Foreign support in the Winter War consisted of materiel, men and moral support to the Finnish struggle against the Soviet Union in the Winter War. World opinion at large supported the Finnish cause. The Second World War had not yet begun in earnest and was known to the public as the Phoney War; at that time, the Winter War saw the only real fighting in Europe besides the German and Soviet invasion of Poland, and thus held major world interest. The Soviet aggression was generally deemed unjustified. Various foreign organizations sent material aid, such as medical supplies. Finnish immigrants in the United States and Canada returned home, and many volunteers (one of them future actor Christopher Lee) traveled to Finland to join Finland's forces: 8,700 Swedes, 1,010 Danes (including Christian Frederik von Schalburg, a captain in the Danish Royal Life Guards and later commander of the Free Corps Denmark, a volunteer unit created by Nazi Germany in Denmark during World War II), about 1,000 Estonians, 850 Ukrainians,[1][bettersourceneeded] 725 Norwegians, 372 Ingrians, 366 Hungarians,[2] 346 Finnish expatriates, more than 20 Latvians and 190 volunteers of other nationalities made it to Finland before the war was over.
Pope Pius XII condemned the Soviet attack on 26 December 1939 in a speech at the Vatican and later donated a signed and sealed prayer on behalf of Finland.[3]
Estonia remained officially neutral, but 400–1000 Estonian individuals travelled clandestinely to Finland and volunteered to fight against the Soviet invaders. It is estimated that around 100 Estonian volunteers on the Finnish side saw military action before the end of the Winter War.
The Hungarian government officially did not support Finland, but secretly started to search for ways to help. In addition, non-governmental organisations began to organize support for Finland. Hungary helped Finland by giving monetary donations, armaments and military volunteers. Nobel Prize winner Albert Szent-Györgyi offered all of his prize money to Finland.
CountPál Teleki's government sent armaments and war equipment valued at 1 million Hungarian pengős during the Winter War (with knowledge and accord of RegentMiklós Horthy de Nagybánya). The recruiting of volunteers started on 16 December. During the Winter War, around 25,000 Hungarian men applied to fight in Finland; finally, 350 applications were accepted. Their military training started at 10 January and it took almost a month. The volunteers formed a battalion what was commanded by LieutenantImre Kémeri Nagy. The Hungarian Volunteer Detached Battalion had 24 officers, 52 non-commissioned officers, 2 physicians and 2 military chaplains for a total of 346 officers and men.
Travel to Finland was very difficult as the German Reich forbade transit of armaments and war equipment across its territory (including the occupied Polish territories). Therefore, volunteers had to travel across Yugoslavia, Italy, France, the United Kingdom, Norway and Sweden to make their ways to Finland. They travelled without any weapons by a special train, officially classified as "tourists going to ski-camp". Finally the battalion arrived in Finland at 2 March after 3 weeks travelling.
In Finland the battalion was quartered in Lapua, in the training center of the international volunteers. In Lapua they took a part in further military training, learning skiing and winter warfare. Before the Hungarian battalion could see military action, the Moscow Peace Treaty was signed, on 12 March in Moscow, leaving many volunteers frustrated.
In the last days of March, Field MarshalMannerheim visited Lapua where he met the Hungarian battalion. He expressed his thanks to the volunteers for coming to Finland and he promoted Lieutenant Imre Kémeri Nagy to Captain. From 17 April to 19 May, the Hungarian battalion served in Karelia, at the new state border in Lappeenranta.
The Hungarian battalion was embarked at Turku at 20 May 1940, from where a steamboat sailed to Stettin, German Reich (now Szczecin, in Poland). They traveled across the German Reich by a special train with a German guard. The volunteers arrived at Budapest on 28 May.
Besides the Hungarian Volunteer Detached Battalion, other Hungarian volunteers fought in the Winter War in the Finnish army, travelling to Finland individually. 2nd Lieutenant Mátyás Pirityi served in the Finnish Air Force and took part in more than 20 sorties. Warrant Officer Vilmos Békássy's plane disappeared over the Gulf of Bothnia. Géza Szepessy, along with four fellows from the Military Technical College of Berlin, went to Finland where he was wounded in action.
