The Karelo-Finnish Soviet Socialist Republic (Karelo-Finnish SSR), also called Soviet Karelia or simply known as Karelia, was a

republic A republic, based on the Latin phrase ''res publica'' ('public affair' or 'people's affair'), is a State (polity), state in which Power (social and political), political power rests with the public (people), typically through their Representat ...

of the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

. It existed from 31 March 1940 until it was made part of the

Russian SFSR The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (Russian SFSR or RSFSR), previously known as the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and the Russian Soviet Republic, and unofficially as Soviet Russia,Declaration of Rights of the labo ...

on 16 July 1956 as the

Karelian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic The Karelian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, Karelian ASSR for short, sometimes referred to as Soviet Karelia, East Karelia or simply Karelia, was an autonomous republic of the Russian SFSR within the Soviet Union, with its capital in Petr ...

. The latter became the

Republic of Karelia The Republic of Karelia, or simply Karelia or Karjala (; ) is a Republics of Russia, republic of Russia situated in the Northwest Russia, northwest of the country. The republic is a part of the Northwestern Federal District, and covers an area of ...

, a

federal subject The federal subjects of Russia, also referred to as the subjects of the Russian Federation () or simply as the subjects of the federation (), are the administrative division, constituent entities of Russia, its top-level political division ...

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

, on 13 November 1991.

History

The Karelo-Finnish Soviet Socialist Republic was established by the Soviet government on 31 March 1940 by merging the KASSR with the

Finnish Democratic Republic The Finnish Democratic Republic ( or ''Suomen kansantasavalta'', , Russian: ''Финляндская Демократическая Республика''), also known as the Terijoki Government (), was a short-lived puppet government of the Sov ...

. The latter was created in territory ceded by

Finland Finland, officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It borders Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of Bothnia to the west and the Gulf of Finland to the south, ...

in the

Winter War The Winter War was a war between the Soviet Union and Finland. It began with a Soviet invasion of Finland on 30 November 1939, three months after the outbreak of World War II, and ended three and a half months later with the Moscow Peac ...

by the

Moscow Peace Treaty The Moscow Peace Treaty was signed by Finland and the Soviet Union on 12 March 1940, and the ratifications were exchanged on 21 March. It marked the end of the 105-day Winter War, upon which Finland ceded border areas to the Soviet Union. The ...

, namely the

Karelian Isthmus The Karelian Isthmus (; ; ) is the approximately stretch of land situated between the Gulf of Finland and Lake Ladoga in northwestern Russia, to the north of the River Neva. Its northwestern boundary is a line from the Bay of Vyborg to the we ...

and

Ladoga Karelia Ladoga Karelia (, , , Карельское Приладожье, ''Karelskoje Priladožje'' or Северное Приладожье, ''Severnoje Priladožje'') is a historical region of Karelia, currently largely in Russia. Today, the term refers ...

, including the cities of Viipuri and

Sortavala Sortavala (; Finnish language, Finnish and ; ), previously known as Serdobol () until 1918, is a types of inhabited localities in Russia, town in the Republic of Karelia, Russia, located at the northern tip of Lake Ladoga near the Finland, Finni ...

. Virtually the entire Karelian population of the ceded areas, about 422,000 people, was evacuated to

, and the territories were settled by peoples from other parts of the

. Creating a new Republic of the Union for an ethnic group that was not large in absolute terms, nor constituted anything close to a majority in its territory, nor had been a separate independent nation before its incorporation into the USSR, was unprecedented in the

history of the USSR The history of the Soviet Union (USSR) (1922–91) began with the ideals of the Russian Bolshevik Revolution and ended in dissolution amidst economic collapse and political disintegration. Established in 1922 following the Russian Civil War, ...

. Some later historians believe that the elevation of Soviet Karelia from an

Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic An Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (ASSR, ) was a type of administrative unit in the Soviet Union (USSR), created for certain ethnic groups to be the titular nations of. The ASSRs had a status lower than the constituent union republics of t ...

(within the

RSFSR The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (Russian SFSR or RSFSR), previously known as the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and the Russian Soviet Republic, and unofficially as Soviet Russia,Declaration of Rights of the labo ...

) to an SSR was a political move as a "convenient means for facilitating the possible incorporation of additional Finnish territory" (or, possibly, the whole of Finland) into the USSR.''Memoirs of Nikita Khrushchev''. Edited by Sergeĭ Khrushchev. Published by Penn State Press, 2007. . Page 871 (biographic note on O. Kuusinen)
On Google Books
/ref> Suomalais-karjalainen neuvostotasavalta

In 1941, Finland retook the territory that it had lost in 1940 and occupied most of the Karelian lands that had been within the USSR before 1940, including the capital

Petrozavodsk Petrozavodsk (, ; Karelian language, Karelian, Veps language, Vepsian and ) is the capital city of the Republic of Karelia, Russia, which stretches along the western shore of Lake Onega for some . The population of the city is 280,890 as of 2022. ...

(Petroskoi). In 1944, the Soviet Union recaptured the area. Soviet sovereignty was recognized by Finland in the

Moscow Armistice The Moscow Armistice was signed between Finland on one side and the Soviet Union and United Kingdom on the other side on 19 September 1944, ending the Continuation War. The Armistice restored the Moscow Peace Treaty of 1940, with a number of modi ...

and

Paris Peace Treaty The Paris Peace Treaties () were signed on 10 February 1947 following the end of World War II in 1945. The Paris Peace Conference lasted from 29 July until 15 October 1946. The victorious wartime Allied powers (principally the United Kingdom, ...

