Initially, there was no specialized propaganda department in the Finnish army. This kind of work was done by the Ministry of the Press. Only in 1934 was the information center under the Ministry of Defense (Sanomakeskus) established.
Between 1937 and 1939, he organized refresher courses for a total of 68 professional journalists who were trained in gathering information and covering the duties of military personnel.
Participants in the first refresher courses created their own organization called the Propaganda Union, which voluntarily became part of the Finnish national defense. At the end of 1938, both of these organizations were transformed into a state information center, which then, from 1939-11-10, was transformed into the State Council for the collection and delivery of domestic and international information.
Its main tasks included conducting civilian information and propaganda aimed at a potential enemy. At the same time, the information center itself was withdrawn from the State Council and renamed into the Information Department of the Ministry of Defense.
He just focused on military propaganda. The new Directorate of Propaganda of the Supreme High Command compiled official reports on military events. He was in charge of - the production of campaign materials, films, the publication of a number of newspapers, as well as the distribution of news.
Political instructors got the most from Finnish cartoonists
During the Winter War, the Finnish Supreme Headquarters, as well as the propaganda department, did not have their own propaganda unit, like the German propaganda companies at the front. Campaign materials went directly to the troops and were distributed by order of division commanders.
Nevertheless, the issued number of leaflets, as well as newspapers for the Red Army, turned out to be quite significant and they were effectively used against the soldiers of the Red Army, contributing to their transfer to captivity.
At the end of the "Winter War" the activities of the Office were curtailed.
The need for them became urgent again in 1941. The head of the propaganda department of the Finnish general staff captain (major from 8.10.42) K. Lehmus proposed a serious reorganization of the administration.
In April 1941, he visited Germany to learn about the Nazi methods of introducing propaganda. The new organization was inspired by its German counterpart, but it was a very compact, purely Finnish organization.
The State Information Center resumed operations in June 1941. The word "propaganda" due to the actions of the 7th Political Directorate of the Red Army received a very negative label in Finland, meaning only crude and false information and its further use was discontinued.
The Finns offered the Soviet pilots who surrendered to the Finnish army along with their aircraft 10 thousand dollars and free travel to any country in the world
The Propaganda Department and all propaganda units were renamed from the end of June 1941. The renamed information detachment of the Supreme General Staff was responsible for official reports, photographs, films, leaflets directed towards the enemy, as well as the education and entertainment of its own troops and the censorship of field mail. By analogy with the German propaganda companies, "Information Companies" were created.
Information campaigns were organized as follows:
The total number is 40 or 41 people. From 7 to 10 units of various cars, up to 15 motorcycles, bicycles.
In the Information Detachment of the Supreme General Staff there were two information officers in the Karelian Army. They acted as liaison officers and coordinated information campaigns. The third in information technology was Major G. Waselius, an officer assigned to liaise with the Dietl mountain corps in Lapland, from the summer of 1941 to early 1942.
All of these companies produced written reports, newsletters, photographs, film stories, organized screenings of films on the front lines, and also distributed propaganda leaflets, and campaigned for Soviet troops through loudspeakers.
For the distribution of leaflets, agitmins were used, propaganda shells of various systems, both tsarist and German, and supplied to the Finnish army by various European countries within the framework of aid during the "Winter" war. To the maximum, the small forces of the Air Force were also involved.
Most of the Finnish leaflets are written in the correct Russian language, with a fair amount of artistry, which is not surprising in principle. The backbone of the first information department was made up of White émigrés, mostly former officers of the Russian army.
An example is the example of Major General Severin Dobrovolsky (1881-1946). After the defeat of the whites, Severin Tsezarevich moved to Finland, to Vyborg, where he was actively involved in the Russian emigration. He was a member of the board of the Union of Labor Intelligentsia of the Vyborg province. Cultural and Educational Society and Secretary of the Committee of Russian Organizations in Finland to Aid the Famine in Russia.
Dobrovolsky was also known as a lecturer who spoke in Finnish cities and towns where Russians lived: Vyborg, Helsinki, Terioki (Zelenogorsk), Kuokkala (Repino), Kello-maki (Komarovo), etc. During the "winter war" Dobrovolsky was forced to live in Helsinki and the Finnish town of Hamina, closest to Vyborg. He worked in the Finnish army's propaganda department, drafting anti-Soviet leaflets and publishing articles and appeals in anti-Soviet newspapers. After the German attack on the USSR, Dobrovolsky joined the Russian propaganda department of the Finnish State Council, where he wrote anti-communist articles for the foreign press and collaborated with the prisoner-of-war newspaper Severnoye Slovo.
On the night of April 20-21, 1945, General Dobrovolsky was arrested by order of the Minister of Internal Affairs of Finland, the communist Yuryo Leino, who made this decision at the request of the Soviet Control Commission. In total, 20 people were arrested (10 Finnish citizens, 9 persons with "Nansen passports" and one former Soviet prisoner of war), in the opinion of the Soviet side, "guilty of committing war crimes, carrying out espionage and terrorist activities against the Soviet Union on behalf of the Germans." All 20 arrested were immediately extradited to the USSR and imprisoned in Lubyanka.
In making the decision to arrest and extradite, Leino acted bypassing the country's President K. G. Mannerheim and Prime Minister J. K. Paasikivi. After the top government officials in Finland were notified of the incident, there were no more such extraditions.
On November 25, 1945, General Dobrovolsky was sentenced to death by a military tribunal of the Moscow Military District under Article 58-4 of the Criminal Code. According to the recollections of fellow inmates, he refused to petition for clemency. The officer was shot on January 26, 1946.
The son of General Dobrovolsky, Severin, took an active part in the activities of the emigre youth organization "Link". In 1945, some of the leaders of "Link" were among those extradited by the USSR, but Severin Dobrovolsky Jr. escaped this fate.
