"Osprey Publishing Finland at War 1939-45" Topic

"In the face of Soviet invasion in 1939-40, and once again in 1941-44, the armies raised by Finland – a tiny nation of only 4 million people – astonished the world by their effective resistance. At the end of both these campaigns – the Winter War, and the Continuation War – the fiercely patriotic defiance of vastly stronger Soviet forces by Marshal Mannerheim's soldiers won their country a unique prize: although forced to accept harsh terms, Finland was never occupied by the Red Army, and retained its independence. This book explains and illustrates, for the first time in English, the organization, uniforms, equipment and tactics of Finland's defenders…"
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Amicalement
Armand

Oh, gad, the Finnish right's myth-making again. It's believable if you don't know anything about the prior history and the details of the run-up. Unfortunately, it's not internally consistent, nor is it consistent with the events of the Second World War.

emckinney:

A fairly provocative statement… I can't think of when I've heard/read this perspective before, at least not outside of Russian historiography.

I'd be interested to know what parts of the quoted synopsis you consider to be myth, or even what part of the popular narrative about the Finland during WW2 that you consider to be myth, and / or inconsistent with events.

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

+1 to Mark.

I'm with Mark and boy wundyr on this. Never heard anything like this before.

+2.

I'm not siding with McKinney, exactly. But must we purposefully ignore Finland's fighting with the Germans in WWII? Was such absolutely necessary? If so, was it "heroic" or merely expedient?

I look at it this way: Finland & Germany had a common enemy, Russia. Finland had to do what they had to do to survive as a nation. They did not necessarily buy into the Nazi ideology by fighting with them. They tolerated a short relationship with them until the end of the conflict.

It was absolutely necessary to fend off a Russian conquest. The Finns were always very clear that they were co-belligerants with Germany and not allies.

There was a lot of sympathy for them in the US. But since the Western Allied nations refused to help arm Finland to defend themselves against our ally Russia, the Finns were left with no choice but to turn to Germany for help.

The "merely expedient" choice was that of the Western Allies to ignore Finland's request for help rather than strain relations with Russia.

Consider what might have happened at Leningrad if the Finns had been truly committed to fighting for Germany. Good chance Leningrad would have been taken. Also consider the Murmansk railroad. The Finns probably could have cut the line early in the war, but were warned by the USA that cutting the road would have resulted in a US declaration of war. The railroad was not cut. Consider also the war in North Finland waged in 1944 between the Finns and the Germans. It was a condition of the "peace" signed between Finland and Russia that the Germans had to go and the Finns had to do the prodding. Don't see any myth making here at all. The Finns got whopped by Russia while the west stood aside and then tried to redress the wrong when they had their chance.

Agree!

Amicalement
Armand

As usual, history gives us complicated questions, and while we don't feel comfortable with it, multiple answers can all be true.

On one hand:
A: Finland had good reasons to join the continuation war.

On the other hand:
B: Finnish success would directly contribute to German success, thus prolonging the mass murder of Eastern Europeans.

The two are not in the slightest mutually exclusive, and can both be correct regardless of Finnish intentions and awareness/lack thereof.

Failing to understand the above is a failure to understand Finland's peculiar subsequent position in the entire cold war.

(I am also a bit curious if people understand that for Finland, the war was two distinct parts.
The winter war, which was purely defensive in nature and the continuation war which involved limited offensive operations)

The limited offensive operations being the reclaiming of Karelian territory that Russia took at the conclusion of the Winter War. They stopped at their old border and did not go on to Leningrad.

For my tastes, in the war on the Eastern Front they are the one army of good-guys. From their standpoint, the Russians posed much more of an existential threat to their country than the Germans did. They made the best play they could.

That was point A in my post.

Finnish history around WW2 offers an interesting case where black-and-white views of the world (for us or agin' us, good guys vs. bad guys) just don't fit with the facts.

During the "Winter War" of 1939, the Germans supported Russia in attacking Finland, and the US, Britain and France supported Finland in defending.

During the "Continuation War" of 1941-44, the Germans supported the Finns in attacking the Russians (Russians in what the Finns still considered Finland), and the US and Britain supported the Russians.

During the "Lapland War" of 1944-45, the Finns attacked the Germans (Germans in Finland), and almost no one supported them, but hey at least the Russians stopped short of crushing their country.

As much as I am a rabid anti-Nazi, and do not give credence at all to efforts to equate Stalin with Hitler, that does not mean that I think it was easy to live on the borders of Stalin's Russian empire (OK, the Soviet Union). The truth is, being stuck between Russia on one side and Germany on the other was not a good place for anyone in the first half of the 20th century.

From my readings of history I conclude that the Finns navigated those difficult waters better than just about anyone else. I don't think it was easy, I think they paid a terrible price in blood, and it was a very near run thing on multiple occasions. But they managed, and from the end of WW1 to today there has always a separate, sovereign nation we know as Finland which was not under a foreign occupier. That is better than I can say for almost any other nation on the eastern borders of Germany or the western borders of Russia.

-Mark
(aka: Mk 1)

A good friend of mine raised that point as well, when we talked about this earlier:

Being a small, thinly populated country in early 20th century Europe was a pretty perilous position to be in and often enough, choices were made where no realistic alternatives existed.

And back to the OP, this is an Osprey I will likely pick up.

Kiitos Tango!

This book was published in 2006 miniMo.

Ah, then ABE.com will have it!