The Winter War

	The Winter War 1. Read about the Winter War on Wikipedia. 2. Watch Finnish news footage from the Winter war. 3. Listen to actual radio reports on the Finnish-Russian war: December 01, 1939 Report on the defense of Finland December 18, 1939 Reports on the Russo-Finnish front December 20, 1939 Report on Swedish volunteers going to Finland 4. International News photo of Finnnish ski soldiers dated 10-9-1939. a. Front of photo b. Back of photo with caption 5. Socialism, Communism, and Finnish-Americans Socialism and Communism have long been part of the Finnish heritage. Many Finns embrace Socialism and Communism, while others stand firmly against them. The Koski family has historically been strongly opposed to both Socialism and Communism. Indeed, Alfred Koski and his siblings were sent from Finland as children in large part because their parents did not want their children to grow up under the influence of Socialism. But some Finns have always embraced Socialism and Communism. In the later 1930s, a significant number of Finnish-Americans emmigrated to the Soviet Union to join the growing Communist movement. Some of those Finnish-Americans were from the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Moving to the Soviet Union in the 1930s turned out to be a serious mistake as many of those people were killed during the purges. They may have been Communists, but they were also foreigners and were not trusted by Stalin's regime. For more information, including a partial list of some of the Finnish-Americans who were killed in the purges, see this Web page by John Earl Hanyes.
	Copyright 2007 by Dan Oja