noob help with squad controls

[Gregorovitch]

This game is hard to play but it looks like its pretty good if you learn how to play it properly, so I want to spend some time figuring out how to play this second mission (Evacuation) and hopefully the lessons will make the rest of the game more enjoyable.

Right now I am having severe difficulty working out how squads work and how to use them. At the beginning of the mission obviously the important thing is to mine the area, so:

1. At the beginning you have two squads on parade next to the mine boxes. How do you select a squad rather than individual soldiers?

2. Who leads each of these squads?

3. If you select a squad and then open the mine box are the mines distributed across squad members or does each soldier have to pick up a load of mines individually?

4. When you order a soldier to lay mines how do you control how many he lays over what area?

5. On first attempt I left the factory buildings to the NW alone leaving the defenders to the east of them as they were. When they were infiltrated by germans I got a "mission failed" message. It looks difficult to protect these buildings - is this a very difficult secondary mission that only exprets should attempt or something?