Finland in British Baltic Policy. British Political and Economic Interests regarding Finland in the Aftermath of the First World War, 1918-1925 by Esa Sundbäck (review)

Abstract

REVIEWS 76I focused library stock. It stands in the borderlandsbetween the well focused monograph and the specialedition of ajournal on a general area of study. Department ofPolitics J. BIRCH University ofSheffield Sundback, Esa. Finlandin BritishBaltic Policy.BritishPoliticaland Economic Interests Regarding Finland intheAftermnath oftheFirstWorld War,i918-I925. Suomalaisen Tiedeakatemian Toimituksia, 3I5. Academia Scientiarum Fennica, Helsinki, 200I. 392 pp. Notes. Tables. Bibliography. Index. Priceunknown. THE author,a lecturerat the Department of History,Universityof Turku,has written the first comprehensive study of British Foreign Office thinking on Finlandin the immediate aftermathof the FirstWorldWar.This isan exercise in diplomatic and bureaucratic history which concentrates almost entirely, and in minute detail, on lower-leveldiplomatsand bureaucrats.Itsmain focus is an examination of the differencesin Britishpolicies towardsFinlandand the Baltic States in I9 I8-1925. The book is at itsbest when it takesFinlandas a case studyin respectof the so-called 'New Europeans' at the Foreign Office. The 'New Europeans' are rightlyassociatedwith a desireto set up a post-warcontinental architectureof new nation-statesthat would be cohered by the nationalismof its constituent parts and would act as a new stabilizingbalance of power. Sundback claims that Finlandfitted the requirementsof this plan and that the Baltic States did not, and that policies towards Finland and the Baltic States, therefore, came to differ widely. The Foreign Office saw the Baltic States as susceptible to German infiltrationand questioned their usefulnessas anti-Bolshevikbuffers. Finland, however, appeared to be resistant to German importunings after I9I8 and thus made a useful anti-Bolshevikally. The only area in which the Baltic States benefited more than Finland, argues Sundback, was in British trade policy. This contention is laid out in one of the shortest but most informativechapters of the study (chapterfive) which makes useful comparisons between Anglo-Finnish trade and broader Britishtrade interestsin the Baltic area and in post-Trade Agreement Soviet Russia. The author argues that the relative paucity of Anglo-Finnish trade in the early I920S was the result of Finland's lack of trading contacts with Soviet Russia and that, conversely, the Baltic States'much greaterrole in Britishtrade resultedfrom theireasy accessto Russian markets. There are some curious omissions, however, both in terms of sources and the scope of this study. For example, the voluminous and highly informative personal papers of Winston Churchill have not been consulted at all, even though Churchill was the Secretary of State for War for much of the period under review and had a lively interestand many contacts in Finland. He had an active agenda for using Finland and the Baltic States in anti-communist military campaigns, which should have been explored. Instead, there is no mention of Churchillor his involvement in Finnishinterests.Nor is there any mention of General H. Gough, the head of the Britishmilitarymission to the 762 SEER, 8o, 4, 2002 Baltic States, who spent much of the early I920S in Finland and gave important advice to British decision-makers. Sundback also fails to exploit that fount of pertinent information, the private papers of Rex Leeper, even though the studyconstantlyrefersto Leeper'scentral role in the Department of PoliticalIntelligence. More importantly,the study suffersfrom a lack of adequate contextualization . The 'Baltic' is throughout treated as a somehow self-contained and sealed arena, separateboth from Britishpolicy towardsBolshevikRussia and from the highly pertinent high political and geo-strategicdeliberationsat the Parispeace conference.A wealth of recentscholarshipexistson thesecontexts, but Sundbackhas based his briefcontextualizingoverviewspredominantlyon outdated surveys. He treats the minutes and memoranda of lower-level diplomatsasthe be-all of ForeignOfficethinkingon Finlandand on the Baltic area. This may be illustrativeof the modus operandi of those bureaucratswhose only responsibilitywas to follow Finnishdevelopmentsand to give advice, but a proper contextualizationand evaluationof such individuals'thinkingwould have required more attention also to Department heads and to the (War) Cabinet. As it is, this study's'Baltic'remains a curiouslydisembodied entity, cut offfromother contexts and considerations. Despite these drawbacks,the study offersvaluable insightsand fillsseveral gaps in scholarlyliteratureon Anglo-Finnish relations. Carefullyresearched and documented, it providesthe mostcomprehensivereconstructionavailable of the thinking and policy formation of non-decision-making Foreign Office and Trade Department officialsdealing with Finland in the early I92os. For those workingin relatedareas,it shouldmake usefulreading. Universityof Tampere MARKKU RUOTSILA Brandes, Detlef and Savin, Andrej. Die Siberaendeutschen im Sowjjetstaat I9I9-I938. Veroffentlichungenzur...