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The Swedish Volunteer Battalion (Swedish : Svenska frivilligbataljonen, SFB) or the Hanko Battalion was a Swedish military unit consisting of 1,000 volunteers, including 800 Swedes, which participated in the siege of the Soviet naval fleet in the Battle of Hanko during the Continuation War of Finland.
The Gulf of Finland is the easternmost arm of the Baltic Sea. It extends between Finland to the north and Estonia to the south, to Saint Petersburg in Russia to the east, where the river Neva drains into it. Other major cities around the gulf include Helsinki and Tallinn. The eastern parts of the Gulf of Finland belong to Russia, and some of Russia's most important oil harbors are located farthest in, near Saint Petersburg. As the seaway to Saint Petersburg, the Gulf of Finland has been and continues to be of considerable strategic importance to Russia. Some of the environmental problems affecting the Baltic Sea are at their most pronounced in the shallow gulf. Proposals for a tunnel through the gulf have been made.
The International Brigades were military units set up by the Communist International to assist the Popular Front government of the Second Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War. The organization existed for two years, from 1936 until 1938. It is estimated that during the entire war, between 40,000 and 59,000 members served in the International Brigades, including some 10,000 who died in combat. Beyond the Spanish Civil War, "International Brigades" is also sometimes used interchangeably with the term foreign legion in reference to military units comprising foreigners who volunteer to fight in the military of another state, often in times of war.
The Swedish Armed Forces are the armed forces of the Kingdom of Sweden, tasked with the defence of the country as well as with promoting Sweden's wider interests, supporting international peacekeeping, and providing humanitarian aid. It consists of four service branches: the Swedish Army, the Swedish Air Force and the Swedish Navy, as well as a military reserve force, the Home Guard. Since 1994, all Swedish military branches are organised within a single unified government agency, the Swedish Armed Forces Headquarters, which is headed by the Supreme Commander, even though the individual services maintain their distinct identities.
Hanko is a port town and municipality on the southern coast of Finland, located 130 kilometres (80 mi) west of Helsinki and 35 kilometres (22 mi) south-west of Ekenäs. It is the town centre of Raseborg. Its current population is 7,718. The town is bilingual, with a majority being Finnish speakers and a strong minority being Swedish speakers (43%).
The Jäger Movement consisted of volunteers from Finland who trained in Germany as Jägers during World War I. Supported by Germany to enable the creation of a Finnish sovereign state, the movement was one of many means by which Germany intended to weaken Russia and to cause Russia's loss of its western provinces and dependencies.
The Moscow Peace Treaty was signed by Finland and the Soviet Union on 12 March 1940, and the ratifications were exchanged on 21 March. It marked the end of the 105-day Winter War, upon which Finland ceded border areas to the Soviet Union. The treaty was signed by Vyacheslav Molotov, Andrei Zhdanov and Aleksandr Vasilevsky for the Soviet Union, and Risto Ryti, Juho Kusti Paasikivi, Rudolf Walden and Väinö Voionmaa for Finland. The terms of the treaty were not reversed after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The Karelian question refers to the debate within Finland over the possible reacquisition of this ceded territory.
Hyvinkää is a city and municipality of Finland. It is located in the Uusimaa region, approximately 50 kilometres (30 mi) north of the capital Helsinki. The city was chartered in 1960. The population of Hyvinkää is 46,903. Its neighboring municipalities are Riihimäki and Hausjärvi in the north, Mäntsälä in the east, Tuusula and Nurmijärvi in the south, and Vihti and Loppi in the west.
The Hanko Peninsula, also spelled Hango, is the southernmost point of mainland Finland. The soil is a sandy moraine, the last tip of the Salpausselkä ridge, and vegetation consists mainly of pine and low shrubs. The peninsula is known for its beautiful archipelago and long sandy beaches.
Panzergrenadier, abbreviated as PzG (WWII) or PzGren (modern), meaning "Armour"-ed fighting vehicle "Grenadier", is the German term for the military doctrine of mechanized infantry units in armoured forces who specialize in fighting from and in conjunction with infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs) – that is, armoured troop carriers designed to carry a mechanized squad of six to eight soldiers into, during and out of combat while providing direct fire support for those troops.