A handful of Italian volunteers also fought in the Winter War on the side of Finland.[citation needed]
Denmark
1,010 Danes volunteered to fight for Finland.[5] Most were stationed in Oulu and never saw combat. An exception were Danish pilots that were stationed at various air bases. Among these were two marine pilots that deserted to join Finland, one of which was killed after having shot down four Soviet planes.[6] A total of 4 Danes were killed - 3 of them pilots.[5]
The Norwegian government prohibited officers or under-officers to volunteer for the war in Finland out of fear that this would aggravate the Germans (they wanted to remain neutral at all costs). Of the 725 Norwegians that volunteered to fight for Finland, only 125 made it to the relatively tranquil Salla front and then just three weeks before the war ended. None of the volunteers were killed or wounded. Many of the volunteers were unfit for combat and many ended up in rest homes and institutions for alcoholics during their stay in Finland. Several of the future leaders of the Norwegian resistance movement such as Max Manus and Leif "Shetland" Larsen were among the volunteers. The most highly decorated Norwegian in the later resistance movement, Gunnar Sønsteby, spent his stay as an office clerk (like many of his countrymen in the Winter War).
In addition to the military volunteers, 30 physicians and 40 nurses went to help the Finnish medical system, under the auspices of the Norwegian People's Aid.[7]
There were numerous nationwide collection campaigns of supplies and money in Norway to help the Finns. In all, the Finland collection (Norwegian: Finlandsinnsamlingen) brought in some 2,000,000kr, the largest popular collection in Norwegian history.[7] Six training aircraft were purchased for part of these funds. Initial flying training was given, close to Oslo, with these aircraft to students sent from Finland.
An important venue for collections for Finland were sporting events, several of which were held for the benefit of Finland in Norway during the war.[8][9][10][11] Some 50,000 backpacks filled with supplies were collected in Norway and dispatched to Finland.[12][13] Collections of rifles (mostly Krag–Jørgensen models) and home knitted shooting gloves also took place. Sigrid Undset, Norwegian author and Nobel laureate, donated her Nobel medal to Finland on 25 January 1940.[14]
The Norwegian government secretly donated to the Finns 12 German-made 7.5cm field gun m/01s[15] (designated 75 K 01 in Finnish service) in February 1940.[16][17] Included in the covert artillery transfer were 12,000 shells.[18] Norway also allowed the transfer of aircraft to Finland via Sola Air Station, near Stavanger.[19][20][21] Norwegian volunteers took part in the assembly of some of the aircraft at the Saab factory in Trollhättan, Sweden.[19]
One of the main reasons that the Franco-British plan—Operation Avon Head—to send troops to Finland never materialized was that Norway would not allow them to use their ports and territory for troops transfer in order to preserve a policy of neutrality. They explicitly threatened to fire upon any ship that came near Trondheim or Narvik on that mission, as it was correctly assumed that such a force would in reality be used to occupy those towns.
The North Norwegian county of Finnmark received over 1,000 Finnish refugees from Petsamo by 6 February 1940;[22] as the Red Army advanced through that lightly defended area Finnish civilians sought shelter on the Norwegian side of the Pasvik/Paatsjoki River. By the end of the war, some 1,600 Finnish civilians had fled to Norway.[23] Finnish soldiers of the independent Lapland Group that retreated across the border into Finnmark were transported south and interned at Hegra Fortress in the Nord-Trøndelag county of Central Norway. The internees were released and returned to Finland at the turn of the year 1939–1940.[24] As the Finns had retreated in the northern areas, they had carried out a scorched earth policy, destroying all housing and infrastructure to impede the Soviet advance.[23]
After the end of the war, Norwegian aid continued, shifting to reconstruction aid. When Norway was itself invaded by the Germans on 9 April 1940, the Finnish government immediately announced that the remaining money set off for Norwegian aid work in Finland could be diverted to use in Norway.[7]
Poland
Poland's Prime Minister Władysław Sikorski, despite the ongoing occupation of Poland (since September 1939), had promised to send support in the form of the Polish Independent Highland Brigade to help the Finns in fighting. The help was organised late, however, and never reached Finland.[25] Nevertheless, six volunteers from Poland fought with the Finns during the war.[26]
Swedish volunteers during the Winter War, carrying Boys anti-tank rifles on their backs.
