Finland, located in the north of Europe, is a relatively special country in the geopolitical landscape of Europe. During the Cold War, European countries were divided into two camps, capitalism and socialism. The peculiarity of Finland is that Finland is a capitalist country, but it borders the big brother of the socialist camp of the Soviet Union. Finland was one of only two European capitalist countries on the border with the Soviet Union at the time. After the drastic changes in Eastern Europe and the collapse of the Soviet Union, the countries of the former Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc turned to the Western countries. Poland, Ukraine and other countries have friction with Russia because of their proximity to the West, but Finland can maintain a balance between Russia and the West.
There is a claim circulating on the Internet that Finns are genetically closest to Chinese. In fact, more than 10,000 years ago, there have been signs of human activity in the territory of present Finland. For a long time the Finns did not establish their own state, but remained in a primitive commune state. In 1362 neighboring Sweden had developed into the first nordic power, while Finland was occupied by Sweden during this period. After the Russian Empire defeated Sweden in 1809, Finland became a grand duchy under the Tsar. Although Finland and Russia were ruled by the same tsar, they were two countries that honored the same monarch. This is not unusual in European history.
Finland has retained not only its language, religion and customs, but also its own parliament, constitution and currency. Although the Tsar was an absolute monarch in Russia, in Finland he was a constitutional monarch subject to the Finnish Constitution, so the Tsar could not do as he did in Russia. The problem is that the rules are dead, and whether they are obeyed or not is another matter. In the beginning, the Tsar kept Finland firmly in his hands in order to eliminate Swedish influence on Finland, and he consciously took the initiative to abide by the autonomy agreement with Finland. After the Napoleonic Wars, Tsarist Russia, as the victorious power, became a European gendarme and began to vigorously suppress national democratic movements across Europe.
During this period, Tsarist Russia gradually increased its control over Finland and eventually completed its annexation of Finland. Since then, Finland has been officially incorporated into the territory of the Russian Empire. In 1917, the February And October Revolutions broke out in Russia. After the fall of the Tsarist government, the Parliament of the Socialist Party of Finland declared that since nicholas II's powers no longer existed, the Finnish Parliament had the power to make, approve and promulgate all Finnish laws, as well as the power to appoint the Finnish government. On 4 December 1917 the Finnish Parliament declared Finland an independent republic. The Russian Soviet government led by Lenin and many governments around the world recognized Finland's independence.
The new Soviet power established by Lenin at that time was faced with a situation in which there was the restoration activities of the remnants of the Tsarist White Army and the interference of imperialist forces on the outside. At the same time, the Russian national economy suffered heavy losses during the previous World War I and the February and October Revolutions. The Soviet regime recognized Finland's independence in a state of disarray, but was unable to reach agreement on the demarcation of the border between the two countries. This laid the groundwork for the subsequent dispute between the two sides. At that time, Finland also established an organization called the Central Revolutionary Committee under the influence of the October Revolution in Russia. On 28 January 1918 the Finnish Revolutionary Committee announced the launch of an uprising. On 29 January, the Workers' Red Guards occupied important state institutions in Finland.
Since the Finnish Revolutionary Committee was established under the influence of the October Revolution in Russia, the Finnish government believed that the rebellion initiated by the Finnish Revolutionary Committee may have been supported by Soviet Russia. The Finnish government sought German support in order to suppress the actions of the Revolutionary Committee. After the October Revolution, although Soviet Russia had withdrawn from the war with Germany, Germany still had a lingering fear of the behemoths on the Eastern Front, so it was natural to hope that Russia would be as completely divided as possible. Finnish government forces, with german support, eventually suppressed the revolution. On May 16, 1918 calendar year ended with the 3-month Finnish War of Independence. Subsequently, the Government of Finland signed a political and military agreement with Germany.
