To find Western Europe’s largest artillery practice range, you have to head north — far north.
Rovajärvi lies just above the Arctic Circle, outside the town of Rovaniemi, in Finnish Lapland. And in late May, as young conscripts complete their final weeks of training on firing artillery cannons, it’s cold enough for the soldiers to bundle up in thick gloves and neck warmers.
Finnish conscript Iivari Luukari has been training for months on these howitzers, which are identical to those currently used in Europe’s bloodiest conflict since the Second World War.
Finnish conscripts stand near a howitzer at the Rovajärvi artillery range. (Emma Godmere/CBC)
“I think that it’s good to prepare for the worst-case scenario, like what happened in Ukraine,” he told CBC News, “but I’m hopeful that there won’t be any wars coming to Finland.”
Hoping for the best and preparing for the worst is a way of life in Finland. The entire country lives by a concept called “comprehensive security,” which requires every citizen, business, military member and government official to recognize the role they have to play in defending their country.
Comprehensive security even came up during Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand’s trip to Finland earlier this month, surfacing in a joint statement as a “strong focus” for Canada’s continued bilateral co-operation with its Arctic ally.
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NATO’s secretary general has warned Russia could launch an attack on the alliance within the next five years. What can Canada learn from its two newest NATO allies, Finland and Sweden, about preparing for what could be ahead? CBC’s Emma Godmere travelled to the two Nordic countries to see and hear how Finns and Swedes are steeling themselves for whatever the future may bring.
“In Finland, people understand well that we have a society which we have built for ourselves, and we like it a lot,” said Janne Kuusela, a senior civil servant leading defence policy at Finland’s Ministry of Defence.
“But the other side of the coin is that we are [a] small nation. We have 5.6 million people, with one of Europe’s largest landmasses, located next to Russia. So people understand that … everybody needs to do their share in defending and safeguarding the nation.”
Defence as a shared duty
The military still shoulders the responsibility of being Finland’s first line of defence, with a long-running conscription system that requires young men to complete mandatory military service when they turn 18 and some 900,000 citizens among its reserves.
But on a societal level, comprehensive security ranges from industries being ready to continue running services in a time of crisis, to citizens having 72 hours of food and water on hand in order to be self-sufficient in an emergency.
“It all begins from individual people,” Kuusela emphasized. “Because if your citizens don’t get this reality, and they are not willing to do their share — then you can pretty much forget about having comprehensive security and robust defence.”
This level of preparedness is necessary in a nation that was invaded by its next-door neighbour only a few generations ago. In the Winter War of 1939, Soviet Russia launched an all-out attack on Finland, stretching into four months of fighting that saw the outnumbered Finns put up a tough resistance.
“Luckily, we were able to fend off the aggressor,” Finnish Foreign Affairs Minister Elina Valtonen noted in an interview in Helsinki in May.
Finnish Foreign Affairs Minister Elina Valtonen emphasizes that Finland and Canada are ‘very like-minded countries.’ (Emma Godmere/CBC)
But, she cautioned — “we had to let go of some territory.”
The Winter War ended in a peace treaty that saw Finland give up 10 per cent of its land — including its then second-largest city of Viipuri — to Russia.
Valtonen warned against such a solution being applied to Ukraine, as the UN Charter, enacted five years after the end of the Winter War, “explicitly prohibits the use of violence to change borders — and this is something we have to ask the international community stick to,” she said.
Threats on the horizon
Finland is also able to share with its allies a keen sense of the threats that loom on the other side of its 1,340 km-long border with Russia.
“During Putin’s regime, Russia has developed into a very imperialist regime and country,” Valtonen said. “We have to take it very, very seriously, this threat that Russia is posing.”
“We know for sure that Russia will increase its military strength on its borders with NATO, especially after the fighting in Ukraine has ceased,” added Kuusela.
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“It’s important to note that Russia has not threatened Finland militarily, but the potential is always there. And it’s the question of military resources and power that Russia has, and then the potential will to use that power to achieve their political goals — that’s a combination we, of course, estimate all the time.”
It’s a danger that nearby Sweden is highly attuned to, as well.
“We continue to see the Russian threat as systemic and long term,” Viktoria Hjort Malmer, defence policy director at the Swedish Ministry of Defence, underscored in an interview in her office in central Stockholm.
“They would fairly quickly have the possibility to regroup along specifically the Baltic borders and the Finnish border,” she said, adding that NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte’s timeframe of a possible attack on the alliance within the next five years is plausible.
“We are definitely preparing ourselves to be able to face that kind of scenario.”
It’s a scenario that would have been perceived a little differently just a few years ago. In 2022, both Nordic countries abandoned decades of military non-alignment to join NATO, following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Now, under Article 5 of the alliance, both countries — just like Canada — are obligated to respond, should any NATO ally come under attack.
A whole-of-society approach
Like Finland, Sweden has established a social agreement to buttress its security efforts. Where Finns abide by “comprehensive security,” Swedes live under “total defence” — which includes a specific responsibility for citizens between the ages of 16 and 70.
“You are obligated by law to serve in the event of heightened alert and war,” said Sara Myrdal of the Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency, one of several government agencies tasked with preparing its citizens.
“It can be everything from continuing to do what you already do” — if you work in essential services, for example — “but you can also be assigned to do something different,” she added, pointing to rescue training that the government is currently looking into providing.
Swedish soldiers observe military exercises underway at the Rovajärvi artillery range. The country reintroduced mandatory military service in 2017. (Emma Godmere/CBC)
Conscription counts as part of this effort. Sweden reintroduced mandatory military service in 2017 for both men and women, with about 8,000 young people being selected for basic training last year. In five years, that number will increase to 10,000, as Sweden ramps up its military expansion.
But for many Swedes, being prepared can be as simple as staying informed. One way the Swedish government has tackled this is through a bright yellow pamphlet that landed in 5.2 million mailboxes last year.
“The reaction towards that brochure, which speaks of the concept of duty and conscription and how you need to get prepared as a citizen, is overwhelmingly a sense of responsibility,” Myrdal said as she flipped through its contents.
The pamphlet, In case of crisis or war: Important information to all residents of Sweden, offers blunt guidance on seeking shelter during an air raid, items needed for home emergency kits and even how to stop severe bleeding.
The Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency’s Sara Myrdal flips through one of the government pamphlets sent to 5.2 million Swedish households last year, with guidance for citizens about preparing for times of crisis. (Emma Godmere/CBC)
“Addressing war is important for us, because that is ultimately the greatest challenge, I would say, to our society,” Myrdal said. “So we need to work on a worst-scenario basis.”
Canada sent out similar guides on how to survive a nuclear attack during the Cold War. Decades later, as Sweden has updated its own crisis guidance for citizens, Myrdal pointed out the opportunity for an ally like Canada to follow in Sweden’s footsteps.
“I think we have things to learn from you, but maybe you can get some inspiration from how we address our population — and how we perhaps dare to to speak about the worst-case scenario the way we do,” she said.
This project was made possible by the R. James Travers Foreign Corresponding Fellowship, a bursary of $25,000 awarded to one Canadian journalist each year to fund reporting from abroad. Watch for more reporting on security, defence and sovereignty issues in Finland, Sweden and Greenland this fall.