and a stick grenade, both up on snowshoes. He is the link that let a patrol call for support or report what it found. Group the pair with the winter infantry of On Patrol #1 and the MG Gun Team, and set them against their opposite number across the snow, the American Walking Radioman. In a diorama the man with the antenna is the squad's voice — the one connecting a small patrol to the larger battle.

Model: BBG136 / King & Country / 1/30 (60mm) scale / matte finish / 2 piece set