Finland lived in a rough neighborhood with no neutrality on offer. Through Allen Dulles, the OSS’ chief in Switzerland, Stalin knew the Finnish side of the siege of Leningrad was largely symbolic. Finland switched sides in late 1944 to make sure that Dulles’ warning to Stalin not to touch Finland’s independence would remain in effect.

In 2001 I interviewed Sgt Harry Matso, the president of the Finnish Jewish War Veterans Association, born in 1918. He served in Karelia with his father. 22 Jewish Finns died in the Continuation War. There were field synagogues in tents 500 meters from German SS units. In 1943 he was worried that Himmler might convince Finland’s Interior Minister to turn over Finland’s Jews. His farmer buddy told Harry he’d have a safe hiding place on his farm in central Finland.

At a postwar ceremony Marshall Mannerheim said that the seven Finnish Jews who perished in the Shoah was seven too many.

Finland is a unique geopolitical paradox.