What exactly in my post indicated that I have any axe to grind with Finland of all places? Finland and Russia have a pretty long and complicated history dating to the napoleonic wars. In more "recent" history Russia and Finland were at odds since the Russian civil war and the Finnish civil war that followed.

During the Finnish civil war the "Whites" which one were already supported by Germany with Mannerheim which remained the commander of the Finnish forces through WW2 having a pretty close relationship with Germany. Overall even prior to the winter war Finland was not exactly "neutral" or to be more exact passive and the whole concept of "greater finland" after the Finnish civil war wasn't just a shrug.

During WW2 the Finns acted in their own best interest and they were not coerced into every action by either Russia or Germany as they had a pretty clear agenda of their own even if they could not act on it all the time due to well them being Finland.

To their credit they are the only country that managed to fight both the allies and the axis with the same government as after Finland broke the Ryti–Ribbentrop agreement by negotiating a separate peace with Russia (or well the Soviet Union) they had essentially to spend the next 7 months "fighting" the German forces with Russian troops supporting them nonetheless but for all accounts the "lapland war" had only a few engagements.

Finland also gave us the only known recording of Hitler outside of his speeches where he bitched about losing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitler_and_Mannerheim_recordin....