Finnish Civil War

This would lead to the Jaeger Movement, a Finnish political and military movement whose aim was to liberate the Grand Duchy of Finland from the Russian Empire and create an independent Finnish state.

Out of this, the Finnish Civil War of 1918 would break out after the fall of the Romanovs.

This Second Period would also force-feed Finnish students both Russian history and language.

It would build resentment towards everything Russians for decades to come.

To close out this tour of the geography of the war, I want to look at the two cases of Finland and Poland.

In the former, Soviet power was declared for only a brief three months, and the Finnish Civil War will be wrapped up before the fighting of the Russian Civil War picks up in mid-1918.

So there was never any real chance of Finland being part of the Soviet Union.

In the latter case, a separate and autonomous Poland will be established out of the wreckage of World War I, and Soviet power was never even seriously attempted before newly formed Poland declared itself an enemy of the Soviets.

There was a sizable workers' and Soviet movement in the country, and in fact, on the 20th of January 1918, a Soviet of People's Deputies seized power in the south of the country, which is the most populated and productive region of Finland.

However, sadly, this Soviet government was not fated to lead the Finnish working class to unite with the Russian workers and peasants.

Shortly after Soviet power was declared, the White Finns, supported to the hilt by Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Sweden, led a counterattack on the Red Finns, launching the Finnish Civil War.

The Finnish Reds were supported by Soviet Russia, but as we now know, Soviet Russia was facing so much of its own economic and social turmoil that it was not able to provide substantial enough assistance to their comrades in Finland.