Finnish Neutrality

Press, Volume C, Issue 29681, 27 November 1961, Page 14

Finnish Neutrality

Few small countries have struggled so strenuously for neutrality—or against such an antagonist—as Finland, whose President (Mr Kekkonen) last week met Mr Khrushchev in Siberia to review relations with the Soviet Union. A Finnish historian, Max Jakobson, recently wrote of the 1939 Soviet - Finnish negotiations: “There is a “ permanent Finnish-Rus-“sian agenda, and it has “ only one item: how to “ reconcile the stubborn “ Finnish will to inde-

“pendence with the Great “Power ambitions of Rus“aia". Two Russian invasions and the tragedy of a forced alliance with Hitler’s Reich failed to crush the Finns; but their continued existence as a corporate nation on the fringe of the Soviet bloc has been secured only through the guarded yet courageous diplomacy in which Mr Kekkonen's predecessor, President Paasikivi, was expert. Mr Khrushchev’s

agreement to postpone the military consultations for which Russia has been pressing (and which might have resulted in the stationing of Russian troops on Finnish territory) testifies to Mr Kekkonen's own abilities as a negotiator. Finland is important not only to the loosely-organ-ised system of the Nordic bloc, but to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, whose Baltic strategy depends upon stabilising the frontiers of Communist encroachment. If Finland were absorbed by Russia in the same way as Estonia, Latvia. and Lithuania, Sweden might be compelled to Join Norway, Denmark, and Iceland in the Atlantic Alliance. President Kekkonen holds fast to his policy of protecting Finland (and thus its Nordic partners) by an almost aggressive neutrality, tempered with enough Eastern bias to attract support from foreign Communists —notably “ deflationists ” such as the Jugoslavs—and criticism from Western purists. It is an uncomfortable policy, the need for which was carefully explained by President Kekkonen on his American tour only last month. German militarism is the fear exploited most often by Russian propagandists in their attempts to weaken Scandinavian regard for the West The renewal of Russian pressure on Finland is based upon the RussianFinnish friendship and mutual assistance pact of 1948. which gives Russia the right to "aid'* Finland on Finnish soil if Germany or any of its allies invades either Finland or Russia through Finland. The Russians' demands may man that war with the West over Berlin is expected, or at least postulated in Rus-

sian military theory. Alternatively, they may be designed to disrupt current plans for reorganising N.A.T.O. defences in the Baltic, where the strongest NA.T.O. naval force is now West Germany’s. Again, they may indicate what Mr Khrushchev has in mind when he talks longingly about “ areas of disengage- “ ment disciplined satellites, obedient to Moscow’s dictates.

Though ruled by a minority Government in defiance of the country’s strongest

party the Communists Finland has kept sufficient freedom to escape satellite status. In response to recent Russian outbursts, President Kekkonen promptly decided to dissolve the

Agrarian Government, advance the elections to February, and thus try to establish an administration

capable of interpreting more

resolutely the Paasikivi doctrine of neutrality and peaceful co-existence with Russia. His meeting with Mr Khrushchev may have allayed Russian misgivings caused by Finnish contacts with the West. The Finns doubtless regard the projected increase of economic ties with Russia as a small price to pay for exemption from heavier Russian impositions; but every such concession by Finland saps its capacity to resist pressure, economic, political, or military.