Spies and the battle for Finnish green gold

Text:

Harald Olausen

The battle for the Finnish forest industry between Germany, the Soviet Union and Great Britain between the First and Second World Wars is an almost unknown sensitive topic that is not discussed publicly but has played an important and far-reaching role in Finland's economic policy decisions before and after the Second World War. The problem is the "conscious scarcity" of the material, perhaps partly because of its sensitivity, partly because the events were skillfully planned and carried out by state intelligence operations. What is important in this article is how past was understood and still is understood, as well as reading memoirs on the subject between the lines, as the arguments and arguments in them can be examined in everyday practice on the basis of their hidden intentions regarding espionage but without falling into the rhetorical traps set by their performers.

Among commercial agents many were spies, such as Ivan Maiski of the Soviet Union - perhaps one of the most cunning and dangerous spies of the turn of the 20th and 19th centuries. GPU and Comintern functions (-1). The Finnish author Mika Waltari explains this in more detail in his book "Soviet Espionage in Finland" (Otava 1994). A lot of high-quality research has been written on Soviet espionage in Finland. The Soviet Union wanted and got the best forests of East Karelia for itself after the Continuation War. Often, however, the Soviet espionage was so transparent and the counter-espionage of the Finnish Central Detective Police so effective that the Soviet espionage were trapped right from the start. NKVD's best-known spies Boris Jartsev and Jelisei Jelisejev caused a lot of problems and tried to build an extensive spy network in Finland. As early as 1930, Stalin had commissioned the Red Army to plan the conquest of Finland. The espionage activities were led by Vasily Terntjev, who was formally engaged in commercial duties at the time. With a decision at the level of the Politburo in August 1940, he was tasked with building a spy network in Finland with which Stalin sought the final solution to the Finnish question in the way he wanted (0).

Much has been written about intelligence services and spies, both fact and fiction. The problem is the intelligent delusions [ta1] [oo2] of successful projects that we know little about. When searching on the subject on Amazon and Google, you will notice how many works seem to deal with the Gestapo's activities within Germany and its unoccupied territories. This year, two fascinating opuses will appear, including Al Ciminon's Nazi Sex Spies: True Stories of Seduction, Subterfuge and State Secrets, and Rhoddri Jeffrey-Jones 'Ring of Spies: How MI5 and the FBI brought down Nazis in America, but these are not directly related to my topic. However, descriptions of the ways and patterns in which German spies have operated can be found in these books, and perhaps the same features can be observed in German operations in relation to the Finnish forest industry as in German spy operations elsewhere.

Since the 16th century, Finland and the other Nordic countries have belonged to the German sphere of infuence in one way or another socially, culturally and politically. The activities and writings of Count van der Goltz finally confirmed this to Finnish politicians in 1918 (1). The North was part of Germany's interests, and the Huvudstadsbladet[ta3] [oo4] (The Germans are well aware that Finland has historically belonged to its own sphere of interest, so suffice it to say. To that extent, perhaps it could be added that the Swedish-speaking district and politicians in particular have always and especially before World War II maintained the Germany card. Swedish-language Huvudstadsbladet in particular) later "officially" confirmed the matter July 10, 1940. The behind-the-scenes battle for green gold in the northern hemisphere had begun immediately after the forest company Gutzeit Oy had expanded drastically after acquiring in 1918 the forests of both Ilomantsi [ta5] [oo6] [oo7] and Finland Wood and Lieksa Pankakoski and Enso (These are companies. Former large forest companies that Gutzeit bought. Purchases were significant. After these, Gutzeit also became a truly significant forestry company in the world) (2). In his memoirs (3), Finland's first foreign minister, Otto Stenroth on the goverment of Paasikivi I from 1918, says that the idea of ​​a military alliance between Finland and Germany was revived at a high level even before he took over the leadership of the Foreign Ministry. He concludes that the initiative came from the emperor via Count von der Goltz, who was awarded the title of General of Finland:

"It is also certain that all those people that thought it is possible to unite East Karelia with Finnish armed forces assumed that Germany would give its military support to such an attempt and that the planned cooperation would be based on a military alliance between the two countries."

