According to Finnish historian Oula Silvennoinen Finland’s intelligence organisation Valpo and the German Reichssicherheitshauptamt cooperated in setting up a unit dubbed Einsatzkommando Finnland during World War 2, Swedish daily Dagens Nyheter wrote last Sunday (in Swedish). The news struck Finland and Finnish historians to the bone as Silvennoinen revealed a very limited number of details from his PhD thesis, to be defended this upcoming weekend.
Silvennoinen claims that the Finnish-German unit’s purpose was to deal with communists and Jews in the northern parts of the east front.
Finland’s role in WW2 has been fogged for decades. Post-war investigations were hampered repeatedly by vanishing suspects and evidence.
Recent findings show that Finland treated their POV’s most brutally.
If Silvennoinen’s findings can be proved, Finland’s history will have to be rewritten. There’s also the issue of the country’s responsibilities towards the Jewish community.
I must add, in hindsight, that I had no idea that the Finns’ propensity for massacres remains intact. Certainly, I was full aware of the Jokela incident almost a year ago, but yesterday’s tragic onslaught took me with surprise completely — at which time this post was already published.
Please understand that I’m not trying to score cheap points in referring to genocidal inclinations. What happened yesterday is nothing short of depressing, but in a wider scope, I still can’t help but wonder why Finland seems particularly affected by the phenomenon, and severely so.
Bullshit
Oh yeah dear Jarle! Just one thing about your “news” and about that funny Silvennoinen thesis. Why don’t you ask about these things from finnish jews? After all there are jews in Finland who consider themselves as finns. And you could check things out with our jewish war veterans who served in the Finnish Army during WW2 very heroically and yes, two of them even received an Iron Cross (which they naturally refused to accept). But oh no, not you, i-feel-good-about-me journalist. You just repeat the same shit that some obscure “investigator”. Funny thing about all these finnish holocaust stories is that finnish jews don’t know about them, never heard about them, even when they were serving up North during the war. They had their own synagoga there which was very confusing for germans. No one in Lapland, wheater a finn, a finnish jew or a sami has ever seen a single camp up there. Nobody knows where the hell these finnish death camps were, except you and mr Silvennoinen. Isn’t that strange? Finlands role in WW2 might be fogy for you, but it is well documented and researched. There are thousands of studies, books, documentaries and thousands of biografies about the subject. It is very clear to all of those willing to dig in, but you don’t, of course. You just an journalist who can repeat any crap and feel good about it. You can always say it was not your idea, somebody just said it. And yes, we are a violent nation, and yes, we killed a lot of enemies during the war, and yes, we still do kill more people per capita than any other western nation, but to suggest that we are somehow prone to massacres is cheap. It is disgusting after Kauhajoki.
haistapaska: “Bullshit”, you say, and that may very well be so, but I’m prepared to give Silvennoinen a chance to prove his allegations true before passing verdict. It’ll be interesting to see what evidence he’s collected in this weekend’s thesis defence.
finne igen
(I expect that haistapaska and you are one and the same): I understand that Finnish Jews were considered “untouchables” in the alleged (please note that i do write alleged) Finnish-German agreement. I’m afraid my only source here is in Norwegian (Aftenposten). Hope you understand it (if not, this may come in handy):
If you click the link: Please note the picture of Hitler, Mannerheim, PM Jukka Rangel and president Risto Ryti amicably partying, June 1942.
I suppose the main point that I try to put across here is that, yes: with all likelihood Finnish Jews weren’t affected by the Einsatzkommando, whose field of operation was on the east front, according to Silvennoinen. And again, I see no reason to trust his allegations, but no reason to reject them either. Not until he’s proved himself horribly wrong, which remains to be seen. The purpose of this post is merely to convey a story that, at the time of publishing, apparently hadn’t been reported in English, to my knowledge.
At any rate I think it’s fair to say that, while Finnish Jews obviously escaped the horrors of Holocaust, not all Norwegian Jews did. We were, as you may recall, occupied at the time.