However, mannerheim, commander-in-chief of the Finnish government forces, believed that Germany's defeat was a foregone conclusion by this time and opposed the government's policy of defecting to Germany. After Germany's defeat in late 1918, the pro-German Sven Hoowood resigned as regent and Mannerheim succeeded him as Finland's supreme leader. Mannerheim eliminated German influence in the Finnish army and repaired Finland's relations with the victorious powers such as Britain and France. At this time, the only diplomatic tension in Finland was Soviet Russia in the east. Finland did not reach a border agreement with the nascent Soviet regime when it became independent from Russia, so Finland has been in territorial disputes with its eastern neighbors since the day of its independence.
The civil war between the government forces and the Revolutionary Committee during Finland's independence was also seen as an element of Soviet intervention. Therefore, Finland's relations with Soviet Russia after independence have always been quite delicate. By the 1930s, with the rise of Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union tried to expand its sphere of influence in Eastern and Northern Europe as a strategic buffer between it and Nazi Germany. On August 23, 1939, the Soviet Union and Germany signed the Soviet-German Non-Aggression Pact. The Soviet Union placed Finland in its sphere of influence in the treaty. On 30 November 1939 the Soviet Union launched an offensive against Finland. After the outbreak of the war, the Finns took advantage of their home battles to familiarize themselves with the terrain and climate to give the Soviets a head-on blow.
The Soviet Union invested a huge number of troops in the Soviet-Finnish War, but it paid a heavy price of 375491 casualties, which led to great damage to the country's reputation. In the end, the Soviet Union failed to achieve its original goal of conquering all of Finland. Finland not only retained its sovereignty in this battle, but also won international prestige. However, Finland was still unable to resist the powerful Soviet army, and the Soviet-Finnish War ended in a crushing Victory for the Soviet Army: the Soviet Army forced Finland to cede and lease part of its territory after paying a heavy casualty price; and the Finnish side successfully defended the country's independence. Another side effect of the Soviet-Finnish war was that Finland began to approach Nazi Germany in an attempt to resist the Soviet Union.
The German side believes that the Performance of the Soviet Union in the Soviet-Finnish War fully proves the Soviet Union's external strength and central cadres. This strengthened Nazi Germany's determination to launch a war of aggression against the Soviet Union. At 3:45 a.m. on June 22, 1941, Nazi Germany and its vassals launched a full-line offensive against the Soviet Union, while Germany began to enlist Finland's threat to the Leningrad region of the Soviet Union on the Northern Front. At the end of June 1941 Finland joined the German side in the war. Finland, however, refused to publicly recognize its alliance with Germany, only that it was a "joint battle" with the Germans. Finland participated only in military operations against the Soviet Union, not in the German war with the Allies on the Western Front, or in the Axis bloc led by Germany, Japan, and Italy.
Even Finland stopped fighting the Soviet Union after recovering disputed areas with the Soviet Union. Germany repeatedly demanded that Finland join in the attack on Leningrad, but the Finnish side remained unmoved. The president of Finland at the time warned his countrymen: "Small countries have no emotional capital." If we follow Hitler and beat the Soviet Union to the ground, it will only make the resentment between the two sides grow." Finland exercised restraint at this time in order to keep a line of human feelings. It proved that it was Finland's restraint that allowed it to maintain its independence after World War II. After World War II, the Soviet Union had wanted to liquidate Finland, but the move was resisted by the Western bloc, led by the United States.
Finland was only involved in military operations against the Soviet Union during the war, so Finland did not have any deep hatred with the Western bloc. The dispute between Finland and the Soviet Union is justified and justified if it stands on its own stand: the Soviet side of course believes that Finland's act of following the German army to the Soviet union's territory during World War II is an act of aggression, but the Finnish side believes that it is fighting in the areas that are already disputed between the two countries. These areas were considered by the Soviet Union to be its own territory, but Finland thought it was recovering lost territory. Finland did not follow the Germans in further attacking the Soviet Union after achieving its goal of "recovering lost territory".
It was this restraint that allowed Finland to avoid overstimulating the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union was of course somewhat hostile to Finland at the time, but it was not as hateful as it was to Nazi Germany. Eventually, the Soviet Union and the West bargained and preserved Finland as a strategic buffer zone between the two sides. Although Finland was able to maintain its independence, the Soviet Union punished it to some extent. At the Tehran Conference in late World War II, Stalin advocated the restoration of Finnish lands acquired by the Soviet Union in 1940 and proposed that Finland should further cede the Bechaimo region as compensation for following Germany in the war of aggression against the Soviet Union. This would also allow the Soviet Union to gain a border with Norway.