There are two notable points in Stenroth's writing that are essentially related to the struggle for the Finnish forest industry. First of all: although Germany lost its 1st World War, [ta8] [oo9] it did not lose its interests in Finland or its political, economic and cultural interests, despite the fact that for understandable reasons it withdrew for a decade due to its own internal political pressures. Forced by conditions in a quiet flame in the 1920s and 1930s by German entrepreneurs and spies.[ta10] Germany had collapsed in 1919, politically, economically and militarily. Nevertheless, the influence of the Germans in Finland did not diminish or they did not lose interest in Finnish timber. I meant that German interests were maintained and connections even though in 1919-1925, for example, Gutzeit's timber exports to Germany were small. The second key venue for the struggle for the Finnish forest industry was East Karelia, where British Secret Service men, German businessmen and Russian communist spies, as well as Finnish tribal warriors, crisscrossed each other in valuable forests surrounded by wilderness.

That is why I ask in this article why Germany would not have had plans for the products of the important Finnish forest industry as well? After all, they also had plans, like the Allies, to secure Swedish wartime ore production for their own use (4). Germany itself had huge forest resources in southern Germany, but northern Germany and future hostilities required large amounts of wood in its various forms, which Finland, and especially East Karelia, provided almost indefinitely. Therefore, the battle for the Finnish forest industry was fought with great stakes on high-level backstage on a spy front without public fuss between Britain, Nazi Germany, and the Soviet Union.

Finnish forest industry products began to flow on the world market as early as the 1870s. At that time, the global power Britain was one of its most important trading partners. For example, Norwegian-owned Gutzeit sold most of its production to the UK. It should also be remembered that Germany's interests in the Finnish forest industry were related to the strategic view of Finland as a part of its natural, political, economic and cultural interests, while Stalin and Lenin were more interested in Finnish forests and Finnish expertise in the forest industry and international trade relations.

In addition to ideology, Lenin and Stalin also had two reasons to try to conquer Finland. The first was a revenge for the failure of the spring 1918 revolution and the second a revenge for Finland's secession from Russia, that is, to restore the borders of 1914 (5). Lenin's interests in Finland were practical and economic. Lenin was particularly interested in the Finnish forest industry and Finland's huge timber resources. His interest in Finland is beautifully illustrated by more than 340 articles, speeches, and other documents where he deals with Finland and the Finns. There are many relevant Finnish memoirs of discussions and meetings with Lenin (6).

On December 8, 1917, Lenin received a delegation from the Finnish Senate, Carl Enckell and Karl Idman. When asked how the Soviet government responded to the request for independence from Finland, Lenin replied that the Council of People's Commissars would recognize Finland's independence if the Finnish Senate made a formal request to do so. Lenin also assured that the Central Executive Committee will approve this decision. On December 30, 1917, the Council of People's Commissars, chaired by Lenin, met to discuss a request from the Finnish government to the Soviet government for recognition of Finland's independence. The next evening the meeting continued. In the evening after eleven, Secretary of the Council of People's Commissars Bontsh-Brujevitsh handed Svinhufvud a decree recognizing Finland's state independence. When Lenin learned that the Finnish government delegation Prime Minister Pehr Svinhufvud, Carl Enckell and Karl Idman asked to receive him, he left for a few minutes and chatted with the members of the delegation. Lenin asked Svinhufvud, "Are you happy now?" Svinhufvud muttered his gratitude for his assurance. (7).

However, Lenin was clearly upset by the loss of Finland's forests. The importance of Finnish forests to Lenin is also told by the fact that economic relations between Finland and the Soviet Union emerged immediately after the October Revolution. On November 23, 1917, Lenin signed the Decree of the Council of People's Commissars on "Free Import of Paper, Pulp and Paper Products from Finland into the Territory of the Republic of Russia". Paper imports from Finland were then discussed at two meetings of the Council of People's Commissars, chaired by Lenin (8). Lenin knew very well that the forest industry was important, but Russia did not have what Finland had, know-how, technology, and sales channels. They lacked everything but cheap labor.

In a speech to the First All-Russian Assembly of the Navy on December 5, 1917, Lenin assured that there was no need to fear the fragmentation or disintegration of Russia into separate republics. Today we know that his goal was to keep Finland part of Russia after the Reds first defeated the Whites. Therefore, earlier on, in November 24, 1917, he endorsed the power of the attorney for the People's Commissar for National Affairs, Joseph Stalin, but send him over  to participate in the Extraordinary Assembly of the Finnish Social Democratic Party, reminding Stalin of what Marx had once stated:

"No great nation has been able to come and do as well in isolation from all the seas as Peter the Great's kingdom was at the beginning. No great nation has ever submitted to the detachment of its coasts and estuaries. No one could have imagined a great nation that was isolated from the sea coast. Russia could not leave in the hands of the Swedes the Neva estuary, which was inherently suitable as an export port for goods."

