Finland and the Memory of War

Abstract. The 20th century proved to be a tumultuous period in the history of both Russia and Finland. Finland began the century as a grand duchy of the Russian empire, but by the time it was over Finland had gained its independence, fought two full-scale wars against its former mother country, and seen it revert from Russia into the Soviet Union and back again. Perceptions of this troubled, shared history still tend to be contradictory among modern Finns and Russians. The legacy of the mainly antagonistic historical relationship seems to be a number of open questions and sources of bitterness. In this article I will summarize the sensitive historical issues in the Finnish-Russian recent past. As a professional historian I will sketch out the way things looked like in Finnish eyes. Histories of both Russia and Finland are entangled to each other, and the only way to heal the wounds dealt by the past is to confront the past – in all its contradiction and ambiguity.

Keywords: Second World War, Finland, Soviet Union, Finnish-Soviet wars, memory.