Finland is not afraid of Russia, because history has taught it never to look away from its eastern neighbor, and in the worst case scenario it is ready to defend itself by all means, including weapons.

Such a claim of Henry Vanhanen, a foreign policy expert and adviser to the Finnish National Coalition Party, may come as a surprise at first glance, as until a few decades ago war could not be linked to Finland. For many, this country is a symbol of democracy, liberalism, social protection, tolerance, human rights, everything but weapons, violence and war, writes Al Jazeera.

But this is only at first glance, because the turbulent history of the Finns has taught them that everything they have today, they must be ready to defend at any time with their own blood.

In this case, the threat is more than obvious and comes from Moscow, evoking Finnish memories of the brutal winter wars of 1939 and 1940 launched by the Soviet dictator. Joseph Stalin. In those wars, the Finnish army repulsed the forces of much more powerful Soviet troops and inflicted heavy losses on them, but lost part of its territory. The Finns never forgot that.

"We have had very difficult experiences, we have never forgotten that, it is in our DNA," Finnish President Sauli Niinisto once told Russia.

Because of all this, Finland has never looked away from its neighbor with whom it shares a 1.340 km long border, and Vanhanen for Al Jazeera He said that despite efforts to build good neighborly relations with the USSR and later with Russia, and military neutrality, it was working to strengthen its military potential to be prepared for the worst-case scenarios.

And the story of these "worst-case scenarios" became relevant after the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the changes in the foreign and security policies of Sweden and Finland, which sought NATO membership because of the Russian threat, which caused unequivocal threats from Moscow.

- Finns are not afraid of Russia, but, of course, many are shocked by Russian terror on Ukrainian civilians and are worried about the war. It does not seem likely that Russia will resort to military means against Finland, but whether there is a threat or not, we are ready for all scenarios. Finland is a stable democracy and it is not easy to be surprised if it is touched. "But we can expect different hybrid measures against Finland, but nothing too serious that we could not solve on our own," Vanhanen said.