From Germany's Aims in the First World War by Fritz Fischer, 1967
The revolution had also re-activated the national question in Russia, and Germany at once reinforced her agitation in this field. Zimmermann, for example, asked the Finnish delegation in Stockholm as early as March 15 ‘to make the present situation in Russia the occasion of immediate energetic action.’ ‘The moment for the proclamation of Finnish independence seemed to have arrived.’ The Stockholm Finns, however, who were wavering between looking to Sweden or to Germany for support, preferred to wait and see how the Russian revolution developed, so as not to ‘compromise themselves’. Zimmermann criticized their hesitations sharply. Finland, he said, ‘had every interest in heightening the current confusion in Russia by energetic action’.1
1 On this, besides the archival material, see C. Jay Smith, Jr., Finland and the Russian Revolution 1917-1922 (Athens (Georgia), 1958), pp. 11 ff. Germany’s promise, give in June and July, to supply arms to the Finnish underground army (Skyddskar) was honoured in October.Fritz Fischer, Germany's aims in the First World War.
With introd. by Hajo Holborn and James Joll.
New York : Norton, 1967, page 369.
From Soviet Union's Aggressions Against the World, Gen. Oleg Sarin & Col. Lev Dvoretsky, 1996
As countries are classified by age, Finland is rather on the youthful side, dating only from the Treaty of Tartu with the Soviet Union on October 14, 1920. Prior to that date, it had been a vassal state of Sweden (1155-1809), and then a grand duchy of the tsarist governments from 1809 to the time of the Russian Revolution in 1917. During these centuries, the Finns desired to have their freedom. They had their own ancient culture and language and felt they had every right to govern themselves. When the revolution occurred, the saw a golden opportunity to shed the yoke of foreign domination. They proclaimed a republic in 1919, and organized resistance to Bolshevik elements that were trying to annex Finland to the new Soviet Union. They were led by a former tsarist general, Carl Gustaf Mannerheim, with help from Germany. That they succeeded in repelling the Bolsheviks at this time should have been a lesson to those who showed aggressive tendencies later.But in 1939, following the combined Soviet-German war against Poland and Soviet actions against the Baltic countries, Finland again found itself having to defend against Soviet domination. Despite two nonaggression treaties between the two countries, the Soviet Union invaded little Finland on November 30, 1939, by sea, land, and air.
In official circles of the Soviet Union and in propaganda published in many media to the entire world, the government attempted to justify this aggression by claiming that the war was instigated by “reactionary circles in Finland.”1 In other words, Finland should be blamed for everything that occurred. It was this tiny nation that decided to assault its huge neighbor and thus provoke a counterattack on itself. Even for a person without knowledge of the overall situation between the countries, but with a modicum of common sense, it was obvious that things could not have developed like this; that the very idea was laughable. Our research into the history of the war proves conclusively that it was started without provocation by Stalin using the utmost in treachery and deceit against a country will to grant logical concessions to its mighty neighbor.
The war cost both sides combined hundreds of thousands of casualties, but gained little in fact for the Soviet Union. Stalin and his accomplices apparently had trouble tolerating a sovereign and successfully developing a state so closely allied to the West and at a strategically disadvantageous location to the Soviet Union. It looked like a good bet for them to accomplish the Sovietization of Finland, or even better, to return it to the Soviet empire. This was the goal in 1917. It seems to have persisted until 1939.
In planning a quick war against Finland, the Soviet leadership had already designed the postwar organization to be installed there. The creation of a puppet pro-Soviet government headed by the secretary of the Executive Committee of the Communist International, Otto Kuusinen, was seen as the best solution. Moscow thought that this government to be based in Helsinki was to be the head of the “. . . leadership of the people’s power in the liberated territories (from legal Finnish authorities.”2 The Kuusinen “government” was organized in Moscow and was actually recognized by the Soviet government. It proclaimed itself as the People’s Government of the Democratic Republic of Finland, promising to rely on wide support by the liberated Finnish people. Until the war ended in 1940, Stalin refused to communicate whatsoever with the legitimate government of Finland. Only after Finland turned to Sweden as an intermediary on January 24, 1940, did the Soviet leadership become at all ready to begin peace talks. But success toward peace had to wait until the end of February, when the situation changed.
The situation at that time was that the Soviets had finally broken through the Finnish main defense line (Mannerheim), England and France decided to provide support to Finland, having developed a plan of joint operations near Petsamo. The Soviet government became afraid of the possibility of armed conflict with these Western nations and decided to limit its acquisitions to territory adjacent to the Soviet border. Finally, on March 12, 1940, Finland capitulated and by treaty ceded to the Soviet Union the entire Karelian Isthmus and the industrial city of Viborg. But Stalin again showed his treacherous and cruel nature. Despite the fact that Viborg was included in the treaty, he ordered the Red Army to conduct a brutal attack against the city as the last operation of the war, an utterly senseless and wicked act. Viborg was to become part of the Soviet Union without firing a single shot, but Stalin was so obsessed with a spirit of revenge that he needlessly sacrificed many lives of both Finnish and Soviet young men. This was only typical of Stalin’s crimes . . .
1. Soviet Encyclopedic Dictionary (Moscow: USSR State Printing House, 1987), p. 1235.
2. N.S. Khruschev, Memoirs: Questions of History (Moscow: State Political Publishing House, 1990), p. 100.( pages 21 - 23, notes on p. 224 )
Alien wars : the Soviet Union's aggressions
against the world, 1919 to 1989 / Oleg Sarin, Lev Dvoretsky
Novato, CA : Presidio, 1996.