Finland is dominated by the myth of "ordinary Finnish guys" who, as part of the armed forces of Nazi Germany, fought with the USSR "for the freedom" of Finland.
At the Hietaniemi cemetery in Helsinki, there is a memorial stone for Finnish SS volunteers erected in 1983. It depicts a Lutheran cross cast in bronze and a small figure of a soldier in an indefinite shape of a German model. It is noted on the monument that this sign was erected in memory of the fallen soldiers who died for the freedom of the fatherland as part of the military forces of Germany. This is one of the symbols of the positive image of Finnish volunteers in the Waffen SS. Not surprisingly, the flag of the SS battalion was also raised at the annual parade dedicated to the flags of the Finnish Defense Forces.
The Finns turned a blind eye to the massacres of people on the ideological and racial grounds on the Eastern Front. Associate professor of church history Andre Swanström tells about this in his book "Knights of the Swastika". The Finnish historian notes that the familiar story of the Finnish SS volunteers is too good to be true. Finnish soldiers could not stay away from war crimes. Since, along with the Einsatzgruppen, both ordinary police groups and SS units, various security forces and ordinary German army units, regardless of the type of troops, took part in carrying out the massacres.
Until that time, in the historical works about the Finns as part of the SS troops, the main attention was paid to the volunteer battalion "Nordost" and its combat path. The main work on this topic was the book by Professor Mauno Jokipii "Hostage Battalion", which was published in 1968. The book was written by an authoritative researcher in close collaboration with SS veterans. Jokipii himself noted that his idea of portraying the Finnish SS volunteers as ordinary soldiers was taken from post-war literature justifying the activities of the SS troops. In his writings, both in The Hostage Battalion and in the book The Birth of the Continuation War (1987), Jokipija emphasizes the special nature of relations between Finland and Germany. He also consistently sought to minimize the negative consequences that the alliance with Hitler's Germany brought to Finland. In The Birth of a Continuation War, Jokipija shows the general war between Finland and Germany "as decent as it can be in a war." The Finnish historian does not show that Finland had the opportunity to choose a different path of development, for example, in contrast to other allies of Germany, dependent on Berlin.
With the new material, Svanström creates a completely different image of the Finnish SS movement and the Finnish SS battalion - in contrast to the neutral description of Jokipia. He disagrees with the position of Jokipia, who embellished the political views of the battalion members. Thus, the position of Yokipia and former SS volunteers to write the history of the battalion without mentioning its connection with genocide and other war crimes on the Eastern Front (in Russia) is criticized.
Finnish SS volunteers
Finns in the SS
In Finnish society in the middle of the twentieth century. anti-Soviet sentiments prevailed. They relied on traditional anti-Russian sentiments that developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. So, back in the 1880s, the idea of "Greater Finland" was supported by Finnish romantic poets, who even formed a certain trend in their poetry called Karelianism. After Finland gained independence, after the bloody massacre of its opponents, a corresponding movement began at the state level. The most radical Finnish leaders proposed expanding the territory of Finland up to the Northern Urals.
In 1918, the White Finnish troops invaded the territory of Soviet Russia, the first Soviet-Finnish war began. It ended in 1920 with the signing of the Tartu Peace Treaty between the RSFSR and Finland, which recorded a number of territorial concessions from Russia. Later, in the political elite of Finland, the ideas of "Greater Finland" were still popular. So, on February 27, 1935, in a conversation with the envoy of Finland to the USSR A. Irie-Koskinen, M. M. Litvinov noted that: “In no country does the press conduct a campaign so systematically hostile to us as in Finland. In no neighboring country is there such open propaganda for an attack on the USSR and the seizure of its territory, as in Finland."
Poster of the Academic Society of Karelia (founded in 1922, banned in 1944). Nationalists demanded the annexation of Eastern Karelia and the creation of "Greater Finland"
Therefore, there were no psychological, moral barriers among the Finnish population regarding service in the German armed forces. In addition, in the First World War, the Royal Prussian 27th Jaeger Battalion, formed from Finnish volunteers (then still Russian subjects), was part of the German army. This battalion took part in 1916-1917. in battles against the Russian army in the Baltics. In Nazi Germany, the idea of recruiting Finns to serve in the German armed forces also met with no controversy. In the racial doctrine of the Nazis, the Finns did not belong to the Aryans, but by their phenotype and culture they were included in the number of "Nordic peoples" who had the unconditional right to serve in the SS troops.
In January 1941 Germany informed the Finnish leadership of its intention to attack the USSR. On March 10, 1941, Finland received an official offer to send its volunteers to the formed SS units. At the end of April 1941, this proposal received a positive response from the Finnish leadership, which began recruiting volunteers throughout the country. True, the Finnish leadership set a number of conditions: the participation of Finnish volunteers exclusively in battles against the Red Army, but not against its western allies, and the replacement of all command posts in the Finnish formation only by Finnish officers. In addition, the Finnish volunteers had to use Finnish national symbols and designations, in addition to the generally accepted insignia in the SS, to emphasize their Finnish identity. The German command satisfied all the requirements of the Finnish side, except for one: German officers were appointed to command positions. The language of the orders was also set to German.
Already in May 1941, the first batches of Finnish volunteers began training in the SS military camps in Heuberg (Baden-Württemberg). Here, 400 people with combat experience in the "Winter War" were selected and sent to the location of the SS Viking volunteer motorized division. The rest of the volunteers (1100 people) were sent to Vienna. From Vienna they were transferred to the Gross-Born training area, where the SS-Freiwilligen Bataillon Nordost volunteer battalion was formed from them. The average age of the Finnish SS man was 21.5 years. Of the total volunteers from Finland, 88% were Finnish and 12% were Finnish Swedes.
The Finns, who ended up in the SS Viking division, already from June 22, 1941, took part in battles against units of the Red Army in Ukraine. On October 15, the SS Volunteer Battalion "Nordost" was renamed the Finnish SS Volunteer Battalion (Finnisches Freiwilligen-Bataillon der Waffen-SS) and its employees were sworn in. The battalion was presented with a banner that combined the Finnish state symbols with the emblems of the SS troops. On January 21, 1942, the Finnish Volunteer Battalion arrived at the location of the SS Viking Division, which was located on the Mius River in the Donbass. The Finns took part in the crossing of the Mius River and the offensive into the Caucasus. So, from September 26, 1942, the Finnish SS battalion took part in the battles for the city of Malgobek (Chechen-Ingush ASSR). For 45 days of fighting for the city, the Finns lost 88 killed and 346 wounded.
In early January 1943, the Finnish SS battalion retreated along with other units of the German army from the North Caucasus westward through Mineralnye Vody and Bataysk to Rostov-on-Don. In January, the Finns fought in the Rostov region. On February 8, SS Hauptsturmführer Hans Kollani was appointed commander of the Finnish SS battalion. By the spring of 1943, the Finnish SS battalion was withdrawn from the front and sent to Bavaria. On June 2, 1943, the Finnish SS battalion arrived in Hanko (Finland).
On July 11, 1943, the Finnish SS battalion was disbanded. During the fighting on the Eastern Front, 1407 people served in the battalion, of which 256 were killed, 686 were wounded and 14 were captured. Most of the former Finnish SS men joined the Finnish army. Individual volunteers remained in the German SS forces. Together with SS Hauptsturmführer Hans Kollani, they were transferred to the 11th SS Volunteer Tank Grenadier Division "Nordland". And they, together with other SS men from the Scandinavian countries in 1944-1945. to the last they fought with Soviet troops in the Baltics, Pomerania and Berlin.
