He’s ninety years old, and his secrets must be from the war. I can’t imagine that they carry much weight anymore. “Can you give me some examples?”
“Things contrary to Finland’s perception of its own history. Unpleasant things. Most of it has been written about in one place or another by historians, but often disputed or discredited, called surmise or conjecture, because no one wants to know the truth. I’m a national hero. I’ll write a book and give this unpleasantness the official stamp of veracity.”
I’m still doubting. Arvid and I compliment Ritva on the moose roast.
“What do you think of Finland’s great Lord and Savior, picture of moral rectitude and man of supreme honor?” Arvid asks.
“You mean Mannerheim?”
“The one and only.”
Baron Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim. Descended of Swedish royalty. Imperial Russian army officer. Commander in chief of Finland’s defense forces in the Second World War, and later the nation’s sixth president.
“He was a great man,” I say, “a great leader. Finland might not exist today without him. The Russians or the Germans or both would have destroyed us.”
“That’s correct. Much recent historical research has taken up the question of the extent to which Finland protected Jews during the war. Mannerheim is lauded for his efforts.”
“You’re the one they’re going to accuse of being a Jew killer, not Mannerheim,” I say.
“I killed Communists. I didn’t give a flying fuck if they were Jews or not. Jewish prisoners of war were concentrated in the middle of Finland, near the Second Central POW camp in Naarajarvi. Can you think why that might be?”
“History books say they were placed there for their own protection.”
“Wrong. They were placed there in case it was necessary to sell them off to the Gestapo.”
“Sorry,” I say, “but how could you possibly know that?”
“Bruno Aaltonen was friends with the head of the Gestapo, and they discussed it at length. My father was friends with Aaltonen. He told Dad about it. Dad told me. And besides, it was a common topic of discussion among Valpo detectives.”
“You’re telling me Mannerheim was an anti-Semite and prepared to take part in the Holocaust.”
“No, I’m telling you he was a pragmatist, faced with weighing the lives of a few hundred Jews against the liberty of Finland, a country he protected at all costs, and the lives of its citizens, which at that time numbered about four million. I’m telling you great men don’t become great without getting their hands dirty.”
“It’s hard to believe,” I say.
“You believe fabrications in history books. You’re brainwashed. Our relationship with Germany was rooted in ideology as well as shared military goals. The Continuation War was about expansionism. Through Valpo, we only handed over about a hundred and thirty people to the Gestapo through extradition. But the military turned over about three thousand, mostly Red Army. You know why?”
“Why?”
“Because we wanted slave labor. Germany had an enormous number of prisoners of war. We were trading our Red Army prisoners for their Finnic and especially Finnish-speaking prisoners so we could settle them in Karelia, which we had captured from the Soviet Union and which we intended to ethnically cleanse of Russians. It would have eased the labor shortage on the home front. It was an ideological decision. Nationalists had dreamed about the opportunity to occupy Eastern Karelia since before I was born. Mannerheim signed off on this. He refused to send our troops to attack St. Petersburg with the Germans. Giving the Gestapo three thousand POWs was a way of smoothing that over.”
“What about Jews?” I ask.
“We gave the Gestapo latitude. If they requested extradition of a particular person, like as not, we wouldn’t inquire about the basis for the request. We knew goddamned good and well though, that an extradition was a death sentence.”
“This is powerful stuff. How could it have been kept secret for so long?”