Last week Finland's aging (78), anxious President Juho K. Paasikivi summoned editors of Helsinki's principal newspapers to the Presidential Palace, handed them a news item and an earnest exhortation. The news was the text of Finland's unwanted treaty of "mutual aid" with the Soviet Union, signed in Moscow's Kremlin. The exhortation: sugar-coat the news in order to minimize anti-Russian feeling among Finns.
Over Finland's state-controlled radio Paasikivi himself set the sugary tone. Said he: "We can look with confidence toward the future." In Moscow, Prime Minister Pekkala had already thanked the Soviet Union for its "benevolent attitude." Editors and politicians took the...
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