this post was submitted on 20 Oct 2024
240 points (98.8% liked)
HistoryPorn
4730 readers
643 users here now
If you would like to become a mod in this community, kindly PM the mod.
Relive the Past in Jaw-Dropping Detail!
HistoryPorn is for photographs (or, if it can be found, film) of the past, recent or distant! Give us a little snapshot of history!
Rules
- Be respectful and inclusive.
- No harassment, hate speech, or trolling.
- Engage in constructive discussions.
- Share relevant content.
- Follow guidelines and moderators' instructions.
- Use appropriate language and tone.
- Report violations.
- Foster a continuous learning environment.
- No genocide or atrocity denialism.
Pictures of old artifacts and museum pieces should go to History Artifacts
Illustrations and paintings should go to History Drawings
Related Communities:
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Damn, I wonder why the Finns would ally with the nazis after being brutally attacked just a few years earlier
The Finns knew beyond doubt about the Holocaust, and they chose to help the nation enacting it out of self interest.
Cope.
You'd be better off pointing out that the President and fascist sympathizer that enacted that alliance was put on trial when the Finns swapped sides after they saw the Nazis were losing and convicted for his crimes, and that they, like Franco and some nations in the Balkans, mostly didn't comply with Nazi demands to hand over their Jewish population, so in terms of "Aiding the Holocaust" guilt they're somewhere between Vichy France and Fascist Italy.
The idea that Risto Ryti was a fascist sympathizer is... a reach.
Finland is... between Vichy France and Fascist Italy in Holocaust guilt?
Vichy France and Fascist Italy both gleefully shipped off their Jewish populations to be murdered. The Finns took a horrific side, but at no point did they give up their own Jewish citizens to the Nazis.
Vichy France and Fascist Italy were both much more gruesome and eager collaborators.
Finland is slightly better than the Soviet Union in that their Nazi collaboration was in response to a mass campaign of ethnic cleansing (of almost half a million Finns expelled by the Soviets after the unjustified aggression of the Winter War) rather than preceded by a mass campaign of ethnic cleansing (of Poles in the USSR by the Soviets before the joint Nazi-Soviet invasion of Poland). Both remain unconscionable.
1: If "sympathizer" is a reach it's only because "collaborator and ally" is more damning and accurate.
2: And Italy was divided enough over fascism to fight a civil war and have a native resistance when offered a chance, instead of swapping sides when it was clear their preferred side was losing. They still willingly and knowingly enabled the Holocaust, and a war with the Soviets that they knew was both ideologically and racially motivated with plans for extermination and mass slavery.
If you'd like some reading on the topic of their knowing collaboration with the Nazi plans:
https://humanityinaction.org/knowledge_detail/helsinki-on-the-brink-finland-and-the-holocaust-era/
I think they do a pretty good job of staying as unbiased as possible in it.
3: It wasn't an ethnic cleansing, it was a voluntary evacuation.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evacuation_of_Finnish_Karelia
Though, of course, that half a million people voluntarily evacuated rather than being part of Stalin's USSR says a lot in itself.