Sweden, which had declared itself to be a non-belligerent rather than a neutral country (unlike for the rest of World War II wherein Sweden tried to uphold neutrality), contributed military supplies, cash, credits, humanitarian aid and some 8,700 Swedish volunteers prepared to fight for Finland. The Swedish Army, which had been downsizing its armed forces since the 1920s, transferred approximately 1/3 of its equipment to Finland, among them 135,000 rifles and 330 guns and large quantities of ammunition.[27]
A small number of aeroplanes was given to Swedish Voluntary Air Force, in action from 7 January, with 12 Gloster Gladiator II fighters, five Hawker Hart bombers, and eight other planes, amounting to one third of all the Swedish Air Force's fighters at that time. Volunteer pilots and mechanics were drawn from the ranks. The renowned aviator Count Carl Gustaf von Rosen, nephew of Carin Göring, Hermann Göring's first wife, volunteered independently. There was also a volunteer work force of about 900 workers and engineers. In March, the unit was to be reinforced with five Junkers Ju 86 bombers; on 11 March, the bombers were in the Swedish town of Boden with all preparations completed but the end of hostilities on the 13th precluded their deployment.
The Swedish Volunteer Corps, with 8,402 men in Finland—the only common volunteers who had finished training before the war ended—began relieving five Finnish battalions at Märkäjärvi in mid-February. Together with three remaining Finnish battalions, the corps faced two Soviet divisions and were preparing for an attack by mid-March but were inhibited by the peace agreement. Thirty-three men were killed in action, among them the commander of the first relieving unit, Lieutenant ColonelMagnus Dyrssen.
The Swedish volunteers remain a source of dissonance between Swedes and Finns. The domestic debate in Finland had in the years immediately before the war given common Finns hope of considerably more support from Sweden, such as a large force of regular troops, that could have had a significant impact on the outcome of the war—or possibly caused the Soviets not to attack at all. However, the help from volunteers, especially the Scandinavian ones, was appreciated by the Finns. This is shown by the fact that during the Norwegian campaign against the German invasion in April 1940, a Finnish group of volunteers formed an ambulance unit and helped the defenders until forced to return home because of the success of the German armed forces. A group of Swedish and Finnish volunteers also fought alongside Norwegian soldiers against the German invaders near Os, on 2 May as well.
From the Swedish government’s perspective, the voluntary bataillons represented a convenient measure, not only to „canalize“ so-called „activist“ forces within the population, but also to deflect criticism that Sweden was not doing anything to help their neighbouring country.[28] Many Swedish government officials, however, feared that, within the dynamics of the war, the voluntary movement could evolve into a regular military intervention, thereby inevitably dragging Sweden into the conflict. These concerns might have influenced the Swedish government’s initial reluctance to wholeheartedly approve of the volunteers' intentions. Sweden's role seemed to be rather passive overall. Defense Minister Per Edvin Sköld e.g. ruled out that Sweden would train or equip the volunteers, fearing that this step could be perceived as co-belligerent by the Soviets.[29]
Shoulder patch and insignia of British SisuWinter War volunteer unit.
The British government sold the Finnish air force 30 BristolBlenheim bombers and Gloster Gladiator fighters. U.S.-made Brewster B239 fighters came too late to participate in combat missions, and the same applied to ten Hawker Hurricane I fighters. The British government also provided small arms and ammunition, including a large number of Boys anti-tank rifles in 1939 and 1940.
France also sent aircraft, including the Morane Saulnier M.S.406 fighter. In 1940, it was decided to send a new fighter, the Caudron–RenaultC.714. Six C.714s previously marked for shipment to the Polish Air Force were placed in containers and diverted to Le Havre harbour for shipment to Finland. On 12 March 1940, the first six aircraft were already on their way to Finland when news of the armistice between Finland and the Soviet Union was received. At the time deliveries were halted, ten aircraft were in containers at Le Havre waiting to be lifted to the ships and three more were on their way from Paris. The French Army also supplied small arms and ammunition, mostly of obsolete design.