You’re right. That was uncalled for, and I apologise for that. A very informal, not-so serious tone isn’t always appropriate. Right now I think it’s fair to say that we all partake in your mourning the loss of Finns in their prime (an incident of which I was unaware at the time of publishing). I can see how my remark may have been perceived as insensitive.
By the way: I think I owe to inform you that I write here in the capacity of private blogger, not journalist.
hi jarl. no i’m not the bull shit guy, he’s full of it. Unfortunately I have to come after you again. You said that your source is Aftonposten. Poor choice. There was no agreements about the jews between Finland and Germany. Germany put a lot of pressure on Finland to hand over jews to them, Himmler particulary. There were finns who would have done this but marshall Mannerheim told the germans that this would be done over his dead body. Mannerheim was no humanist, he was an old school officer in the russian tsar’s army and one the closest officers to the tsar ( also a baron, nobleman), but he considered nazis as beerhall drunks and vulgar idiots. Mr Hitler was to him always an upstart corporal who had no business in his table. Hitler came to Finland as an uninvited guest to Mannerheim’s bírthday, surprise which did not make Mannerheim happy. After that Mannerheim had to repay the visit.There were some finns who had strong nazi sympaties but none like the Quisling bunch. I do know you were occupied by the Germans and none too happy about it. The same fuckers were here too in Lapland, but they were rather poor lot. They could not do much of anything during the war. There are some stories about finnish jewish officers fighting up there and the synagoga which I told you about was right there. Germans didn’t like it at all but could not do anything about it. The main problem about the Silvennoinen thesis is this: how come finnish jews have not heard about these death camps and killings? They know everything else. They know where an old nazi is hiding in Argentina but not what happened in our own country? I mean, get real. Of course Silvennoinen will whip out nice bunch of documents and say look a here, but that is the problem of the method. When nobody has seen these camps or killing fields, when nobody has found their remains for sixty years, one has to ask Is this real? Was it real? I’m just puzzled why nobody else knows about this. That is all. But like you said, let’s wait and see what Silvennoinen has for us.
Jarle, I would advice you to watch the DVD part 1 and 2 of Gustaf Mannerheim. It will be shown at Armémuseum in Stockholm pretty soon.
When seeing this documentary, you will learn of who and what Mannerheim was. As Finne Igen already said; Mannerheim did not in any point support the Nazi regime, except from what was necessary in order to prolong the forthliving of Finland.
Mannerheim was an aristocrat, maybe somewhat old-school in the thought of the higher and lower classes. He did not think that those fanatic “people’s” dictatorships, neither of bolsjevism or national-socialism, did any good. He had fought Germany in WW1 and had no high thoughts of them. He had returned home to Finland from his post as General in the Russian Army during the revolution. He would probably rather had seen the old Czar as the ruler of Russia than Lenin and Stalin. Mannerheim actually said after seeing the information of the failed coupe of Hitler in 1923, that “remember this man – he might become very dangerous in the future!”. He also was known to unofficially say “the little corporal” or “the little painter” about Hitler – loathing him for his common breed and low military rank.
Hence, Henrik Arnstad’s tries to make it look as this aristocratic Field Marshal actually loved National Socialism is just hillarious. It’s like trying to convince anybody of that Churchill was a Bolsjevik just because he was allied with Stalin’s Soviet Union.
If anybody should want to attack Mannerheim for his political point of view, it would rather be that he could be concidered an old-school aristocrat. Bolsjeviks and Nazis was just common peoples’ crazy thoughts, far below a counts dignity.
Somebody said that Mannerheim was an creature from an sunken continent, a man whos values and morals were from 1800′s rather than 1900′s. And while he could be merciless soldier, he was the chairman of the finnish red cross and founded an childrens welfare foundation well before any politician had any idea of taking care of children. And while he was able to work with elected officials and politicians, he himself saw parliamentary democracy as something odd. I guess the greatest recognition comes from his most fanatic enemies, the soviets. When the war was over the soviets demanded that Mannerheim must named as a care taker of Finland. Even they saw him as man who can keep things cool. Remarkably he did it, even though he was an old and very sick man at the time. It was not because he wanted it. It was something that he had to do as an officer of the old school. It was his last duty in his mind for his country, regardless ones personal condition or wishes.