The Soviet-Finnish Armistice Agreement, concluded on 19 September 1944, provided that the Soviet-Finnish border would largely return to the boundary laid down in the 1940 Peace Treaty, while Finland further ceded the province of Bechaimo to the Soviet Union. Only 313 miles of the 820-mile-long Sufinnish border remain in the same state as it was in 1920. The Soviet Union thus acquired 45,840 square kilometers of land from Finland. The Soviet Union demanded that Finland pay $600 million in compensation to the Soviet Union at the same time as it ceded land, and later the Soviet Union agreed to reduce the amount of reparations to $300 million under the mediation of Britain and the United States. Finland also had to dismantle its permanent fortifications and military installations in the Soviet-Finnish border area. The Finnish government at the time simply couldn't come up with $300 million.
But Finland does not dare to say that it cannot afford to lose. Because Finland only said that it could not afford to lose, then the Soviet army directly drove over. Finland almost mobilized a national donation to pay this reparations. Many people even took out their own wedding rings at the time. This is a great shame for a country. But if you don't agree, you will have to bear the danger of national destruction. In the end, Finland, a small country, survived the tenacity of the government and people: Finnish people fought in the war at the age of 54 and then to 16 years old; soldiers rushed up to fight tanks without weapons. After the defeat of the war, everyone paid compensation together - the government's treasury, the people's homes smashed pots and sold iron, and finally paid off the huge amount of reparations.
The Finns lost their teeth and swallowed them in order to preserve their independence. But then you have to be careful to serve the big guys in the east and west at the same time. Finland's independence was essentially the product of a game between the Soviet Union and the West, otherwise the Finns would not have been able to hold their country no matter how tenaciously they clenched their teeth. Since Finland was retained as a strategic buffer zone between the Soviet Union and the West, it was necessary to maintain a balanced foreign policy between the two sides at all times. Although Finland practiced a similar system to the West in its country's political and economic system, it was careful in its foreign policy to balance the West and the Soviet Union rather than irritate either side.
In 1948, the Soviet Union and Finland signed the Finnish-Soviet Agreement on Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Assistance in Moscow. It was this paper agreement that tied Finland to the Soviet chariot. Although Finland maintained a Western system, it was the Soviet Union's lead in international affairs. Western countries also know that Finland is a geographically helpless choice. The Western countries, led by the United States, have acquiesced to this situation, but at the same time they are constantly improving Finland's economy and strengthening their influence on Finland through various means. During the Cold War, Finland, as a capitalist country, was psychologically more inclined to the Western camp, but diplomatically it was always necessary to maintain a strategic balance between the West and the Soviet Union.
As a result, Finland, a capitalist country, never joined NATO or the European Union during the Cold War. Maintaining independence with a neutral diplomatic line and parliamentary democracy and a capitalist economy became Finland's established national policy. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Finland took advantage of Russia's internal affairs to join the European Union. Although the EU is also an international organization formed by Western countries, it also squeezes Russia's strategic space. But after all, the EU is still an economic organization, so Russia can still accept it. If Finland joins a political-military organization like NATO, it means that there is no longer a strategic buffer zone between NATO and Russia. There will be a direct confrontation between the two sides, and Finland will be at the forefront of the confrontation.
This is obviously not something finland is happy to see, so Finland has not joined NATO so far. Finland pursues a policy of military non-alignment and independent and reliable defence as a permanently neutral country: finland has cooperated increasingly closely with NATO in recent years, and on the other hand, it has been careful to avoid an impact on Russia. In international affairs, we should try our best to avoid getting involved in conflicts between major powers. Finland, which is also at the forefront of the geopolitical game between Russia and the West, stands in stark contrast to Ukraine: Ukraine's current turmoil is obvious to all, while Finland is a developed country known for its high welfare.