Finns pay €200 to write anti-Russian messages on Ukrainian shells

Moscow’s last attempt to invade Finland may have ended in an
embarrassing bloodbath more than 80 years ago, but memories seem to live long
in the Nordic state.
A former colonel in Finnish military intelligence whose
father was wounded by Soviet Union artillery fire in 1940 is one of hundreds of
Finns who have paid to write messages on shells used to bombard Russian
positions in Ukraine.
SignMyRocket.com, a non-profit organisation that raises
funds for the Ukrainian armed forces by allowing supporters to sponsor
munitions, said Finland had emerged as its biggest source of donations after
the US.
After spending decades as a byword for wary neutrality and
handling first the Soviet Union and then Russia with extreme care, Finland has
been galvanised by President Putin’s onslaught in Ukraine.
The country has applied to join Nato, announced a €2 billion
increase in defence spending, and sent the Ukrainians 11 packages of military
kit worth a total of roughly €190 million, including anti-tank rockets.
The public has been squarely behind this policy shift, with
58 per cent calling for an even bigger military budget, 85 per cent saying they
are worried about Russia and 83 per cent saying Finnish territory should be
defended at any cost.
A number of prominent Finns have gone so far as to pay
SignMyRocket at least €200 apiece to have their messages inscribed on Ukraine’s
155mm artillery shells.
Martti J Kari, the former assistant head of Finland’s
military intelligence, who is now a professor at the University of Jyvaskyla,
chose the words: “Merry Christmas from the Kari family!”
He wrote on Twitter:“In February 1940, my father was injured
by a shell fragment while fighting off Russian aggression in the [Karelian]
Isthmus. Our family had the chance to fire a 155mm artillery shell with a
letter of dedication at the aggressors attacking Bakhmut [a Ukrainian town
currently besieged by Russian forces] this Christmas. Now we are even.”
Sofi Oksanen, a novelist and dramatist sometimes likened to
a Finnish equivalent of Margaret Atwood, also conjured up memories of Finland’s
Winter War against the Soviet Union invaders with her artillery shell.
“This year the money I would have spent on fireworks went to
this kind of rocket to defend Ukraine from Russian aggression,” Oksanen
tweeted.
“And I have a feeling also my Finnish grandfather (veteran
of Winter War and War of Continuation) sent his wishes with me, and so did my
Estonian grandfather, a forest brother [anti-Soviet partisan], and my Estonian
grandmother’s brothers, who died while hunted by NKVD [Soviet secret police].”
Not everyone in Finland is comfortable about the sudden
outpouring of sentiment against the Russian military. Helsingin Sanomat, the
country’s leading newspaper, suggested some of the messages might have crossed
a line between justified moral outrage and dehumanising indignation.
Kati Parppei, a Russian history lecturer, told the newspaper
that there had been a resurgence of Finland’s ancient “Russophobia” and the old
“spirit of revenge”.