I have already said that, on the contrary, as is claimed in history in Finland, Lenin's interests in Finland were practical and related to Finnish forests and the sale of timber through Finland to the world market as a loss for Finland. One of Stalin's secret missions was also unclear. We unfortenatly know who he all met and what he was talking and what about. It is not clear whether the Bolsheviks had any idea what kind of country they were taking over. They understood nothing about the economy, and commerce in particular. Russia was already bankrupt in 1919. Timber was one way of trying to acquire an important currency, in addition to the fact that orthodox monks smuggled icons and Eremitash (tsars former palats) valuables were sold through Finland to rich collectors.

Aimo Minkkinen, the director of the independent Lenin Museum in Tampere, explains how in January 7-10 1918 Lenin was secretly in Finland at the Halila Sanatorium thinking about the future of the Russian Revolution. It also shows that Lenin thought about the takeover of Finland in one way or another, motivated by the Finnish forest industry and the forests of East Karelia. That is when he recorded topics in his diary for further development. In Halila, Lenin was preoccupied with questions about "the national chauvinism of the oppressed" and how to conquer "other nations oppressed by the Great Russians so far on the side [ta13] [oo14] [oo15] of the Russian Socialist Soviet Republic." At the same time, he warned the Bolshevik Politburo against collapsing into "Great Pan-Slavism" by seeing only good fishing waters in Finland, forgetting everything else. On the other side, he literally meant to see the forest from the trees. According to the official Bolshevik history, Aimo Minkkinen spoke of Lenin as a friend and savior of Finland, but I did not believe it. He was interested in Finland's trade relations with the world. So these are my own conclusions.

1918 was a catastrophic year for the economy of Finland and especially for the Soviet Union. Many parties abroad lacked confidence in the opportunities against Finland as an independent state and in its ability to meet the expenses required for independence. It is argued that this lack of faith would also have had a strong effect on the depreciation of the "markka," the Finnish Mark, or FIM. In the autumn of 1918, the Finnish markka had lost about 20%. The Soviet government had forced the Bank of Finland to redeem large amounts of rubles at higher exchange rates than those the bank received when exchanging rubles at foreign banks. The shops received rubles and exchanged them at the Bank of Finland. This naturally increased the number of payment instruments in circulation in Finland. The Bank of Finland's total losses in ruble terms rose to FIM 534.4 million (9). Finland's losses in the Soviet Union in terms of goods, real estate, bank receivables, and receivables from customers rose to FIM 1 billion.

During the First World War, inflation accelerated as inflation in the Russian ruble pushed down the mark tied to it. This affiliation did not end until April 1917. Later, the problems of the Finnish markka caused a stir in the Parliament, and the Governor of the Bank of Finland, Stenroth, eventually had to resign. He was replaced by Risto Ryti. The Board of Directors of the Bank of Finland was chaired by Real Government Secretary August Ramsay. The years 1918-1922 were particularly difficult times in the international foreign exchange market, and as the Finnish markka fell, the payment of foreign debts became more difficult. For example, in the spring and summer of 1920, Gutzeit had received a £ 150,000 loan from The British Bank of Northern Commerce Ltd in London. Of this loan amount, Gutzeit sold £ 50,000 to the Nordic Bank for FIM 5,900,000. When an equal amount was sold to the Bank of Finland at the same time, FIM 4,285,000 was received. The difference would therefore be FIM 1,615,000. As Gutzeit had been forced to enter into a "forced" agreement with the Bank of Finland, it suffered losses of around FIM 15 million in 1920 alone from the timber trade alone and about the same for cellulose (12).

