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Subject: Did Finns fought aganist Allies?!?!??!
kane    9/7/2006 10:27:09 AM
^^^^topic^^^^
 
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CJH       9/7/2006 2:02:08 PM
You must mean - "Did the Finns fight against the western allies?" meaning besides the USSR. In that case, not to my knowledge.
 
Still, Finnland did supply Nazi Germany at least with platinum.
 
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Heorot    Finnish SS   9/29/2006 5:56:34 PM

Yes there were Finns fighting for Germany.

 

Finland had over, 1,400 Finnish volunteers in the Nazi Waffen SS, 300 of whom were killed in the Ukraine and in the Caucasus. Finland concluded a secret agreement with Nazi Germany before the invasion of the USSR that would allow Finland to secretly send Finnish volunteers to Heinrich Himmler’s Waffen SS forces. Himmler formed a Finnish Waffen SS Volunteer Battalion from these Finnish troops called “Nordost”. This Finnish Battalion was attached to the “Nordland” Waffen SS Regiment of the 5th SS Division “Wiking”, one of the most brutal and fanatical Nazi SS Divisions of World War II, commanded by Felix Steiner.

Finnish Nazi SS troops formed the vanguard and spearheaded the German Wehrmacht assault against the Stalingrad and Caucasus regions in 1942 and advanced to the Grozny oil fields in Chechnya. This was the farthest Nazi advance into the Soviet Union by the Axis, spearheaded by Finnish Nazi Waffen SS volunteers. It is important to remember that the Finnish government of Risto Ryti sent the Finnish Nazi SS volunteers. There was government action on the part of Finland. Ryti should have been prosecuted for war crimes and for genocide. But he never was


 
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Photon       12/17/2007 12:56:49 AM
Might as well as try to prosecute Franco for sending a complete Spanish volunteer division to the Eastern Front.

(If genocide is such a big deal, why not go after the worst of the bunch -- Joe Stalin?!?)

Whether it be Spain or Finland, sending out 'volunteers' was shrewd move by their respective political leaders -- get the fascists from your backyard out of the way, and at the same time look good to Hitler.  Killing two birds with one stone ... classic! 

 
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Jeff_F_F       12/22/2007 7:24:34 AM
Let's not forget that the Soviets launched the unprovoked Winter War against Finnland to conquer the Karelian peninsula in the winter of 1939-1940. Overall the Finnish government was not particularly supportive of the war against the Soviet Union. They rapidly retook the territory conquered by the Soviets and then stopped at their old borders, which was something like 50km from Leningrad. Without their support, the German attack on Murmansk--one of the primary lend-lease ports--faltered. I can't really blame them for not being terribly enamored of the German cause, since Germany and the Soviet Union were technically still allies when during the Winter War and Germany provided only limited assistance to the Finns during that fight.
 
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CJH       12/22/2007 12:29:34 PM

Let's not forget that the Soviets launched the unprovoked Winter War against Finnland to conquer the Karelian peninsula in the winter of 1939-1940. Overall the Finnish government was not particularly supportive of the war against the Soviet Union. They rapidly retook the territory conquered by the Soviets and then stopped at their old borders, which was something like 50km from Leningrad. Without their support, the German attack on Murmansk--one of the primary lend-lease ports--faltered. I can't really blame them for not being terribly enamored of the German cause, since Germany and the Soviet Union were technically still allies when during the Winter War and Germany provided only limited assistance to the Finns during that fight.

The USSR's Winter War against Finland was part of a greater policy. The USSR also seized the Baltic countries as well as Romania's Bessarabia in 1940. It is as though Stalin was acting to secure his northern and southern flanks in anticipation of some future conflict.

 
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Branting       7/30/2009 12:41:24 PM

Let's not forget that the Soviets launched the unprovoked Winter War against Finnland to conquer the Karelian peninsula in the winter of 1939-1940. Overall the Finnish government was not particularly supportive of the war against the Soviet Union. They rapidly retook the territory conquered by the Soviets and then stopped at their old borders, which was something like 50km from Leningrad. Without their support, the German attack on Murmansk--one of the primary lend-lease ports--faltered. I can't really blame them for not being terribly enamored of the German cause, since Germany and the Soviet Union were technically still allies when during the Winter War and Germany provided only limited assistance to the Finns during that fight.


Actually the Finns did not stop at the old border but continued far beyond it. Their commander was heavily critisized for that after the war. He however always claimed that he did it only for pure military (tactical) reasons. He was looking for a good defense position to stop on. 
 
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