Within a month, the Soviet leadership began to consider abandoning the operation, and on 29 January 1940, via intermediaries in Sweden, Finland's government was approached on the subject of preliminary peace negotiations. Until this point, Finland had fought for its existence as an independent and democratic country. However, at the news that Finland might be forced to cede its territory or sovereignty, public opinion in France and Britain, already favorable to Finland, swung in favor of intervention. When rumors of an armistice reached governments in Paris and London, both decided to offer military support. Although already at war with Nazi Germany, Britain and France put together a combined force of 100 000 troops and 62 bomber aircraft to go to Finland's aid. However this plan was thwarted on 5 March when Sweden refused passage. On 6 March, President Kallio of Finland authorised a Finnish peace delegation.[30]
United States
The Soviet attack was condemned by some Americans, with some businesses refusing to sell supplies to the Soviet Union. Responding to a call from a manufacturer who refused to sell to the aggressor, the American-Russian Chamber of Commerce compared his objections to "[refusing] to sell to a man because he beats his wife".[31]
As late as 1939, it seemed highly improbable that the United States and the Soviet Union would forge an alliance. U.S.-Soviet relations had soured significantly following Stalin's decision to sign a non-aggression pact with Nazi Germany in August 1939.
Following the Soviet occupation of Eastern Poland in September 1939 and the Winter War in November, President Franklin Roosevelt publicly condemned the Soviet Union as a dictatorship and to impose a "moral embargo" on the export of certain products to the Soviet Union.[33][34] Soviet propaganda also claimed that after the Winter War, sanctions were imposed on frozen funds, which were then lifted later, due to Germany's invasion of the USSR on June 22, 1941.[35]:4
The Continuation War, also known as the Second Soviet-Finnish War, was a conflict fought by Finland and Nazi Germany against the Soviet Union during World War II. It began with a Finnish declaration of war and invasion on 25 June 1941 and ended on 19 September 1944 with the Moscow Armistice. The Soviet Union and Finland had previously fought the Winter War from 1939 to 1940, which ended with the Soviet failure to conquer Finland and the Moscow Peace Treaty. Numerous reasons have been proposed for the Finnish decision to invade, with regaining territory lost during the Winter War regarded as the most common. Other justifications for the conflict include Finnish President Risto Ryti's vision of a Greater Finland and Commander-in-Chief Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim's desire to annex East Karelia.
The Finnish Defence Forces (FDF) (Finnish: Puolustusvoimat, Swedish: Försvarsmakten) are the military of Finland. The Finnish Defence Forces consist of the Finnish Army, the Finnish Navy, and the Finnish Air Force. In wartime, the Finnish Border Guard becomes part of the Finnish Defence Forces.
The Winter War was a war between the Soviet Union and Finland. It began with a Soviet invasion of Finland on 30 November 1939, three months after the outbreak of World War II, and ended three and a half months later with the Moscow Peace Treaty on 13 March 1940. Despite superior military strength, especially in tanks and aircraft, the Soviet Union suffered severe losses and initially made little headway. The League of Nations deemed the attack illegal and expelled the Soviet Union.
The Phoney War was an eight-month period at the start of World War II during which there was only one limited military land operation on the Western Front, when French troops invaded Germany's Saar district. Nazi Germany carried out the invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939, and the Phoney period began two days later with the declaration of war by the United Kingdom and France against Germany, after which little actual warfare occurred, and ended with the German invasion of France and the Low Countries on 10 May 1940. Although there was no large-scale military action by Britain and France, they did begin some economic warfare, especially with the naval blockade and shut down German surface raiders. They created elaborate plans for numerous large-scale operations designed to cripple the German war effort. These included opening an Anglo-French front in the Balkans, invading Norway to seize control of Germany's main source of iron ore, and an embargo against the Soviet Union, which supplied Germany's main source of oil. By April 1940, the lone execution of the Norway plan was considered inadequate to stop the German offensive.
