# The country that defied an empire

Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/free-state-with-joe-brolly-and-dion-fanning-6213217/the-country-that-defied-an-empire
Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/free-state-with-joe-brolly-and-dion-fanning-6213217/the-country-that-defied-an-empire.md
Podcast: [Free State with Joe Brolly and Dion Fanning](https://stenobird.com/podcast/free-state-with-joe-brolly-and-dion-fanning-6213217)
Published: 2026-04-04T00:00:00+00:00
Episode link: https://freestatepodcast.com
Audio file: https://sphinx.acast.com/p/open/s/641338125bde790011089c5b/e/69d043433a785fb94b1e7f97/media.mp3
Processing state: not_requested
JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/free-state-with-joe-brolly-and-dion-fanning-6213217/episodes/the-country-that-defied-an-empire
Duration seconds: 2879

## Resource

Olivier Norek says he has never met a killer who wasn’t eaten inside by what they’d done. Before he became a writer, Norek was a policeman in the most dangerous parts of Paris and a humanitarian worker in the former Yugoslavia. On Free State today, Norek tells the story of Simo Hayha, the sniper known as the White Death, who fought for Finland during the Winter War when the Soviet Union invaded the country. He tells the story of how Finland, abandoned by the world to fight alone, stood against the Red Army, fighting for their communities. Norek researches his books the way he would investigate a crime and in preparation for the Winter Warriors, he spent a winter in Finland, experiencing the subzero temperatures in which Finns fought to defend their country. He tells us what the Winter War meant to Finland and how it shaped the world we live in today. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

## Actions

- request_transcript: `POST https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/free-state-with-joe-brolly-and-dion-fanning-6213217/episodes/the-country-that-defied-an-empire/transcription-requests` — Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode.
- read_markdown: `GET https://stenobird.com/podcast/free-state-with-joe-brolly-and-dion-fanning-6213217/the-country-that-defied-an-empire.md` — Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource.

A page view does not enqueue transcription. Agents should invoke `request_transcript` explicitly when they need this episode processed.

## Transcript

Full transcripts are not published on public pages unless there is a clear rights basis.