I cite this illuminating example because it is the first real economic crisis in independent Finland, in which the forest industry - especially Gutzeit - played an important role, and international players, such as the United Kingdom, Gutzeit's largest trading partner, and Germany, were insignificant due to their own economic and political crises, Yet they were interested in the Finnish forests , in the Finnish forest industry, and especially in Gutzeit because of the key role of the forest industry in the Finnish economy, as it controlled the Finnish as well as exports from the Russian forest industry, as the example of the Aunus sawmill owned by Lenin's neighbors shows. This example is important because it tells a bit about what kind of world Gutzeit worked in. You can shape it but leave something out. This is an economic history that few know about and that is problematic. I already told you about Otto Stenroth's memoirs. He doesn't say everything. In a way, Gutzeit saved the Finnish state's economy during a difficult period when currency fraudsters speculated on the weak FIM, as was the case until Finland joined EMU. This is very important here, as it provides a motive for why both the Germans, the Russians, and the English were so interested in Gutzeit in particular.

In July 1919, the Bank of Finland made a remarkable proposal to the Finnish Sawmill Owners' Association. The bank offered to borrow FIM 750 for each saw timber standard in stock. The loan period was two years, and the first nine months were interest-free. In return, the borrower had to undertake to make 50% of the foreign currency received from the sale available to the Bank of Finland at a rate that was 1% below the bank's current sales rate. During 1919, Gutzeit shipped 68,647 standards for export. Restrictions and scarce access to foreign currency created two foreign exchange markets. Official rates were much lower than those the public was willing to pay to be able to buy a variety of necessities. Gutzeit, who wanted to retain as much freedom as possible to sell the foreign currency he wanted, did not initially accept Stenroth's proposal for the Bank of Finland but was later forced to reverse his decision, as most timber stores accepted the bank's offer only on condition that its biggest competitor, Gutzeit accepted, too.

Due to the civil wars and the embargo, the Soviet Union sold its own timber from East Karelia through Finland to the west through the Bulgarian company of Lenin's friend Hella Wuolijoki (13). Luckily for the writer Wuolijoki, the timber collapsed, because she did not start writing her plays until after the time of scarcity, when her Aunus sawmill had collapsed and transactions had stopped anyway (14). In December 1927, Hella Wuolijoki bought the company's shares and began cooperating with Oy Carelian Timber Ltd. Shortly thereafter, the sawmill burned but was rebuilt. No one can demonstrably say whether it was burned by rivals and patriots or by the Russians themselves? All this swallowed large sums of money. At the end of 1928, Aunus Puuliike bought all the shares of Carelia, and at the same time the company's share capital was increased to FIM 15 million, probably by marking the assets at higher values. By 1930, liabilities had already risen to FIM 72.2 million and its loss for the year to FIM 54.1 million. The whole fuss smelled of intentional cheating. The company had been managed completely recklessly without know-how or even the most basic financial know-how. There was more to the Finns than the Russians, when in 1925 the Russians made a 100,000 std pseudo-trade with the English. According to Viktor Hoving, the pricing policy of the Soviets seemed to be regardless of calculations of real profitability:

"Therefore, their competition was particularly destructive. Most of Russia's sawn timber exports pass through the Arkhangelsk. Until the outbreak of World War II, Russian competition was a threat to all Finnish sawn timber exports. market areas."

Gutzeit naturally had good relations with Germany, as the founder of the company, Wilhelm Gutzeit, was of German nationality and spoke German as his mother tongue. He was born in Köningsberg in 1802 but moved to Norway in the early 1820s, where his first job was at the Modum glass factory near Drammen. The owners of the factory, Benneche and Wegener, were Germans. Drammen's business had a significant German influence in the early 19th century. In Norway, there had previously been a similar concentration of German merchants in Bergen during the Hanseatic League. As soon as exports began in 1873, the great role and importance of Germany and Britain as buyers of Gutzeit's goods became clear. The following year, 1874, the Norwegian sawmill used 178,000 logs and manufactured about 41,000 and exported 39,000 cubic meters. The United Kingdom topped the export list by 23 000 cubic meters, while Germany was only 5th at 2430 cubic meters but rose to 1875 cubic meters the very following year (1875).