The Finnish Army is the land forces branch of the Finnish Defence Forces. The Finnish Army is divided into six branches: the infantry, field artillery, anti-aircraft artillery, engineers, signals, and materiel troops. The commander of the Finnish Army since 1 January 2022 is Lieutenant General Pasi Välimäki.
The Finnish Air Force is one of the branches of the Finnish Defence Forces. Its peacetime tasks are airspace surveillance, identification flights, and production of readiness formations for wartime conditions. The Finnish Air Force was founded on 6 March 1918.
Sweden maintained its policy of neutrality during World War II. When the war began on 1 September 1939, the fate of Sweden was unclear. But by a combination of its geopolitical location in the Scandinavian Peninsula, realpolitik maneuvering during an unpredictable course of events, and a dedicated military build-up after 1942, Sweden kept its official neutrality status throughout the war. At the outbreak of hostilities, Sweden had held a neutral stance in international relations for more than a century, since the end of the Napoleonic Wars in 1814 and the invasion of Norway.
The Winter War was fought in the four months following the Soviet Union's invasion of Finland on 30 November 1939. This took place three months after the German invasion of Poland that triggered the start of World War II in Europe. Sweden did not become actively involved in the conflict, but did indirectly support Finland. The Swedish Volunteer Corps provided 9,640 officers and men. The Swedish Voluntary Air Force also provided 25 aircraft that destroyed twelve Soviet aircraft while only losing six planes with only two to actual enemy action and four to accidents. Sweden also provided a portion of the weapons and equipment used by the Finns throughout the war.
Operation Silver Fox from 29 June to 17 November 1941, was a joint German–Finnish military operation during the Continuation War on the Eastern Front of World War II against the Soviet Union. The objective of the offensive was to cut off and capture the key Soviet Port of Murmansk through attacks from Finnish and Norwegian territory.
The Ryti–Ribbentrop letter of agreement was a personal letter from President of Finland Risto Ryti to German Führer Adolf Hitler signed on 26 June 1944. It was sent during the Soviet Vyborg–Petrozavodsk Offensive, which had started on 9 June and threatened to knock Finland out of the Continuation War.
The occupation of Norway by Nazi Germany during the Second World War began on 9 April 1940 after Operation Weserübung. Conventional armed resistance to the German invasion ended on 10 June 1940, and Nazi Germany controlled Norway until the capitulation of German forces in Europe on 8 May 1945. Throughout this period, a pro-German government named Den nasjonale regjering ruled Norway, while the Norwegian king Haakon VII and the prewar government escaped to London, where they formed a government in exile. Civil rule was effectively assumed by the Reichskommissariat Norwegen, which acted in collaboration with the pro-German puppet government. This period of military occupation is, in Norway, referred to as the "war years", "occupation period" or simply "the war".
The Battle of Salla was fought between Finnish and Soviet troops near Salla in northern Finland during the Winter War. The Soviets had orders to advance through Salla to Kemijärvi and Sodankylä, and from there to Rovaniemi in just two weeks. From there they were to advance to Tornio and cut Finland in two. The Finnish troops managed to stop the Soviet advance just east of Kemijärvi. During the last days of February 1940 the Finnish troops were replaced with the Swedish, Norwegian and Danish volunteers of the Stridsgruppen SFK.
The Interim Peace was a short period in the history of Finland during the Second World War. The term is used for the time between the Winter War and the Continuation War, lasting a little over 15 months, from 13 March 1940 to 24 June 1941. The Moscow Peace Treaty was signed by Finland and the Soviet Union on 12 March 1940 and it ended the 105-day Winter War.
The Hungarian Volunteers in the Winter War travelled to fight for the Finns after the Soviet invasion of Finland in 1939. For a variety of reasons, volunteers from the Kingdom of Hungary fought on the side of Finland during the Winter War (1939–1940) against the Soviet Union.
