To the Editor:
Readers of COMMENTARY might be interested to learn of the widespread comment which my article, “The Specter of Finlandization” [December 1977], attracted in Finland itself. A long excerpt was published in Helsingin Sanomat, Finland’s leading newspaper, and this was followed by an editorial in the same newspaper, critical of the article but moderate in tone. Subsequently, editorials and columns, some of them increasingly agitated and strident, appeared in many newspapers and periodicals. The sheer volume of the reaction made it clear that my article had touched on an issue that, notwithstanding declarations from official Finnish circles, continues to trouble a great many people in Finland. It was, of course, impossible for me to reply to every critical remark, but I did attempt a general response. Here are two excerpts, the first from my letter to the editors of Hufvudstadsbladet and Suomen Kuvalehti and the second from my letter to the editor of Helsingin Sanomat:
A recent article of mine on Finlandization has been widely commented upon in many Finnish newspapers and periodicals, and though this did not come as a total surprise, the implications of such a reaction are a little disturbing. I can think of several explanations for the outcry. If a foreigner has grossly slandered a country, it is, of course, the duty of every patriot to demonstrate his loyalty by denouncing him. But I do not think that my article falls into this category—not being involved in Finnish domestic affairs, I wrote about the subject with some detachment; my wish was not to attack, but to understand and to analyze. It is perfectly true that I was interested not only in Finland’s internal but also in its external affairs; in this, however, I was following the advice frequently given by Finland’s powerful neighbor, that the relationship between Finland and itself is worth studying as a model which other countries would do well to follow. Surely I cannot be blamed for accepting the advice of Messrs. Brezhnev, Kosygin, and Suslov.
A second possible explanation for the publicity given to my article surely does not apply in this case. In an authoritarian political system the media are orchestrated; instructions are given to deal, in a hostile or friendly spirit, with certain subjects. But since there is freedom of the press in Finland, such an interpretation is unwarranted.
Lastly, there is the possibility, indeed the likelihood, that however inoffensive in approach, my article touched a nerve; those who now take such pains to refute me (and my name, after all, is not a household word in Finland) must feel in their hearts that beyond all the official rationalizations there is a genuine question: in what direction has Finnish democracy been moving? The violent reaction to my article in some quarters shows a certain unease over this question.
It would be unprofitable to cover the same gound again, but permit me to make some general observations. While foreigners have no right to interfere in Finnish policy, or in that of any other country, they certainly have the right to observe and to comment; only dictatorships expect that such comment will always be laudatory. I was concerned with the internal “adjustments” in Finnish politics, and since it is my view that these have gone well beyond the limits imposed by Finland’s geopolitical position, my remarks were hardly acceptable to those who favor such “adjustments” and even want to improve upon them. But as good democrats, they might show a little tolerance for views which differ from their own.
I have been criticized for having adduced only one slender volume in defense of my arguments. But the essay published in COMMENTARY was an abridged version of a chapter in a book; it is not customary in an essay to cite all one’s references. Although I have not read everything, many books and articles pertaining to the subject were translated for me. Incidentally, when I started out, my own views on Finlandization were not unlike those of George F. Kennan, until I began to study the texts of the major speeches of Finland’s political figures, freely available in English and Russian translation. It was only then, when I compared the “official ideology” with the reality, that the discrepancies between theory and practice became obvious to me. In short, my doubts arose as a result of reading the official documents rather than as a result of the strictures of critics of Finlandization.
You refer to the remarks of George F. Kennan on Finland in his recent book, The Cloud of Danger. Mr. Kennan, like Voltaire’s Pan-gloss, seems to believe that everything is for the best so far as democracy in Finland is concerned. I think it a mistake to attribute too much weight to Mr. Kennan’s views; he would be the first to admit that he is not really familiar with the Finnish domestic situation. I still admire some of his works, but just as I cannot share his defense of official South African policy (and, until recently, Rhodesian policy), I cannot accept what he says on Finlandization, though in fairness to him it should be noted that his references to Finland consist of three or four sentences in a book of two hundred pages. The reviewer in the London Times called The Cloud of Danger a flawed, superficial collection, filled with defeatist generalizations. This is a harsh judgment, for a book covering the whole world cannot possibly deal in depth with every subject. But it is true that the book does exhibit a defeatist undertone.