Thanks a million for a most interesting Mannerheim crash course, Finne igen and Historicon, even if he — to my knowledge — never headed the Valtiollinen Poliisi, which is the agency currently in dispute. The remark I made on Aftenposten’s party photo was, of course, very en-passent, although it definitely illustrates the relatively close ties between your wartime government and Nazi Germany. Which, of course, is not to say that the Finnish government at the time condoned Nazi ideology, but it does serve as an indication of Finland’s strategic thinking. I think it would be fair to say that the government must’ve deemed Germany the likely victor.
The Norwegian government faced much of that same dilemma, too, taking a very cowardly stance in trying to remain neutral for as long as possible. However, when finally forced to choose, the government and the Norwegian parliament sided with the allies, paving the way for Quisling and his cohorts, following the government’s evacuation, which poses an interesting question:
Granted, we did have an exile government based in London, but in truth, the Nazi-friendly Quisling government took care of the day to day administration at home. Some would argue that Norway in fact had a Nazi government during WW2, even if we indeed had a legally elected government abroad.
In addition, numerous civil servants, police officers, high and low-ranking military officers and personnel in Norwegian intelligence, insofar that we had such agencies at all, sympathised with the Nazis, which may well have been the case in Finland, too. Which is why I’m not yet prepared to discard Silvennoinen’s allegations altogether. Not quite yet, anyway.
In other words: I don’t think that the existence of an Einsatzkommando Finnland (which, by the way did not operate in Finland, according to Silvennoinen) — or not — has anything at all to do with Mannerheim, just as the Holocaust simply cannot be attributed to professional Wehrmacht officers, whose duties merely were to defend their country — just like Mannerheim.
I’m sorry if mentioning Mannerheim in the passing (based on his appearance in said photograph) mislead you to suspect that I blame him for anything at all — except, maybe, for being a walking anachronism.
For all I know, Silvennoinen’s allegations are sheer bullocks, but I’m not in the habit of passing verdict until I’ve seen the evidence.
Thanks again for most enlightening information, however irrelevant (which, I’m afraid, is my fault entirely).
We had our pro nazis too, but as a whole the nazi ideology didn’t appeal for finns. First obstacle was of course the race issue. We were not a germanic race like norwegians after all, we were ” a servant race” in their plans. One famous anecdote: 18 year old volunteer for finnish waffen ss-batallion was asked what is his political orientation. He was supposed answer national socialism but instead his answer was: football. The german officer was naturally irritated. When the next guy came to the inerview and was asked his political ideology his answer was skiing. The german officer got really angry. Story may be totally fictional but it reflects the additude towards the nazi ideology at that time. Finnish goverment really believed 1941 that Germany could beat Soviet Union and in order to get revenge from Winter war, joined in. We were the most important ally for Germany inm the eastern front during the war, but also already in 1942 our military intelligency raported to our gorverment that Germany has lost the war. Eventually we had to fight the Germans out from finnish Lapland in our third war: Winter war 1939-40, Continuation war 1941-44, Lapland war 1944-45 (against germans former allies). This is the background for Silvennoinen’s thesis and it will be interesting to see what he comes up with.
“I must add, in hindsight, that I had no idea that the Finns’ propensity for massacres remains intact. ”
It is estimated that a couple of hundred thousand Norwegians are descendants of the original Forest Finns.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forest_Finns#Situation_today
What we must see is what Mannerheim actually saw: The future in the big picture. Finland after 1939 was like a game of chess with very high stakes. Soviet Union attacked Finland 1939 and it was only by Stalin’s own hand when he shot, prisoned, scared and sacked his officers that saved Finland. With a competent STAVKA-command, Finland could not have defended itself against the overwhelming Red Army, even if every finn should have fought like 10 lions.