. The Finnish Karelians were evacuated to Finland again. In September 1944, the

with

Vyborg Vyborg (; , ; , ; , ) is a town and the administrative center of Vyborgsky District in Leningrad Oblast, Russia. It lies on the Karelian Isthmus near the head of Vyborg Bay, northwest of St. Petersburg, east of the Finnish capital H ...

(Viipuri) was transferred from the Karelo-Finnish SSR to the

Leningrad Oblast Leningrad Oblast (, ; ; ) is a federal subjects of Russia, federal subject of Russia (an oblast). The oblast has an area of and a population of 2,000,997 (2021 Russian census, 2021 Census); up from 1,716,868 recorded in the 2010 Russian census ...

of the RSFSR, but

remained a part of the republic. On 16 July 1956, the republic was incorporated into the Russian SFSR as the Karelian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic. This move can perhaps be explained in the context of the general post-war improvement of Finno-Soviet relations, which also included such steps as the Soviets' return of the

Porkkala Naval Base Porkkala Naval Base was a Soviet naval base operational from 1944–1956 in the Municipality, municipalities of Kirkkonummi, Ingå and Siuntio on the Porkkala peninsula, 30 kilometers (19 mi) ''west'' of Helsinki, Finland. The area was l ...

leased territory to full Finnish sovereignty (January 1956), and leasing

Maly Vysotsky Island Maly Vysotsky Island or Malyj Vysotskij Island (; ; ) is an island in northwest Russia, that was leased to Finland. It is located in Vyborg Bay, next to Vysotsk, 12 km (7 miles) southwest of Vyborg. Between 1918 and 1940, the island was ...

and the Soviet section of the

Saimaa Canal The Saimaa Canal (; ; ) is a transportation canal that connects lake Saimaa with the Gulf of Finland near Vyborg, Russia. The canal was built from 1845 to 1856 and opened on 7 September 1856 (Old Style: 26 August 1856). It was overhauled and wi ...

(conquered by the USSR in 1940 and 1944) back to Finland (1963). The abolition of the Karelian SSR in 1956 was the only case in the history of the USSR (1922–1991) of merging a member republic of the USSR into another republic. The

state emblem of the Soviet Union The State Emblem of the Soviet Union was the official symbol of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics adopted in 1923 and used until the Dissolution of the Soviet Union, dissolution of the state in 1991. Although it technically is an emblem ...

had to be changed to reflect this, with one of the 16 ribbons symbolizing constituent republics (that in the Finnish language) removed. Soviet banknotes bearing the emblem were also changed accordingly. In the last days of the USSR, the Karelian ASSR became the

, a

subdivision Subdivision may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Subdivision (metre), in music * ''Subdivision'' (film), 2009 * "Subdivision", an episode of ''Prison Break'' (season 2) * ''Subdivisions'' (EP), by Sinch, 2005 * "Subdivisions" (song), by Rush ...

of the

Russian Federation Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

, on 13 November 1991.

Politics

The chairman of the Karelo-Finnish

Supreme Soviet The Supreme Soviet () was the common name for the legislative bodies (parliaments) of the Soviet socialist republics (SSR) in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). These soviets were modeled after the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, establ ...

(1940–1956) was a Finnish communist

Otto Wille Kuusinen Otto Wilhelm "Wille" Kuusinen (; ; 4 October 1881 – 17 May 1964) was a Finnish-born Soviet politician, literary historian, and poet. After the defeat of the Reds in the Finnish Civil War, he fled to the Soviet Union, where he worked unti ...

. In the republic, there was also a separate

Karelo-Finnish Communist Party The Communist Party of the Karelo-Finnish SSR (, ), initially known as the Communist Party (Bolshevik) of the Karelo-Finnish SSR, was the branch of the All-Union Communist Party/Communist Party of the Soviet Union in the Karelo-Finnish SSR (1940� ...

led in the 1940s by G.N. Kupriyanov.

Yuri Andropov Yuri Vladimirovich Andropov ( – 9 February 1984) was a Soviet politician who served as the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from late 1982 until his death in 1984. He previously served as the List of Chairmen of t ...

served for some years as the first secretary of the republic's

Komsomol The All-Union Leninist Young Communist League, usually known as Komsomol, was a political youth organization in the Soviet Union. It is sometimes described as the youth division of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), although it w ...

branch, the

Leninist Communist Youth League of the Karelo-Finnish Soviet Socialist Republic Leninist Communist Youth League of the Karelo-Finnish SSR (, abbr. ''KSSNT:n LKNL'' or ''KSSNT:n Komsomol''; , abbr. ''KSSNT:n LKNL'' or ''KSSNT:n Komsomol''; , ''Leninsky kommunistichesky soyuz molodezhi Karelo-Finskoy SSR'', abbr. ''LKSM KFSSR'', ...

Chairmen of the Supreme Soviet

Chairmen of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet

Chairmen of the Council of People's Commissars

The Council of People's Commissars was renamed the Council of Ministers in 1946.

References