The
Hungarian Volunteers in the Winter War travelled to fight for the Finns after the Soviet invasion of Finland in 1939. For a variety of reasons, volunteers from the
Kingdom of Hungary fought on the side of Finland during the
Winter War (1939–1940) with the
Soviet Union.
Hungarian-Finnish Relationship before and after World War I
At the end of the 19th century the
Finno-Ugric linguistic affinity became widely accepted after extensive public debate. Some
Magyar scientists (e. g.
Ármin Vámbéry orientalist) and intellectuals (e. g.
Arany János,
Jókai Mór) were unable to accept that the
Hungarian nation had family relations in Northern
Europe. To them, relationships with the
Hun or
Turkic peoples seemed much more plausible, mainly in the years of the Hungarian millennium around 1896. At this time the Finnish people, living in
Tsarist Russia, were receptive to the idea of Finno-Ugric affinity and regarded the proud and freedom-loving Hungarian nation as an ideal.
After the
First World War,
Finland became independent, but
Hungary lost the war and roughly two-thirds of its territory as a result of the
Treaty of Trianon. One-third of Hungarians were suddenly left outside Hungary's borders, as it became increasingly...
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