After the cease-fire in 1940, with huge amounts of Karelian refugees in Finland, the loss of prime farm-land in Karelia and Finlands 2;nd largest city Viborg occupied, Finland was severely crippled. And with Soviet troops stationed at Hangö only some kilometers away from Helsinki, the situation was not good. Not good at all. Mannerheim probably foresaw this situation. Otto Ville Kuusinen, the bolsjevik finn who had formed the “Finnish” Terijoki-regime hadn’t given up his claims to “liberate” Finland from the democratic government. Finland surely needed an ally to persist in this time of crisis.
Mannerheim had talks with Sweden in order to secure Finlands sovereignity. Sweden, wisely since their army was not ready for any serious fighting, turned him down. But Finland was in desperate need of an ally. And it couldn’t be the Soviet Union without joining it as the Baltic countries had been forced to.
USA was too far away and even though they had politically supported Finland’s struggle in the Winter War, Roosevelt was in no position to actually send troops against anybody at the time, due to the strong will of the US citizens to avoid war at any cost. (This changed as we all know after Pearl Harbor.)
Another possible ally was France and England. Churchill and Mannerheim had good relations at the time, both politicans concidering themselves equals and “upper-class”. But after Germanys attack on Denmark and Norway, the geographical possibilities to receive help from them was close to none.
The only rising power to support the small country against Soviet Union was Germany. Those were probably also quite eager to be able to use Finland as a prolonged front in their forthcoming attack (Operation Barbarossa). In this position, Finland could feel secure to get help with both supplies, troops and weapons from Germany. There were no German directives as forcing an Nazi regime on Finland – but they needed that front.
So, when Operation Barbarossa started, Finland waited patiently. Mannerheim had foreseen that Russia would bomb Finnish cities, and they did. This was the reason to start the Continuation war, a war that would free the occupied territories from the Soviet Union. It is a fact that some finns had dreams of their own “lebensraum” in Karelia, but Mannerheim chose very wisely in what to attack and how long he would advance. After a harsh warning from USA to leave the railroad from Murmansk unharmed, there were no more Finnish sabotage actions on the railroad. He also realized the situation in Leningrad, stopping his troops way away from the city and in that manner, leaving a life-line strait into the city. Hitler demanded Mannerheim to open a northern front on Leningrad, but Mannerheim refused. Did he already then know how the war would end? Why else would he refuse this?
It is true that Finland advanced into Soviet, occupying cities and territory in between lakes Ladoga and Onega. Why Mannerheim decided to advance over the former border is hard to say. Some say he saw the possibility to let Finland grow. Other say that it was easier to defend along the river Svir, with the lakes on eather side thereby shortening the front and getting a natural defending position. Yet other say that he took the Soviet-Karelian territory in order to have something to negotiate peace with. Mind that he had been a General in Russia before; he had full information of how many soldiers this huge country could draft. He was aware of the Russian soul, how Russians disregarding their hatred of their bolsjevik regime, gladly could sacrifice their life, not for communism, but for “Mother Russia”.
When the Red Army initiated their attack in 1944, Finland was again put against overwhelming forces. The Red Army broke through the thin defense lines along the isthmus south of Viipuri, throwing the Finns back in unorganized retreat. The situation was deplorable. Many divisions from the Svir front was diverted to the Viipuri front in order to stop the attack. It wasn’t before Viipuri had fallen (and suprisingly easily), that the Finnish defenders could halt the onslaught. But the situation was still critical. If the Red Army, who threw in several Armored Guard-divisions, should manage a break-through, the road to Helsinki would have been wide open. Finland needed something to stop those tanks, and anti-tank weapons was terribly scarse at the moment. By negotiating with Germany, and by president Ryti personally signing an agreement that they would get the AT-weapons if they would fight with Germany until the bitter end, Germany delivered Panzerfausts and Panzerschrecks. This probably saved Finland, who only days later found themselves involved in the largest battle ever occured in the Nordic countries; the battle of Tali-Ihantala. A battle with lots of Russian tanks trying to break through the lines, artillery concentrations which was described to a constant thunder where you couldnt single out the explosions, and huge charges of infantry. Not to forget a constant strafing and bombing from the air. If Finland shouldn’t have received those AT-weapons, the outcome of the battle could have been quite something else. This time, the front held.