Gutzeit's timber was imported to Germany via a port in Brake in Weser estuary, and Gutzeit's sales and marketing began with a Bremen-based company called Robert Modersohn. The most active expanding markets after 1870 were Denmark, the Netherlands, and Germany (16). German exports went mainly to the Elbe and the already mentioned Weser estuary, where the transport of sawn timber from the Nordic countries became cheaper than imports by rail from the forest areas of southern Germany. Modersohn was an agent until 1901. Pratje & Collstrop, a company formed by R. Collstrop in Copenhagen, headquartered in Bremen, but with offices elsewhere in western Germany, then took over as agent. Another agent in Germany was W. Brugman & Sohn from Dortmund. A total of 20 foreign buyers of sawn timber were on Gutzeit's lists in 1873. According to the purchase agreements, about 18,000 cubic meters of exports in 1873, about 8,000 cubic meters, were shipped to Britain, France, and Germany. Britain's share of exports of sawn timber in 1920-1924 remained high, with Germany's share declining after the First World War of 1919 for understandable reasons. The role of Great Britain and Germany as buyers of Finnish forest industry products was significant.

Finland lived from its forests and was completely dependent on the sale of the wood processing industry in foreign trade, especially after steam sawmills were allowed in Finland in 1857 and sawmill restrictions were lifted in April 1861. Before the First World War, Norway was strongly oriented towards England, and during the war the attitude further strengthened. The losses of the Norwegian merchant navy with their crews were mostly blamed on the Germans, and this alone was enough to increase anti-German sentiment among the Norwegians and the Gutzeit as well (17). The company's Norwegian management and shareholders in Drammen were pro-English and in part also reflected the UK's position as a leading exporting country by far. After the company became a Finnish state-owned company Enso-Gutzeit, the pro-Germanism of the company's political leadership was reflected in the strengthening of Germany's position as one of the most important export countries.

In the Senate, the purchase of Gutzeit in 1917 was being prepared by a committee formed by the later Prime Minister and President J.K. Paasikivi. At the beginning of 1919, the company became completely Finnish when the state bought 4,400 shares, or more than half of the 7,200 shares, from Norwegian shareholders. In 1927, the name of Ab W. Gutzeit & Co was changed to Enso-Gutzeit Osakeyhtiö and the companies of Pankakoski and Enso merged. Of particular interest to Enso-Gutzeit is the monitoring of its trade relations with the United Kingdom and Germany, as well as the political direction of the company. Gutzeit's chairman of the board was the most significant and important of the state-owned companies, and therefore planted the country's top political names, such as former prime ministers Cajander and Tanner and Svinhufvud until his election as president. Gutzeit was the most important company in the Finnish state. It was led by the best names in the industry and key politicians. That means the best.

Espionage and governmental covert operations are lines drawn in the water of history that leave no permanent traces. Some descriptions of espionage can be found, for example, in relation to Germany on Gestapo's spy networks in Hal Vaugh's "In the Bed of the Enemy - Coco Chanel's Secret War," which described Chanel's anti-Semitic activities as a Gestapo spy. One possible, but perhaps not factual and valid, explanation of why Germany's own statistics show low timber imports could be that the Germans had deliberately reduced their statistics for propaganda reasons. In its propaganda, the NSDAP emphasized Germany's own domestic market and everything German, both in the trade (from pencils to technology) and in large-scale industry; it would not have served its purpose if the statistics had shown significant imports of timber and thus stripped clothing off its propaganda. But this is just a conjecture, it is also possible that the statistics are accurate. It is now clear, however, that in a totalitarian state like Germany, the NSDAP and its protrusions, the RHSA and the Gestapo, were aware of almost everything related to foreign trade, and that they were a carefully primed part of the millennial Nazi empire.

The actions of the Soviets in relation to the Finnish forest industry evoke the image of China's relations with Macao and Hong Kong. These countries had large-scale spy networks in the People's Republic of China, which seek to disrupt the activities of similar spy networks in the Republic of China, i.e. Taiwan. The intelligence services, led by Kang Sheng, Mao's personal security chief and a member of the Gang of Four Group, staged large-scale anti-British riots among local students, promising local communists that if the situation escalated, the People's Republic of China would come to the rescue. The promise was, of course, empty. Mao had no idea of ​​returning Hong Kong and Macao to China by force - let alone by peaceful means.

How does this relate to Gutzeit? The actions of the Soviets sound similar to the policy of the People's Republic of China with regard to Macao and Hong Kong. Similarities can also be found on the spy front, as in a similar way different spy networks would rumble and pile up in Finland. Like Finland in relation to the Soviet Union, Hong Kong and Macao were the gateway to the People's Republic of China to the west, and in both cases, clandestine activities helped to raise a hard Western currency. Unfortunately, the investigation into the German intelligence and spy network cannot be studied in exactly the same way as the activities of the Soviet Union in Finland in the 1920s and the intelligence services of the People's Republic of China in Hong Kong and Macao.

