Saksalaisten sotilaiden lapset. Ulkomaalaisten sotilaiden lapset ...

with a change in the law made in 1941, civilian were no longer allowed to use
condoms. In spite of a lack of raw materials however, the manufacture of condoms
was never limited at any time.
German soldiers may also have extensively used birth control methods when with
Finnish women. German soldiers arriving in Finland had access to condoms during
the entire war, as they could be bought from their canteens. Large numbers of
quality condoms were already produced in Germany before the war. Although the
German political and military leadership took a negative view of German soldiers
having relationships with women from the so-called subhuman races, the
Wehrmacht leadership was pragmatic. Because it was difficult to control the sexual
activities of soldiers at home and in occupied territories in spite of the ban, an
entire field bordello organization maintained by the Wehrmacht was created. There
were separate army bordellos for enlisted men and for officers in the large
garrisons. The army also acquired large numbers of condoms, with the word
Wehrmacht on the package. This was in order to try to keep the soldiers fit for
action by keeping all sexually transmitted diseases at bay. The condom was an
effective tool for this goal.
In his memoirs, SS veteran Sakari Lappi-Seppälä describes how a sergeant major
in the Finnish SS battalion distributed packages of contraceptives to the men in
Stanberg in June 1941 before the attack on the Soviet Union. German soldiers in
Finland had so many condoms that they also distributed them ”wholesale” to
Finnish soldiers in the Svir River sector. The part of town where the German
garrison in Turku was housed, the so-called Little Berlin, also had a Berger & Co.
canteen in it, among other things. It should be noted in passing that Finnish women
worked in this canteen. Condoms were the most sold item there. German soldiers
once made a balloon out of condoms and attached it to the chandelier in the
popular Rex Café in Pietarsaari. Because condoms were so easily available,
German soldiers often used them for other purposes than the originally intended
one. ”Care packages” were distributed in company headquarters at the front to
Finnish soldiers going on leave from 1942. These packages contained silver gelatin
and disinfectant creams for use both before and after intercourse. The idea could
have come from the corresponding so-called health package used by the
Wehrmacht.
Children fathered by German soldiers may have been nearly always unplanned.
Children probably resulted when couples did not happen to have a condom at the
necessary moment, from carelessness, when alcohol was involved, and for other
reasons. One child came into the world when NCO Alfred Berger attended a
birthday party in Oulu for a women working at the Hotel Arina that he half knew
named Eila. Berger later wrote to this daughter: ”Your dear mother had a birthday
on 18 June 1943. She was turning 21 and invited me, along with another woman
friend and comrade of mine. Eila had gone through a lot of trouble to set a good
table in those horrible war years. There was salmon and alcohol in many forms.
Exactly 9 months later you were born on 18 March 1944.”
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