Nonetheless, I have to urge Germany to reconsider its alliance with Horia Sima's Iron Guard in Romania, Benito Mussolini's Fascist Party in Italy, and the Falangist government led by General Mola in Spain. Also, the situation in Europe since the Croatian crisis has been incindeary.
The prospect of a second world war--one fought with the newly discovered nuclear ordinance in the last three years--between the Anglo-French alliance and the German-Italian-Romanian Pact of Steel--is horrifying. Perhaps worse, there are terrible rumors emerging from the Soviet Union that General Secretary Beria is ordering purges of "Stalinist Counterrevolutionaries"--and that the Soviet Union might soon collapse under the strain of three decades of intense dictatorship.
For all the talk of the Croatian crisis, you must remember the Narva Incident too. They are part and parcel, and here in the Baltic area the latter had more consequences in terms of national attitudes, as well as the policy decisions. As a result, many people in Finland and the Baltic nations consider the Pact of Steel our insurance against the USSR - be the facts of the matter what they may. There are those who say Stalin would have gobbled us all up if it were not for the Pact's existence. Personally, I doubt that, but who knows?
Only a week ago we had (again) a Patriotic People's Movement march here in Helsinki, demanding that the Prime Minister Kekkonen's government should apply for Pact membership. Of course, the Social Democrats and Communists did stage their separate counter-demonstrations in support of the "Kallio-Fagerholm-line". The Civil Guard leaders are strongly in favour of membership, as is much of the army, but as long as President Walden has any say in the matter, Finland will do nothing to antagonize the Anglo-French. Or the Soviet Union, for that matter.
As for von Schleicher, he is much respected here. Walden already sent his condolences, of course, as did Kekkonen. As it happens, tomorrow Finland will host Germany in a football friendly at the Olympic Stadium and I hear it will start with a moment of silence. The Helsingin Sanomat said today our team will wear black armbands, too, to match those of the Germans.
The moderate right wing here do indeed consider the Chancellor as a model for a strong national leader - something they would have quite wanted General Mannerheim to become for the 30s and the 40s. That was not to be, and I think I'd rather have our Nordic model democracy, even if it seems to continually stumble from political crisis to another...