From 1941 to 1943, 1,408 Finns volunteered for service on the Eastern Front of World War II in the Waffen-SS, in units of the SS Division Wiking. Most of these volunteers served as motorized infantry in the Finnish Volunteer Battalion of the Waffen-SS. The unit was disbanded in mid-1943 as the volunteers' two-year commitment had expired and the Finnish government was unwilling to allow more men to volunteer. In 1944-1945 a company sized unit of Finnish defectors recruited to the SS continued fighting alongside Germany.
The Battle of Gangut took place on 27 JulyJul./ 7 August 1714Greg. during the Great Northern War (1700–1721), in the waters of Riilahti Bay, north of the Hanko Peninsula, near the site of the modern-day city of Hanko, Finland, between the Swedish Navy and Imperial Russian Navy. It was the first important victory of the Russian fleet in its history. It is commemorated in Russia as one of the Days of Military Honour.
The Battle of Hanko was a lengthy series of small battles fought on Hanko Peninsula during the Continuation War between Finland and the Soviet Union in the second half of 1941. As both sides were eager to avoid a major, costly ground battle, fighting took the form of trench warfare, with artillery exchanges, sniping, patrol clashes, and small amphibious operations performed in the surrounding archipelago. A volunteer Swedish battalion served with Finnish forces in the siege. The last Soviet troops left the peninsula in December 1941.
Edvard Immanuel Hjelt was a Finnish chemist, politician and a member of the Senate of Finland. Hjelt studied chemistry in Finland and in Germany and became rector of the University of Helsinki in 1899. He opposed the increasing influence of Russia in the Grand Duchy of Finland and started his career in politics. Good connections to Germany created during his chemistry studies before and after his graduation made it possible for him to get military help during the Finnish Civil War. Hjelt organized the training of the Finnish Jäger troops in Germany.
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 traveled to Finland to join Finland's forces: 8,700 Swedes, 1,010 Danes, about 1,000 Estonians, 850 Ukrainians, 725 Norwegians, 372 Ingrians, 366 Hungarians, 346 Finnish expatriates, more than 20 Latvians and 190 volunteers of other nationalities made it to Finland before the war was over.
24th Separate Assault Battalion "Aidar" (Ukrainian: 24-й окремий штурмовий батальйон «Айдар», 24 ОШБ）, also known as the Aidar Battalion, is an assault battalion of the Ukrainian Ground Forces.
Carl Johan Korsman was a Finnish shipowner and military officer.
Ukrainian volunteer battalions were militias and paramilitary groups mobilized as a response to the perceived state of weakness and unwillingness of the regular Armed Forces to counter rising separatism in spring 2014. They trace their origins to the "Maidan Self-Defense" militias formed during the Euromaidan in 2013. The earliest of these volunteer units were later formalized into military, special police and paramilitary formations in a response to the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Most of the formations were formed or placed under command of the Ministry of Internal Affairs — as "Special Tasks Patrol Police" — and Ministry of Defence — as "Territorial defence battalions". A minority of battalions were independent of state control.
Antti Isotalo was a Finnish Jäger lieutenant, military recruiter, farmer and activist. He served in the German Empire's battalion of Finnish volunteers on the Eastern Front of World War I and briefly in the Finnish Civil War (1918) on the Whites' side. He repeatedly evaded capture by authorities while recruiting men for the battalion in 1915 and 1916. After recovering from wounds sustained in the civil war, he recruited volunteers for the Estonian War of Independence and then joined the Aunus expedition as one of its commanders during Finland's "tribal wars" in 1919.
Carl-Olof Wrang was a Swedish Army lieutenant colonel. Wrang joined the Waffen-SS in 1939 but deserted and instead fought the Soviets in Finland during the Winter War. Wrang also participated in the Continuation War and saw action in the Battle of Hanko. After the war, Wrang re-entered the Swedish Army and was placed in the reserve in 1946. He worked as a factory manager for a few years, before resuming his military career. Wrang served as commanding officer of the Swedish Army Paratroop School in the late-1950s and served as a UN observer in Kashmir and with the Swedish battalions during the Congo Crisis and during the Cyprus dispute in the 1960s. He retired in 1977.
The Lappohja railway station is located in the town of Hanko, Finland, in the village of Lappohja. It is located along the Karis–Hanko railway, and its neighboring stations are Skogby in the east and Santala in the west.
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