There are a few reasons why the analogy argument does not apply to the Gestapo - first, Germany was not in the same situation as the Soviet Union in Finland and the People's Republic of China in Hong Kong and Macao; Hitler's danger was just waking up (there were plenty of Nazi supporters in England, such as the nobleman Sir Oswald Mosley and his supporters), and Germany was not without friends internationally unlike the Soviet Union, let alone the People's Republic of China. The Soviets' actions in relation to Finland were influenced by the need for material resources and efforts to spread Soviet socialism to the world. In the case of the People's Republic of China, for its part, the Primus motor, which pushed Mao Zedong and Kang Sheng's intelligence services forward, was a direct emergency and panic over the construction of missiles and the launch systems they were forced to have.

The Germans did not suffer from a shortage of resources like the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China because, despite the defeat of World War I, German industry was ready in the international financial markets and it expanded quickly . However, the Germans lacked the green gold of Finland and Gutzeit and the cash it had been able to do on the international market, which they desperately needed. That is why it is good to ask: why did Nazi Germany be so interested in Finland and the Finnish forest industry, and especially in Gutzeit? They had wood in the south but it cost to transport it to northern Germany. It was cheaper to import timber from Finland than to transport it by rail from the forests of southern Germany.

We find a veiled answer to this question from Hans Metzger, who belonged to the inner ring of the Third Reich's Finnish affairs during the war. Metzger was a member of the Nazi party and formally a press assistant to the German embassy but his position was in fact much more important. Metzger spoke Finnish, as his mother was a descendant of a well-known Finnish family Danielson - Councilor J.R. second cousin Danielson-Kalmar, an old Finnish leader, and cousin of painter Hugo Backmansson - and he spent his childhood summers in Finland.

In 1931, Metzger began studying law at the Universities of Marburg and Helsinki. In 1934 he moved to Berlin to the Ministry of Agriculture. He served in the Foreign Trade Department of the Ministry and personally knew the people who represented the fiercest right, for instance Aaro Pakaslahti, Finland's ambassador Aarne Wuorimaa and the then missionary councilor, an influential key player in Finnish-German relations, and the head of the Foreign Ministry's political department in 1939-1941 and chief of staff in 1941-1943.

Was Nazi Germany interested in Finnish agriculture or the forest industry, or both, when it sent its Trade Policy Department official to Helsinki for a post of insignificant and probably covert press officer? Most likely both, because in reality this influential man Hans Metzger, appointed Press Attaché of the German Embassy on September 1, 1939, whose German father, a civilian Professor of Forestry, also lived in Finland, conveyed directly to the Finnish government with high-ranking Finnish officials and politicians such as priest and member of parliament, Antti Kukkonen, being, in the words of the then German Ambassador to Finland von Blucher, "a key official (Schlussekraft)".

Why has no one investigated this further? After all, a man who was a real Nazi had a classic spy cover story for safety. He if anyone was interested in the Finnish forest industry and especially in the forests of East Karelia. And the father is a German forestry science professor. What has Dad done in Finland? But his actual work as a forestry expert for the Third Reich in the shelter of his son. Metzger was a spy for spies, as he regularly visited the Finnish Club, the Stock Exchange Club and the parliamentary café, but especially in the Hotel Kämp, where diplomats, international journalists and other spies, who were often both diplomats and journalists themselves, stayed. Why? Because Metzger acted as an important high-level field man, forging relationships and delivering important messages acting as a personal courier under the protection of diplomatic status.

Metzger talks about snapping in two of his books, mostly for the general public, about anything but what has been at stake in all of this. Not to mention that it is part of his job description to deceive and mislead, and make others quiet, keep the truth hidden and give the public a false picture of Nazi Germany's intentions in Finland. Metzger had a particularly good relationship with IKL (Patriotic People's Movement), in other words, he fed his "fraternal party ideology" to the Patriotic People's Movement propaganda . And particularly good distances to Antti Kukkonen, a peasant alliance who had served as the Minister of Education of as many as five different governments. The contacts guaranteed him functional relations with the pro-German far-right politicians and military leadership who led Finland at the time. Antti Kukkonen was a kind of liaison between Nazi Germany and Finland. I can't say more. I just mean there were spies, spokespersons and curious ears everywhere. Especially in the KÄMP-hotel.

