Lateknight
Banned
Fixed that for you. Germany and Finland was never allied. So by the definition of OP Finlands forces still fight the USSR unless he fixes the scenario.
That's pure semantics they fought together against the same foe.
Fixed that for you. Germany and Finland was never allied. So by the definition of OP Finlands forces still fight the USSR unless he fixes the scenario.
Finland in the axis? Since when?
Finland was never a member of the Axis, they were co-belligerent. Maybe only a minor distinction but it is an important one.
So if we go by OP, Finland still fights the USSR as they never were an axis member.
For comparison:
At the start of Barbarossa the composition was the following:
Army Group North: 21 ID, 3 PZ, 2 SS, 3 Security Div
Army Group Center: 32 ID, 9 PZ, 1 SS, 1CAV + IR Grossdeutschland
Army Group South: 30 ID, 5 PZ, 2 SS
In Addition AGS had
Hungarian 2 I Brig 1 Cav Brig
Slovak 1 Mobile Brig, 2 ID
Italian 2 ID 1Cav D
Romanian 14 ID 1PZ, 3Cav Brig, 3 Mountain Brig, 2 Brig Fortress Troops
The only significant contribution came from the Romanians
In retrospect, it can be said that the attempt to create an illusion that Finland was not an actual German ally but was rather constantly sitting on the fence, as it were, was a very successful policy during the war and in its aftermath. But we would do well to remember that it was a deliberately crafted, purpose-built argument aimed to further the goals of the Finnish wartime leadership (and the nation), to make Finland seem "almost neutral", not something borne out of neutral historical analysis.
Historiographical thought in Finland has recently been coming around to abandon the idea of "co-belligerence" or the theory of Finland fighting "a separate war" as as a political and ideological invention that was used to try and soften the negative international consequences of Finland going against the Allies, created especially for the benefit of the United States and the USSR. In 2008, 16 of 28 (57%) Finnish history professors polled agreed that there are no grounds for talking about a separate war. Only six (21%) supported the old thesis. I'd say such numbers would be even stronger for accepting the relationship with Germany as an alliance today, considering that especially the younger generations of history professionals seem to be ready to ditch the idea of a separate war, while those who hang on to the concept are older people who do it out of habit.
Finland was a minor German ally, and as such can be considered as a member of the Axis in broad terms. Even if it had a lot of leeway in its relations with Germany, in comparison to other minor German allies, it still was a combatant on the German side that was even materially dependent on Germany to keep up its war affort against the USSR, limited and mainly based on its own needs as that effort was.
I'm not saying that Finland didn't fight on Germanys side, I'm arguing that Finland wasn't a de Jure ally to Germany, which means calling Finland a German ally or a member of the axis is false.
De Facto on the other hand is a completely different matter. I'm not arguing about that.
Generally, though, when talking about Finland and Germany in WWII, I like to just talk about Germany and its allies, and avoid the word "Axis" as much as possible. Like we can see in this discussion, it only tends to make things more complicated.![]()