The Finns

Back in the 1980s, I was told a story about the Finns by a fellow Norwegian who had served time as an army officer for UN in Lebanon back in the days of the Lebanese civil war.

The Nordic UN delegations were in charge of neighboring areas, and from time to time they coordinated their operations.

For some reason, the Finnish area was always the area with the least trouble. While the Danes, Swedes and Norwegians were always having to deal with trouble, the Finns rarely had any incidents.

Full of admiration for their Nordic Neighbors to the east, the Scandinavian delegates decided that they should look closer into the routines and procedures of the Finnish officers, so they asked them for a short presentation to learn their secrets.

The Finns were all very happy to comply, and so there was a meeting set up where the Finns would tell their Scandinavian friends how they went about their work.

The meeting went well. Everyone was courteous and kind. There was coffee and cakes. But there was nothing told that could shed light on what the big secret could be. Everything was done exactly like things were done everywhere else. So why exactly was there never much trouble in the Finnish area.

"Ah!" said the Finnish officer with a big smile. "You see, we a have a long history of dealing with mischief. We have little tolerance for it. We do not engage as much in dialog as you do."

"So what exactly do you do?" asked the Scandinavian officers, eager to learn about the Finish secret.

"Well. When there's trouble of any kind, we take them outside where we ask them to dig a hole next to the road. Then we shoot them, cover the hole, and that's it. Problem solved."

The Scandinavians looked in disbelief at the smiling Finnish officer. But he was not kidding. That was how they dealt with mischief, and that was the reason they had so little of it.