Bruno Jalander

Jalander was born in Brahestad on 28 August 1872.^[1] He was educated at the Finnish Cadet Corps in Fredrikshamn.^[1]

Jalander served in Nyland's Finnish sniper battalion until the Finnish national military was disbanded.^[1] For three years he served with a Russian troop unit in the Caucasus.^[1] He then worked in different jobs such as deputy chief of police and insurance inspector.^[1] When World War I broke out in 1914 Jalander resumed his military service in Russia where he served as company commander and battalion commander's adjutant in the defence units set up by the Petrograd Infantry Division.^[1] Following the February Revolution of 1917 Jalander began to work in the Office of the Governor-General of Finland.^[1] He was also a member of the military committee composed of activists who gathered to fight against Russian rule.^[1]

In November 1917 Jalander was promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel and was appointed governor of Nyland County.^[2] In April 1918, after the German occupation of Helsinki, he resumed his post as governor.^[1] In June 1918 he joined the Finnish army as a colonel.^[1]

As governor, Jalander came into open conflict with Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim, then regent of Finland. Their differences centred on how to treat Russian refugees in Finland, Mannerheim's plan for a Finnish attack on Petrograd in support of the White Russian cause, and Jalander's view that Mannerheim had during the World War been more loyal to the Russian imperial cause than to Finnish independence.^[1] He served as governor until 1932, when he was forced to resign following his firm opposition to the Lapua movement.^[1]

On 15 March 1920 Jalander was appointed minister of war in Rafael Erich's cabinet.^[3] A few months later he was promoted to the rank of major general.^[3] The cabinet resigned in April 1921.^[3] In September 1921, Jalander was re-appointed minister of war to the second cabinet of Juho Vennola.^[3] One of his most significant acts as minister was securing the appointment of Lauri Malmberg as commander-in-chief of the Civil Guard in 1921, thereby preventing the election of Mannerheim to the post.^[1] Jalander continued to serve as minister of war in the cabinet led by Aimo Cajander and in the cabinet led by Kyösti Kallio between 14 November 1922 and 22 June 1923.^[3]

Jalander took a firm stand against the Lapua movement and played a direct role in the events that triggered the Mäntsälä rebellion of 1932. He refused to prevent the Social Democratic MP Mikko Erich from speaking at a workers' hall in Mäntsälä and dispatched 30 policemen with orders to arrest the armed Lapua men who had gathered there. The police proved unequal to the task, and demands for Jalander's dismissal grew into calls for the entire government to resign. He was forced to leave his post in the summer of 1932. His dismissal was said to be the consequence of a promise made by President Pehr Evind Svinhufvud to the leaders of the Mäntsälä uprising.^[1]

Jalander served as League of Nations evacuation chief during the Spanish Civil War in 1938–1939.^[1]