44 - The Winter War: The British Reaction to the Invasion of Finland

The WW2 Podcast

Angus Wallace

Society & Culture, History

4.6 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 1 June 2017

⏱️ 41 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Last year I talked to Irish Historian Bernard Kelly about his book "Military Internees, Prisoners of War and the Irish State during the Second World War", thats episode 23 for those who haven't listened. We discussed how the Republic of Ireland walked the tightrope of neutrality and how it treated troops of belligerent nations who found themselves within its borders..
Chatting with Bernard after that recording I discovered his MA thesis looked at the Russia's Winter War with Finland. Yet another interesting WW2 topic and that's what we'll be discussing in this episode.

In November 1939 Russia attacked Finland, Britain and France were already at war with Germany and were not keen on declaring war on Russia in the defence of Finland. More importantly a total collapse of Finland might mean a Russian threaten Sweden and Norway?

Also throw into the mix that Swedish iron was vital to the German war effort it meant the Allies needed to do something, but what?

Transcript

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0:00.0	Last year I talked to Irish historian Bernard Kelly about his book, Military
0:05.6	Attorneys, Prisoners of War and the Irish State during the Second War War.
0:10.2	That's episode 23 for those who haven't listened.
0:14.0	We discussed how the Republic of Ireland walked the tightrope of neutrality and how it treated
0:20.0	troops of belligerent nations who found themselves within its borders.
0:25.0	Chatting with Bernard afterward, I discovered his MA thesis looked at Russia's winter
0:29.7	war with Finland.
0:31.1	Yet another interesting World War II topic and that's what we'll be discussing
0:35.9	here. But before we kick off if you enjoy the podcast and think it's worth a dollar or two,
0:41.7	why not show your support via Patreon at patreon.com
0:46.9	slash W. W.2 podcast. I put the show together on my own there is no team of web designers researchers or
0:54.6	audio professionals behind the show it's just me and at the moment between
0:59.0	child care duties this is what I do and if you go to the patreon page you'll be able to see it's not the most economically viable of jobs I've ever had
1:08.1	but it is the most enjoyable. So as you might subscribe to a magazine, why not go to Patreon.com slash
1:14.8	W.W.2 podcast and commit a small contribution that helps me put the show together
1:21.4	or click on donate on the website. I thank those who already
1:26.4	support the show. So to Finland, Bernard, the title is Drifting Towards War, the British Chase of Staff and the Winter War.
1:37.0	What we're going to focus on is the British response to the Soviet attack on Finland in 1939. So Britain declared war on Germany in September
1:48.3	1939 in response to the invasion of Poland. Then in November Russia crosses the border into Finland.
1:57.4	Why did Russia invade Finland? Well I'll take you back another little bit there
2:00.9	Angus first to talk about the Allied Declaration of War on Germany.
2:05.6	The context for all of this is that the Allied strategy at the start of the war was this of economic warfare.
	...

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