Le Nord : revue internationale des Pays de Nord - 01.06.1939, Page 491
THE RELATIONS BETWEEN FINLAND
AND THE USSR.
By Y. Ruutu,
Professor of Public Law at the Social-Economic Highschool of Helsinki.
THE underlying cause of international conflicts is often a
lack of mutual confidence. Thus the motive which led
the USSR to suggest various territorial adjustments to Fin-
land appears to have been a suspicion that Finland would not
always and in any circumstances remain neutral if a third Power
attacked the USSR, but would, either under pressure or of her
own free will, allow the attacker to make use of Finnish terri-
tory for military operations against the USSR. Suspicions of this
nature, again, have their rise in the general European situation.
Since 1920 the frontiers between the USSR and Finland have been
those agreed on in the Dorpat Peace Treaty. In 1932 these fron-
tiers were expressly re-guaranteed in the Non-Aggression and
Neutrality Pact then concluded, which was renewed in 1934
to run to the end of 1945. Now, however, the European situation
has altered to an extent that has caused the USSR to seek addi-
tional security for her western border by establishing various
bases in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, in addition to which she
has proposed similar arrangements to Finland.
For the first, the USSR has made proposals to Finland for
the surrender of five islands in the Gulf of Finland, viz., Seiskari,
Lavansaari, Tytársaari, Suursaari and Peninsaari.
Secondly, the USSR has proposed frontier adjustments on the
Carelian Isthmus, where at one point the Finnish frontier reaches
to within about 30 kilometres of Leningrad.
Thirdly, the USSR proposes the surrender to her of Puu-
manki, the north-western corner of the Kalastajasaarento (Ry-
bachi) Peninsula on the Arctic coast.
In compensation for these surrenders of territory, the USSR
offers various areas of land along the eastern frontier of Finland,
now belonging to East Carelia.
Finally, the USSR goes on to propose:
that the defence works on the Carelian Isthmus be abolished;
that a piece of Finnish territory at the mouth of the Gulf of
*) This article is written on November 16th a fortnight before the
Sovjet Union’s aggression on Finland.