History: World War II Photography, Finnish Defense Forces, Finland

Although Finland did not achieve full national independence until 1917, its current military traditions goes back more than 300 years. As an integrated part of the kingdom of Sweden, Finland supplied the Swedish armies not only with drafted foot soldiers, but also with highly qualified officers. Contributing as much as one-third of the manpower of the Swedish armed forces, the Finnish infantry and cavalry distinguished themselves at a time when Sweden was playing a decisive role in European power politics. The setbacks that Sweden eventually suffered in Europe were explained by the Finns, with considerable justification, as mistakes that had been made by the Swedish kings on the political level. The performance of the Finns on various battlefields had justified their reputation for bravery and their confidence in their own martial abilities.
With the decline of Swedish power in the eighteenth century, the Finns were called upon to defend the country's borders to the east against the traditional enemy, Russia. On three major occasions, Russian armies occupied parts of the country for a number of years before eventually being driven out by Finnish and Swedish forces. When Finland became the Grand Duchy of Finland in the Russian Empire in 1809 as a consequence of the Finnish War (1808-1809), the Finnish units of the Swedish army were disbanded.
The first indigenous Finnish military elements of three light infantry regiments were raised at the time of Napoleon's eastward drive in 1812, but during most of the nineteenth century, the only Finnish military force was a guards battalion paid for by the tsar. Finns were specifically exempted from Russian conscription, but more than 3,000 of them, mostly from the aristocracy, served in the tsarist armies between 1809 and 1917.
The Finnish Military Academy at Hamina continued to turn out officers who served with distinction in the Imperial Russian Army, a disproportionate number rising to the rank of general.