The Finnish Civil War starting in January 1918, initially did not change this situation. Sweden's Social Democrats had the year before purged the revolutionaries from the party, and were sympathetic but unsupportive of the socialist republic in Finland. Their coalition partners in the cabinet, the Liberals, were rather inclined to sympathize with the White government in Finland, but they were traditionally neutralist and additionally rather suspicious of their Finnish counterparts. Those non-socialists in Finland who were not ardent fennomans seemed to the Swedish Liberals more like the Conservatives they were used to viewing as their political enemies.