After this battle, which was creating huge losses on both sides, the Soviet STAVKA realized that their forces was worn out or in some batallions, actually wiped out. And the more important goal, Berlin needed whatever troops the Red Army could muster. After that, negotiations started. President Ryti saved himself by resigning, hence getting the pact to fight to the end void. Field Marshal Mannerheim took the place as president and accepted the harsh peace-conditions from the Soviet Union, one of them to get rid of the germans troops in Finland. Hence the Lapland War started.
Where Finland should have been if they hadn’t allied themselves with Germany at the time is hard to say. The defeat of the Red Army in 1940 was a huge prestigious loss for the Soviet Union. I don’t think that they should have been passive, but should have completely occupied Finland in about 1944, if Finland still should have been neutral. And without the military equipment received from Germany, with a front line in positions hard to defend, especially with the Hangö front terribly close to the capital, and with battle-hardened veterans in Red Army with modern tanks and equipment, the possibility to stop such an attack should have been impossible. In that way, allying with the dark regime of National Socialism was the thing saving Finland from occupation of the other dark regime of Bolsjevism.
The aftermath, with guys like Henrik Arnstad trying to say that Finland fought as the aggressor as the servant of the Nazis against poor, innocent Soviet Union is not what I call good journalism. Sure, it was not right not to stop at the former border, but was it right of Soviet Union to attack in 1939? And, wihout occupying some of Russia, what would Germany think of the help of Finland, in case of a German victory? There are a lot of questions Arnstad neglect while trying to get Finlands part of WW2 more dirty than it actually was.
Skogfinne: Yes, I’m aware of the Finnish “element” in Norway’s population, especially in Finmark (I mean, take the name, for one…), Troms and, perhaps at Finnskogen, but had no idea that it amounted to a few hundred thousands. Occasionally we see names such as Hildonen appear, on people whose families have been Norwegian for generations. If I’m not seriously mistaken, I even think there are traces of it in my grandmother’s kin, on my mother’s side — and therefore, of course, in me. But rest assured: I have no plans for an immediate killing spree. Besides, I’ve got a lot more Swedish and Danish blood flowing through my veins anyway, which makes me the paragon of a Nordic man, I suppose.
Historicon: You know, Finland’s wartime hostility towards — and fear of — the Soviet Union is highly understandable. That same fear manifested itself here, too, as many a young Norwegian’s incitement for joining the Waffen SS was just that: Fear of the Bolshevik menace. Or so they claimed, in the aftermath of the war. Then again, it’s easy to spruce up your story a bit when it turns out you sided with the bad guys — if you didn’t already know. Whatever the reasons, most of them maintained that they didn’t join in for the Nazi ideology, but it’s actually quite impossible to say. Maybe it’s time to let bygones be just that now anyway, eight years into a whole new millennium.
You wouldn’t happen to know exactly when and where Silvennoinen is expected to defend his thesis, would you? Not that I’d be able to attend, but I’d very much like to find out what else he’s got up his sleeve.
hi jarl! It seems that this Silvennoinen thesis is shrinking like a fart in Sahara. First news about his thesis was that Finland ja finns participated on the Holocaust. There were supposed to have been death camps in Lapland and finnish involvement on them. According the Helsingin Sanomat, there were 12 (!) finnish secret police translators working with the germans up there in this matter. Nobody knows why they were up there or who gave the permit to go to work with the germans. No official or unofficial orders have been found even by Silvennoinen, so it might be that some officers were running their own secret runaway operation inside the secret police during that time. However, this was against the orders of our goverment, Mannerheim and the army. It was also against the general opinion of the country largely, though there were some natzi sympathisizers. To put this whole thing in perspective (after all this hooplah), Silvennoinen claims that these 12 men were involved of murdering some hundreds prisoners, maybe as much as 500 during the war. During couple of weeks in december 1939-january 1940, finnish troops killed about 15000-20000 soviets on a 11 kilometers long road in Suomussalmi. That is one to two corpses on every meter if laid out evenly. 44. elite division was terminated on Raate road. This is one of the most celebrated victories in our history, but from the humanistic point of view, it is one of the most horrifying slaughters in the WW2. In the Suomussalmi battle soviets lost maybe 23000 men in few weeks, finns some 1000. And mind you, finns did not any airpower and very limited heavy weapons at all. It was done mainly by small arms fire and some hand to hand combat which makes the carnage even more horrendous. So, in this light Silvennoinen’s thesis really pales out. It would’ve been interesting indeed if he had really found some real big stuff instead of these 12 translators. I would have been forced to check my thoughts about our war history at least some parts.