A rather similar story can be read in J.H.Magill's book "The Republic in the Fire Test - Memoirs of Finland from the Years of the Hot and Cold War". In 1931, an English officer who attended Eton's elite school arrived at the Karelian forest sites as a "trainee" and was named "Janne Mäkelä" by the foresters. During the Winter War, he served as a liaison between Marshal Mannerheim and the top military leadership of the Western powers. After the wars, Colonel Magill served as a member of the British Division of the Supervisory Commission, and later as the British Military Ombudsman in Helsinki. But why did he come to Finland and by whom? The reason is presumably the same as for Metzger, he and his client, Great Britain, were interested in the Finnish forest industry, the forests of East Karelia and their strategic location in the armpits of the great and then still unknown Soviet Union.

In addition, they needed a high-level courier to convey confidential messages between the British leadership and the Finns over time. After all, the British already had a series of failures in the 1920s from both the Muurman Legion and the adventures of the infamous spy Reilly, who had been a role model for James Bond, in destabilizing the Soviets during the fall of white generals in Russia from the October Revolution until 1922.

But who was Magill himself, the son of an officer with an Irish background, whose father had been the head of the same military company at Sandhurst Cadet School, where Prince Henrik, the son of King George V, who later became Duke of Gloucester, had served as cadet? An interesting case that raises many questions. In his book, Magill describes the wartime James Bond, alias Magill's logic, aptly as the inheritance the privileged: why do they become killers and spies authorized by the Queen to murder on behalf of the state:

"Upper class members seem to have one very vulgar trait in England, which is courage. We are not terrified, among other things, in war (18)."

Magill initially worked for Tornator Oy, a forest industry company based in Tainionkoski, Imatra, Finland, which was merged with Enso-Gutzeit Oy in 1941. Magill learned both Finnish and Swedish to be better at sniffing around on his own. But he does not say anything essential or anything that would reveal him as what he was - an upper-class boy loyal to the king was not sent to Finland in vain for some idle little work or to entertain ordinary workers, as he tries to make his readers understand. Very soon he became a frend with deputy judge with Kotilainen (VIP), the later CEO of Enso-Gutzeit and the Minister of Trade and Industry of the Winter War a operate at full capacity all the time. Magill was charming and skillful. The British send their best possible men to Finland to protect their own interests in the Finnish forest industry and especially in Gutzeit.

On the side, when Magill "entertained" his Finnish friends, he toured the forests of East-Karelia, as if such a tourism was the main point of of his book, which fortunately it is not, and learn to speak even of the village's difficult-to-know rare dialect.

Magill also gets to know General Oscar Enckell and acts as an agent for Oy Lääskelä under his leadership. When he visits Sweden for a week, he stays at Mannerheim's younger brother, Baron Carl Fridof Johan Mannerheim's mansion in Grensholm. Magill returns to report personally to his senior British superiors what he sees, takes messages, comments, evaluates and makes reports in 1932, and is likely to run the spy network he created in the UK until it is time to go back to overseeing events in his host country. He first joined the army in 1936 but does not explain why. Probably because he gets protection for his agent duties and more up-to-date technical and military training. The British Secret Service is more than well versed in that behind-the-scenes game that, in a few years, will take the entire world into World War II. At the time, military training was still quite "gentlemanly," according to Magill, as those to be trained as reserve officers were selected on the basis of family and educational background - as well as perhaps higher-class secret agents.

In his book, Magill explains how he did not incur financial losses from timber business during his tenure. Surely not. Whether it was a reckless statement when all the others suffered, unless they happened to have a bottomless treasury behind the state tailored covert office. It was clear that the English timber owners merged for strategic reasons and at the behest of the state, and eventually became head of the company's Finnish department (19) in 1937, when he began to meet the cream of the Finnish economy, like Holger Nysten, deputy director of the Finnish paper mills. KOP`s director Mauri Honkajuuri and Rainer von Fiandt the head of SYP and Risto Ryti, Governor of the Bank of Finland. The meeting with Ryd was facilitated by the fact that the Governor of the Bank of England was a family friend well known to Magill. During the Winter War, he met Major General Rudolf Walden, still known as Mannerheim's creditor, between the two - doesn't the reader realize that Magill, like Metzger, was the boss of the country's first-class spies and apparently the creator and liaison of an extensive spy network?

