History: World War II Photography, Finnish Defense Forces, Finland

After the second world war, the Finnish Defence Forces relied largely on war-time material. The defence spending was minimal until the early 1960s. During the peak of the Cold War, the Finnish government made a conscious effort to increase defence capability. This resulted in the commissioning of several new weapons systems and strengthening the defence of Finnish Lapland by establishing new garrisons there. From 1968 onwards, the Finnish government adopted the doctrine of territorial defence, which require the use of large land areas to slow down and wear out a potential aggressor. The doctrine was complemented by the concept of total defence which calls for the use of society's all resources for national defence in case of a crisis. One of the aims of the new doctrines was to prevent a strategic strike which Soviet Union employed successfully to topple the government of Czechoslovakia in 1968. During the 1970s and 1980s, the Defence Forces capabilities were developed from this basis. In an all-out confrontation between the two major blocs, Finnish objective would have been to prevent any military incursions inside the borders and, in this way, to keep Finland outside the war.
The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 did not annihilate the military threat perceived by the government, but the nature of the threat has changed. While the concept of total, territorial defence was not dropped, the military planning has moved towards the capability to prevent and frustrate a strategic attack toward the vital regions of the country.