I did my mandatory military service in the Finnish army. I was graduating the NCO school as an artillery forward observer under sergeant. We were all interviewed by the professional officers who trained us on which posting each of us wanted. I had the best grades so I had the first pick.

I chose to stay in the same unit where the NCO training had been held. I took the opportunity to ask a question that had bugged me for some time at that point. Why does the Finnish military train so many FOs? We have a five man FO team in every platoon and an extra team at company level, and I know no other country with that many FOs in their units.

The over lieutenent answered my question: "You are single use, that's why we train so many of you." The enemy sees FOs as high priority targets and can locate us when we use our radios to call fires. So I had quite the hazardous job if there were ever to be international live fire exercises before 2056 when I am too old for reserve.

Russians have shown themselves to be quite incompetent lately. This has caused me to be very confident about our changes of defending ourselves, even alone if needed. It has also demonstrated that my position is important, but not nearly as dangerous as I thought. And we are now applying to join NATO, so that is great.