Magill reveals more of how he was involved in the dinners of important people, for instance in one with a later Conservative Prime Minister (1957-1963) and a colorful Earl of I. Stockton, Harold McMillan, who received a noble status for his political merits, who then reported directly on the events in Finland to Prime Minister Chamberlain. Millheim Magill often visited the military headquarters in Mikkeli. It must be remembered that everything from where and how Magill writes has gone through the strict screening of British intelligence about what can and should be written about events without revealing the true role of Magill and Secret Service behind the events. Magill, a little like Metzger, gossip to attract the interest of the paying public, no matter when he writes how Mannerheim communicated to the Allies in the middle of the Winter War that it should not be too generous to assist Finland, as it could have diminished the risk of German intervention. But what was Magill actually doing in Finland when he visited Mannerheim with General Lang, the personal representative of the Chief of the British General Staff, Sir Edmund Ironside? (20). Finland and the Finns seem to have been an excuse for this champion spy only in passing, as well as for so many other foreign spies interested in the Finnish forest industry and the forests of East Karelia in the battle for world domination and on that side Finnish green gold.

The author has studied the history of ideas and aesthetics at the University of Karlstad, and is a descendant of the Norwegians who founded Gutzeit in Kotka in 1872.

Sources:

(-1) Karl I. Albrecht "Der verratene Sozialismus".

(0) Jukka Seppinen "Hitler, Stalin and Finland - the homeland under the pressure of totalitarianism 1935-1944" (Minerva 2009 page 137).

(1) Van der Goltz "My Operations in Finland and the Baltic States" (WSOY 1920).

(2) Professor Jorma Ahvenainen "Enso-Gutzeit Oy 1872-1992 I years 1872-1923" (Gummerus 1992) page 167.

(3) Otto Stenroth "Half a Year as Finland's First Foreign Minister" (Otava 1931) page 73.

(4) Markku Reimaa "Nordic Connections - In the Shadow of German Power" (Docendo 2015).

(5) Jukka Seppinen "Hitler, Stalin and Finland" (Minerva 2009) page 11.

(6) Enckell Carl "My Political Memoir I" (WSOY 1956) pp. 170-171.

(7) Interview with Harimo Olausen, Director of the Lenin Museum, Dr. Aimo Minkkinen, 14

(8) In Lenin's Memoirs of Finns (Tampere 1969 page 8).

(9) Viktor Hoving "Enso-Gutzeit Osakeyhtiö 1872-1958" (Helsinki 1961).

(10) Erkki Pihkala "Finns in the World Economy from the Middle Ages to the EU-Finland" (SKS 2001).

(11) Viktor Höving, Enso-Gutzeit Osakeyhtiö 1872-1958 (Helsinki 1961), page 367.

(12) Viktor Höving, Enso-Gutzeit Osakeyhtiö 1872-1958 (Helsinki 1961), page 368.

(13) Erkki Tuomioja Hella Wuolijoki and her sister Salme Pekkala in the service of the revolution (January 2011).

(14) Professor Pirkko Koski Involved in everything - Hella Wuolijoki and her play (Otava 2000) page 47.

(15) Table 1 W. Gutzeit & COMP's sawn timber exports and its distribution 1874-1880 (m2) Professor Jorma Ahvenainen "Enso-Gutzeit Oy 1872-1992: I years 1872-1923" (Gummerus 1992) page 69.

16) Professor Jorma Ahvenainen "Enso-Gutzeit Oy 1872-1992: I years 1872-1923" (Gummerus 1992) page 121.

(17) Viktor Hoving "Enso-Gutzeit Osakeyhtiö 1872-1958" (Helsinki 1961).

(18) J. H. Magill "The Republic in the Fire Test - Memoirs of Finland from the Years of the Hot and Cold War" (Weiling & Göös 1981) page 21.

(19) J.H. Magill "The Republic in the Fire Test - Memoirs of Finland from the Years of the Hot and Cold Wars" (Weiling & Göös 1981) page 32.

(20) J.H. Magill "The Republic in the Fire Test - Memoirs of Finland from the Years of the Hot and Cold War" (Weiling & Göös 1981) page 49.

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