The Finnish Defence Intelligence Agency is the combined signals (SIGINT), geospatial (GEOINT) and imagery intelligence (IMINT) agency of the Finnish Defence Forces. Operational since 2014, its responsibility is to support the defence of Finland through information gathering and analysis as an intelligence agency, organic to the Intelligence Division of Defence Command.
The background of the Winter War covers the period before the outbreak of the Winter War between Finland and the Soviet Union (1939–1940), which stretches from the Finnish Declaration of Independence in 1917 to the Soviet-Finnish negotiations in 1938–1939.
During the early stages of World War II, the United Kingdom and France made a series of proposals to send troops to assist Finland against the Soviet Union during the Winter War, which started on 30 November 1939. The plans involved the transit of British and French troops and equipment through neutral Norway and Sweden. The initial plans were abandoned because Norway and Sweden declined transit through their land for fear that their countries would be drawn into the war. The Moscow Peace Treaty ended the Winter War in March 1940, which precluded the possibility of intervention.
The aerial warfare in the Winter War was the aerial aspect of the Winter War between Finland and the Soviet Union from 30 November 1939 to 13 March 1940. While the Soviet air forces greatly outnumbered the Finnish Air Force, the Soviet bombing campaign was largely ineffective, and Finnish pilots and antiaircraft gunners inflicted significant losses on the Soviets.
Operation Weserübung was the invasion of Denmark and Norway by Nazi Germany during the Second World War and the opening operation of the Norwegian Campaign.
The Swedish Intervention in the Winter War was a short-lived but successful attempt by the Swedish Volunteer Corps, along with other Nordic volunteers, to prevent a Soviet invasion of Finland during the Winter War. The volunteers only engaged in a few skirmishes on ground and in the air, the only major battles they participated in being the battles of Salla and Honkaniemi. The term "volunteers" have often been used to describe the Nordic military support for Finland in the Winter War, although involvement by the government of Sweden has been debated over time. Nevertheless, the Swedish military sent enormous amounts of aid to Finland, including:
1 2 Sørensen, Svein H. (2001). Garnisonsgammen i Svanvik – og glimt fra grensevakten i mellomkrigstida (in Norwegian). Oslo: Norwegian Armed Forces Museum. p.41. ISBN82-91218-25-0.
Cox, Geoffrey (1941) The Red Army Moves (Victor Gollancz, London).
Engle, Eloise & Paananen, Lauri (1992). The Winter War: The Soviet Attack on Finland 1939–1940. Stackpole Books. ISBN0-8117-2433-6.
Jakobson, Max (1961). The Diplomacy of the Winter War: An Account of the Russo-Finnish War, 1939–1940. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press.
Öhquist, Harald (1949). Talvisota minun näkökulmastani. Helsinki: WSOY. (in Finnish)
Ries, Tomas (1988). Cold Will: Defence of Finland. Brassey's. ISBN0-08-033592-6.
Schwartz, Andrew J. (1960). America and the Russo-Finnish War. Washington, D.C.: Public Affairs Press.
Tanner, Väinö (1957) The Winter War: Finland against Russia 1939–1940 Stanford University Press, California; also London.
Trotter, William R. (2002) [First published 1991 in the United States under the title A Frozen Hell: The Russo–Finnish Winter War of 1939–40]. The Winter war: The Russo–Finno War of 1939–40 (5thed.). New York (Great Britain: London): Workman Publishing Company (Great Britain: Aurum Press). ISBN1-85410-881-6.
Upton, Anthony F. (1974). Finland 1939–1940 (University of Delaware Press, Newark: part of series The Politics and Strategy of the Second World War) ISBN0-87413-156-1
Van Dyke, Carl (1997). The Soviet Invasion of Finland, 1939–40. Frank Cass Publishers. ISBN0-7146-4314-9.
Vehviläinen, Olli (2002). Finland in the Second World War: Between Germany and Russia. New York: Palgrave. ISBN0-333-80149-0.
Ruprecht, Antal (2003). Magyar önkéntesek a Téli háborúban [Hungarian volunteers in the Winter War]. Hadtörténeti Intézet és Múzeum, Budapest (text in Hungarian and Finnish).
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