This brings me to my last point. One of your writers published a most revealing article, “Sven Tuuva’s Time Is Over.” Sven Tuuva, if I remember correctly, is the legendary hero in Runeberg’s Ensign Steel’s Tales who fell in the war against the Russians in 1808-9, fighting alone on a bridge against a whole platoon of Cossacks. I could not agree more that in our nuclear age the time for such heroics is clearly over. But we should perhaps spare an occasional thought for those poor, misguided heroes of a bygone age who were willing to give their lives for their country. Without them, Finland (and quite a number of other countries) would probably not enjoy independence today. The real point is that, between the Joan of Arcs on the one hand and the Pétains and Lavals on the other—between the extremes of foolhardy and suicidal defiance of a stronger power and obsequious collaboration—there is still some middle ground. It is my impression, however, that Finland at present is not faced with the danger of too great a pendulum swing in the direction of the Sven Tuuvas of this world.
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The editorial in Helsingin Sanomat says that at times an outsider (meaning myself) may see a truth “which we do not lightly admit to ourselves.” But the editorial also says that my article shows how difficult it is for a stranger to give an unbiased account of Finland. Not reading Finnish, I depend on friends who translate for my benefit articles from the Finnish press and speeches by politicians, and I admit that I am frequently mystified. I understand the words but the meaning is not always clear. But I suspect that I would still be puzzled even if I were able to read the original text. It is my impression that Finnish political language has become Aesopian, full of hints and allusions, devoid of open, let alone blunt, speaking; this does make it difficult for strangers to understand Finnish realities.
But is not the language part of the political reality, does it not reflect it? Are the reasons for the ambiguities and the lack of precision and openness mainly linguistic? I fear this is not the case, and this leads me to my next point. You seem to believe that only a conservative of the extreme Right would express concern over Finlandization, or even use the term. Nothing could be further from the truth. May I assure you that events in Finland are followed with increasing interest by men and women representing every part of the political spectrum in many countries, who are motivated not by hostility but by a feeling of sympathy and genuine concern?
A few illustrations should suffice. I have no reason to doubt that President Kekkonen is the greatest living Finnish statesman and also a most fervent patriot. But I am not aware of any other country in which one man has been elected President for twenty-four years in a row. As a historian and student of politics, I know, of course, of countries in which leaders are elected by a majority of 90 per cent, but these are usually not democratic societies. You will argue that Finland is a special case. Perhaps so, but the Finnish case seems to become more and more special every day, and this is bound to cause increasing bewilderment among foreigners.
Or let us take the “changes” undergone by the Finnish Social Democrats during the last ten or fifteen years. (I could think of a much more fitting term, but how easy it is to slide into Aesopian language.) Perhaps the Social Democrats have good reason to admire Communism as it is practiced in the Soviet Union; it is clearly not for an outsider to criticize them. But what puzzles the outsider is the fact that despite their rapprochement with the Communist party of the Soviet Union, despite the fact that they are now less independent and less critical of it than the Italian or French (let alone the Spanish) Communists, they continue to stress their attachment to the ideals and values of social democracy, they are still members of the Socialist International, and they try, admittedly without much success, to convert other social-democratic parties to their policy. One might wish for some clarification of the apparent contradictions here.
To choose another example at random, take the case of the so-called “Black Dozen.” This group of moderate politicians has been harshly attacked and denounced as “unacceptable” to the Soviet Union, despite the fact that they have not deviated from the Paasikivi-Kekkonen line where Finnish foreign policy is concerned, but have simply followed a somewhat independent line in domestic politics. But—what is even more significant—no Finnish newspaper, to the best of my knowledge, has published their statements in full. How often, in recent Finnish history, has it been insinuated that someone or other is “unacceptable”? Under the circumstances, you will have to excuse the perplexity of foreign observers: on the one hand, we are assured that Finlandization is a figment of our imagination; on the other hand, there are many facts which cannot be explained away.
No one in his right mind would blame Finland because its relationship with the Soviet Union, for obvious reasons, is of a special character. The real issue is the “adjustments” that have taken place in Finnish domestic politics as a result of this relationship. Permit me to end this letter in a manner befitting an outside observer, with a question rather than an assertion: can it really be maintained that there has been no erosion of political freedom in Finland?
Walter Laqueur
London, England