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Comment by sdfhdhjdw3 | Hacker News Reader

> Logically if you want an existential threat to Russia to expand up against Russian borders you must want war, no?

No you see, this isn't "NATO expanding up to"...

Countries are sovereign to choose their allies. And countries in eastern europe are asking to join a defense alliance against Russia.

Serious question, have you considered that number 1 no one is forcing eastern europe countries to join this alliance, and number 2 WHY do they want to join it? If you haven't, I'll tell you the answer: What is happening in Ukraine and what happened in Georgia and Chechnia is EXACTLY the reason why these countries want join NATO.

NATO isn't expanding up to Russia's borders. Russia is scaring every country it borders, so they're doing something about it.

Oh look, Finland and Sweden are joining NATO https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/news_197737.htm

Because OF COURSE they do, because otherwise they might be next to be invaded.

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It calls itself a defensive alliance but in the last 20 years it has been exclusively offensive. This is, of course, pretty standard orwellian doublethink.

I have considered why these countries want to join. It's for much the same reason inner city kids want to join gangs - a mix of a desire for protection and a desire to be the threat for once.

>What is happening in Ukraine and what happened in Georgia and Chechnia is EXACTLY the reason why these countries want join NATO

Georgia got whacked for the same reason Ukraine did - because it tried to join our gang. Why were we pouring money into Georgia to sway it towards that point? Well, coz it's a standard empire building tactic to stir shit up on ethnic faultlines along the borders of your opponents. Just ask the British.

I fully understand WHY kids join inner city gangs but we generally try to advise them against it for a reason. Those reasons apply here 100% - it can give you protection, but it can also get you chewed up and spat out as cannon fodder in a larger turf war.

> Georgia got hit for the same reason Ukraine did - because it tried to join our gang.

Man, Russia is really losing this game then. Because countries keep joining Nato. Findland and Sweden now. Sweden has had a policy of neutrality for 200 years LOL.

Fucking losers. If there's one immutable truth in Russian history, is that its wherewithal has never ever been able to match its ambition.

The Finland border area is where the USSR badly lost the winter war. It's naturally suited to defense.

The Ukraine border area is where the USSR almost lost to the Nazis. It is an exposed jugular. A NATO base in Mariupol could cut them off from their black sea fleet/only warm water ports and their oil fields in the caucausus like the Nazis tried to.

You dont have to be a military analyst to see that Finland and Swedens membership is less threatening than ukraine.

Finland joining NATO is absolutely threatening to Russia. Not far from the border, alongside it, is the only railway to Murmansk and the Kola peninsula, which is of prime importance to Russia.

Scaring Finland into joining NATO after their long held policy of neutrality was an incredibly counterproductive strategy for Moscow.

As said above, all nations sorrounding Russia that have joined NATO, have done so because they were and are afraid of Russia.

He's just repeating Russian propaganda.

Russia has been saying "if Finland joins NATO, there will be consequences" since forever. When Finland actually joins Russia says "yeah no problem it's not really a threat". This is to not lose face, _obviously_, but all these parrots all of a sudden go "oh yeah no problem, you don't have to be a military analyst to see it's not a threat". They're just parrots.

>Finland joining NATO is absolutely threatening to Russia

Right. It absolutely is. Just nowhere near as threatening as Ukraine-with-donbas-and-crimea-and-most-of-its-coast joining NATO.

Theyll probably be more comfortablen with Ukraine joining NATO either if they turn it into a rump state with limited access to the coast and no control over the russian speaking heartland.

> Countries are sovereign to choose their allies.

unless those countries are Panama and Grenada that happened to be inappropriately close to self-important US interests.

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