Figure 1.--Here we see a German soldier with two Finnish children on a BMW R12 motorcycle and side car on the Raate road in Suomussalmi, Finland (June 30, 1941). The Finns after the Winter Wae sought German aid and got it. The mobilized for Barbarossa and shortly after this photograph was taken joined the Germans as a co-beligerant. Suomussalmi os located in central Finland closed tonthe Soviet birder, near the vital Soviet rail links to the important Arctic ports--Arkangel and Murmansk. The H on the bike identifies it as a Heer (Army) vehicle. Notice the soldier. He vis notba young man. Wven at this time, the Germans were streaching the manpower limits of the Reich.
Race is often treated as a footnote to World War II. It was not. Race was central to Hitker and NAZI thinking and the war effort that they pursued. The greatest German objective was to seize the land and resources of the East. The people were another matter they were to be removed and murdered in large numbers--Generalplan Ost. Those who were not to be murdered, were to be enslaved. The major problems the NAZIs faced were numbers--there was just not enough of them to achieve their horendous goals. Thus there was interest in gaining control over the Germans outsude the Reich. This effort was uses as an excuse to seize Austria and the Czech Sudetenland (1938). It soon became obvious, however, that it was in part a cover to seize neigboring countries--but it was at the same time also a very real desire. And it was a reason the NAZIs were interested in Scadanavia to the north. There were resources there, but also what the NAZIs called 'genetically valuable material'--the people. Scandanavia was settled by the north German tribes. These were German tribes unknown to the Romans, but would burst on to the Europoean scene as the Vikings in the medieval era. And unlike Germany itself, Scandanavia had a more Germanic population than Germany itself which was more mixed with other European peoples. Finland was, however, not part of Scandanavia, although bordering on it. And the Finnish people were not the descendents of Germanic tribes. They are a Nordic, but not a Germanic people. They are Proto-Uralic peoples. The NAZIs were determined to kill Slavs and other such people, but the Finns looked like Scandanavians--the blond hair and bklue eyes the NAZIS sp admired. And located strategically north of the evolving Barbarossa plan, it was a valuable potential ally. The Finns like other European people had no desire for war. but the Sovier invasion and seizure of Karelia (1939-40) left the Finns willing to cooperate.