So that’s what it all’s boiling down to, then: Sympathisers in the secret services going freelance, probably. If that’s all it is, Silvennoinen obviously knows how to max his publicity. Like you, I’m a bit disappointed to learn that we’re dealing with much ado about practically nothing.
On the other hand, I’m sure you’re relieved that it’s so. I’m sorry for the brief reply, as I’m wallowing in kindergarten-inflicted half sickness. I’ve never been much of a writer in a febrile condition.
It’s quite amazing that a Swedish newspaper (Dagens Nyheter) can use the headline “Finland participated in the Holocaust” (Finland deltog i Förintelsen) and after the Silvennoinen-thesis has shown to be mostly a theoretic example of theories without proof, there is no denial of it.
What if I would write an article of that it was USA who initiated the entire WW2? With the headline “USA responsible for outbreak of World War 2″. And after my thesis was utterly denied, there wouldn’t be any response at all – only the same headline that as a fact, USA was responsible…
I think it’s very unresponsible and unfortunate that a newspaper writing about a thesis, using a head-line that proves to be a lie, won’t take action and say that their head-line was a bit to harsh and somehow take it back.
I agree completely, Historicon, in the sense that Dagens Nyheter obviously bought Silvennoinen’s arguments without getting their facts straight — as, by the way, did I, even though I made precautions in adding the crucial word: “allegedly”.
Blaming WW2 on the USA however, is a little far fetched, wouldn’t you say? Certainly they had a part in diplomatic talks prior to the outbreak — as did many a country, but I think it’s only fair to emphasise that, after all, their initial reluctance to get involved was sincere. If they wanted — or provoked — the outbreak of WW2, they most certainly would’ve thrown themselves into the heat. Instantly, as always.
Of course blaming WW2 on USA is far-fetched, it was merely an example of how somebody could write an article with only a remote fact (the hard peace-conditions of the Versailles-treaty has been said to be a reason for Germany tending to go either to a Communist or Nazi regime and USA was one of the participants of that treaty). But my biggest reaction is that after the information is out in the open, the newspaper just “forget” to write anything, saying that they might have made a hen of a feather…
In my eyes, Dagens Nyheter have lost a lot of its credibility by this article. I know that one of the keys to “good journalism” today, is to up-write the smallest incident to a close to catastrophic state, at least that’s what the Swedish Aftonbladet and Expressen do, just in order to sell more newspapers. But when they’re loosing the perspective like in this article, and don’t admit that their head line and text might have been too offensive without support of facts, I know of people shutting down their subscription of the newspaper, and starting a subscription of Svenska Dagbladet instead. Good journalism in my eyes is to write the truth, and if it appear not to be the truth after some facts have appeard, to deny the former article in a new one.
I see your point, Historicon. Of course, accusing Finland of partaking in the holocaust would be just as unreasonable as blaming America for WW2.
I also share your view on the war’s background. Regaining some of the greatness taken from them in the Versailles treaty, resurrecting German pride and the country’s armed forces — as well as getting back at those who imposed shame on them, were all vital inducements for Nazi Germany’s actions in the onset of the war.
I’m afraid that good journalism will lose the war against the newspapers’ craving for increased circulation figures — especially when you take the printed editions’ recent decline, as a result of click-intensified (hence sensationalised) online journalism. The DN story is symptomatic in that respect, as I’m sure they considered their allegations — loosely based on Silvennoinen’s hints, no doubt — a tad sexier than conveying his reservations.