Programs and Events
Speech to Kauniala War Veterans Hospital, 8 December 2005
Dear Veterans, Admiral Kaskeala, officials and staff from the Kauniala Hospital and Disabled War Veterans Association, defense attaché colleagues and wives,
It is a great honor for me to give the traditional Christmas greetings from the Helsinki Defense Attachés to the war veterans here at Kauniala Hospital.
I am speaking today as the representative of 39 military attachés who are accredited to Finland, representing 31 different countries.
As experienced military officers, we know how important it is to honor veterans who fought for their country.
Each year during our Christmas-season visit to Kauniala, we Defence Attaches gain a renewed appreciation for the excellent medical care given here by the professional and caring staff, and for the support from the Disabled War Veterans Association. In fact this is the fourth year that I have been privileged to attend this party, and I continue to be impressed by the superb support that Finnish war veterans receive here.
We attachés have made many visits to the Finnish Defense Forces over the past year. We have been given the opportunity to visit Army, Navy and Air Force units and exercises all across Finland.
I am happy to report to you veterans here that we have seen with our own eyes that, still today, Finland’s youngest conscripts continue to hold the special spirit that this country is a land, and a culture, and a way of life that is worth fighting for.
That fighting spirit lives on as well in those young Finnish men and women who have volunteered to help bring peace to other very troubled parts of the world. As we enjoy this delicious food and wonderful music, we appreciate that at this very moment, hundreds of Finnish men and women are working to keep the peace in such places as Kosovo, Bosnia, and Afghanistan. From the world-class professionalism and expertise we have seen during our visits to the Finnish military, we know that your peacekeepers are well educated, highly-trained, and exceptionally motivated to support peace and stability around the world. We hope that those soldiers as well can enjoy a peaceful Christmas.
Honored War veterans
For many of us defense attachés, the most meaningful trip we made this year was to the Kainuu Brigade in Kajaani, where we saw conscript training, and then we toured the battlefields of the Raate Road, where we saw the scene of such heroic combat during the Winter War.
I had read about the battles there, but seeing the Raate Road in person, it really struck me how remote and isolated the Finnish wilderness is there. Even though our visit was in April, the land was still covered with heavy snow, and it was easy to imagine how cold and dark and cut-off from the rest of the world that Finnish forest must have seemed to the soldiers who fought there.
And yet, the world did notice, and still remembers, what you veterans achieved there – and I was reminded of that just this week, when I told my father that I would be speaking to Finnish war veterans today. He told me a story from his childhood that I had never heard before.
In 1939, my father was a 10 year-old boy, living on a farm in the north of the American state of Missouri. One of his strongest memories from that time is of sitting with his family on cold winter nights, listening to the radio as news reports described the heroic Finnish soldiers, dressed in white camouflage, valiantly fighting to defend their country.
Dear veterans, hearing my own father speak about the admiration that he still holds for you after all these years, it struck me in a very personal way, how your bravery and self-sacrifice were so incredible that your stories traveled from the deepest Finnish wilderness and reached the ears of a little boy on the opposite side of the world, and made such an impression on him that he has remembered you all his life.
In the United States, it is now common to refer to the American men and women who fought to win World War II as “The Greatest Generation.” But that generation of Americans had you to inspire them. In more ways than you can imagine, the world took hope and courage from Finland, and the example you veterans set by standing up to such impossible odds and defending your country. All of us who live in peace and freedom today owe our deepest gratitude to you.
On behalf of the defence attachés and their spouses, I wish you all a Peaceful Christmas and a Happy New Year for 2006.
Robert F. Byrd, Colonel, United States Air Force
U.S. Defense Attaché to Finland
and Doyén, Helsinki Defense Attaché Association