Finland Frontier Guard
Frontier Guards in bivouac during winter patrol
Courtesy General Headquarters, Finnish Defense Forces
Ski troops towed by a Swedish-built Bandvagn 206 multipurpose
tracked vehicle
Courtesy General Headquarters, Finnish Defense Forces
The Frontier Guard (Rajavartiolaitos--RVL) was
considered an
elite force, organized, even in peacetime, along military
lines
into companies and platoons; its personnel held
military-type
ranks. The RVL was established in 1919, and it was placed
under
the Ministry of Interior. The Coast Guard (sometimes
called the
Sea Guard), dating from 1930, was also under the Ministry
of
Interior and was made part of the RVL in 1944. In a time
of
crisis or war, authorities could integrate the entire RVL,
or
parts of it, into the Defense Forces. The peacetime tasks
of the
RVL were to guard and to patrol national boundaries; to
work with
the police in maintaining public order and safety in
frontier and
coastal areas; to prevent and, if necessary, to
investigate
frontier incidents; and, together with the Customs Office,
to
exercise customs control. The RVL patrolled a special
frontier
zone of three kilometers on land and four kilometers at
sea along
the Finnish-Soviet border. A permit was required to enter
this
zone.
The personnel complement of the RVL, as of 1988, was
about
3,500; an additional 1,000 conscripts were assigned to it.
Coast
Guard personnel numbered 600; no conscripts served with
the Coast
Guard. The RVL was divided into four districts, and the
Coast
Guard was divided into three. Each district was composed
of three
or four frontier companies, a ranger or commando company,
and a
headquarters platoon. Actual patrolling of the border was
conducted by the frontier companies, which consisted of
two to
four frontier platoons. Each platoon manned one to three
RVL
stations. The ranger companies, which served as training
units
for the conscripts, were located at the district
headquarters.
Only career personnel participated in regular boundary
patrolling. A separate Air Patrol Command was equipped
with
Agusta Bell Jet Ranger light helicopters and Aerospatiale
Super
Puma medium helicopters, the latter with an antisubmarine
warfare
role in wartime.
Basic training of the RVL was conducted at the Frontier
Guard
School at Immola in the municipality of Imatra and at the
Coast
Guard School at Otaniemi. NCOs received their training
mainly at
the Defense Forces' NCO school; officer training was
carried out
at the Military Academy and at other military schools.
Conscripts
received their ranger training in the districts where they
were
assigned. Conscripts admitted to the RVL were required to
be in
top physical condition, and they were usually residents of
border
areas. Opportunities offered to RVL conscripts for
training as
reserve NCOs and officers were similar to those offered in
the
Defense Forces
(see The Armed Forces
, this ch.).
Under wartime conditions the RVL would be organized
into
special Frontier Jaeger Battalions. Their mobilized
strength
would be about 11,500. Their tasks would be to operate
against
key targets in the enemy's rear and to defend against
enemy
airborne or other penetration of Finnish rear areas. The
Coast
Guard did not have a reserve component, but several of its
larger
patrol craft had a submarine tracking capability, and they
could
be rapidly converted for antisubmarine warfare and
minelaying and
minesweeping operations.
Each Coast Guard district consisted of a headquarters
platoon, three Coast Guard areas (each comprising two to
six
Coast Guard stations), and Coast Guard vessels. Its fleet
consisted of 7 offshore patrol craft of between 135 and
700 tons
displacement and 53 smaller coastal patrol craft.
Data as of December 1988
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