Pocket (military)

A cauldron is expected to be "boiling" with combat activity, the large enemy forces still quite able to offer "hot" resistance in the initial stages of encirclement, and so are to be contained, but not engaged directly.

In Spanish the word Cerco (literally a fence or siege) is commonly used to refer to an encircling military force.

The word means "mug" in many Finnish dialects; an alternate translation refers to a cubic meter of firewood, a relatively small area in which an encircled enemy could be "cut down" like trees.

A motti in military tactics therefore means the formation of "bite sized" enemy units which are easier to contain and deal with.

The smaller pockets of enemy troops could then be dealt with individually by concentrating forces on all sides against the entrapped unit.

If the encircled enemy unit was too strong, or if attacking it would have entailed an unacceptably high cost, e.g., because of a lack of heavy equipment, the motti was usually left to "stew" until it ran out of food, fuel, supplies, and ammunition and was weakened enough to be eliminated.

Three Finnish regiments enveloped and destroyed two Soviet divisions as well as a tank brigade trapped on a road.