Tag Archives: Finland air force

Buffalo Drivers

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Some 80 years ago today.

Finnish Airforce officers, fresh graduates of fighter pilot course, 5th of June 1943, at Vesivehmaa, a village outside of Lahti, with a German shepherd mascot on the wing. Note their m/36 cavalry jodhpur-style officers’ breeches, complete with stripes.

Finnish offical caption: ‘Ohjaajakurssin päättäneitä upseereja, jotka odottavat siirtoa rintamalaivueisiin.” Sa-kuva image no. 129783. Photographer: Sot.virk. A.Viitasalo

Yes, that is a Brewster Buffalo. The Finns received 44 in 1940 and, by all accounts, they accounted for over 400 “kills” against the Reds. The humble aircraft had a lot of nicknames with the service, including Lentävä kaljapullo (“flying beer bottle”).

The Ilmavoimat, or Finnish Air Force, has its roots in the old Imperial Russian Army’s air corps and sprang to life roughly 105 years ago at the country’s independence from the failing old Empire, using both inherited Tsarist and donated Swedish crews and aircraft.

The small but hearty force has earned a solid reputation fighting first the Reds in 1918 and later the Soviets in the 1939-40 Winter War (using such quaintly obsolete aircraft as Brewster Buffalos, Bristol Bulldogs, Fokker D.XXIs, and Gloster Gladiators) and WWII, which, as they largely just fought the Soviets again, they termed “The Continuation War.”

The Finns, even with a tiny air corps and beat-up planes chalked up nearly 100 aces in WWII, including “Illu” Ilmari Eino Ilmari Juutilainen, the highest (non-German) ace of the war.

Of note, the excellent Päijät-Häme aviation museum now uses the old WWII airstrip at Vesivehmaa picture above. Sadly, while they have about a dozen former Ilmavoimat-operated aircraft, all date from post-1950, and they have no Brewsters as only eight survived the war in Finnish service and the final five in operating condition were scrapped in 1948.

Indonesia orders French, Finland picks Cheesburgers

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Two U.S. Air Force F-35A Lightning IIs assigned to the 4th Fighter Squadron, Hill Air Force Base, Utah, and two Dassault Rafales assigned to the 1/4 Gascogne Fighter Squadron, 113 Saint-Dizier-Robinson Air Base, France, break formation during flight May 18, 2021, over France. The flight was a part of the Atlantic Trident 21, a joint, multinational exercise involving service members from the U.S., France, and the U.K. and is aimed at enhancing fourth and fifth-generation integration, combat readiness, and fighting capabilities, through conducting complex air operations in a contested environment. (U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Alexander Cook)

Rafale is slowly but steadily becoming an export success for Dassault, shaping up to be a worthy replacement for the famed Mirage. As we have covered before, Greece just picked up its first models while India is looking at the carrier variant to augment its growing quantities of land-based models. The UAE, Egypt, and Qatar have the aircraft on order as does Croatia. Now, it seems Indonesia has made good on a theorized order for the French bird, signing a contract last week to purchase 42 Rafale F4s.

Janes reports from Jakarta that the Indonesians will get the first half-dozen Rafaels in 2026. 

Meanwhile, in Helsinki

Finland’s defense ministry announced that the formal purchase agreement for 64 F-35A Block 4 fighter jets was signed on Friday. The aircraft will replace 55 aging (and increasingly unsupportable after the Navy and USMC have divested themselves of the bird) F-18C models.

Importantly, Scandinavian neighbors Norway and Denmark, which Finland is getting increasingly close with, not to mention Poland to the south of the Baltic, are on Team F-35 already. Meanwhile, Italian, Belgian, and the U.S. are expected to make future F-35 deployments to the NATO air policing operation in Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia.

With that in mind, the choice by the Finns seems obvious in hindsight.