Baron Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim was a Finnish military leader and statesman. He served as the military leader of the Whites in the Finnish Civil War of 1918, as Regent of Finland, as commander-in-chief of Finland's defence forces during the period of World War II, as Marshal of Finland, and as the sixth president of Finland.
The Russian Empire dominated the Grand Duchy of Finland before 1917, and Mannerheim made a career in the Imperial Russian Army, rising by 1917 to the rank of lieutenant general. He had a prominent place in the ceremonies for Tsar Nicholas II's coronation in 1896 and later had several private meetings with the Tsar. After the Bolshevik revolution of November 1917 in Russia, Finland declared its independence – but soon became embroiled in the 1918 Finnish Civil War between the pro-Bolshevik "Reds" and the "Whites", who were the troops of the Senate of Finland, supported by troops of the German Empire. A Finnish delegation appointed Mannerheim as the military chief of the Whites in January 1918. Mannerheim was appointed as Commander-in-Chief of the country's armed forces in November 1939 after the Soviet invasion of Finland.