Uncomplicated War Aims

To Finland the present war with Russia is a private war, only incidentally connected with Hitler's conquests. Speaking over the radio last week, Finland's Speaker of Parliament Vaeinoe P. Hakkila stated Finland's uncomplicated war aims, showed clearly why Finland went to war.

Aim No. 1, according to Hakkila, is an eastern boundary that would be easier to defend. By occupying Karelia (ceded to Russia in 1920) to the east, Finland's land boundary with Russia from the White Sea to the Gulf of Finland would be conveniently short, broken up by the big lakes Onega and Ladoga. The Karelians, who are racially kin to the Finns and speak a kind of Russianized Finnish, are well scattered throughout northeastern Russia. If the Finns should decide to claim, by racial right, all the territory in which they live, the New Finland would run as far east as Archangel, cut off Russia effectively from the White Sea.

The second Finnish war aim is just as simple. Russia must pay for the damage of her 1939 attack on Finland. Hakkila had even decided how she would pay. Said he: "As it is certain that the present Moscow Government cannot pay compensation, full indemnity must be taken in kind."

Nowhere in the speech appeared the clause that all Germany's allies must subscribe to --"If Hitler is willing." With increasing rumors that the Nazis had virtually taken over the Finnish Government, observers wondered whether Finland's "war aims" were not mere hopes. And when, at the week's beginning, Finland broke off relations with Great Britain, it seemed most probable that the Finns would get, if they and Germany won, not what they wanted, but what Hitler thought they ought to have.

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