Sweden Is a NATO Member
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Nuclear states can and HAVE gone to wars - but no one wants to mess with the devastating conventional power of NATO.
After the recent gutting, Russia has a few dozen SU-34s that can fly. NATO has thousands of planes.
And Ukraine is about to receive their F-16s
And Russia has explained why they believe they are at war, the insane dictator at the top explained that in the 13th century it was really unfair that some army marched from Poland to what is now Chechnya (even Tucker Carlsson frowned as hard as he could and needed about 6 seconds to collect his jaw from the floor) and therefore Ukraine isn't a "real" nation and should be part of Russia. And that, in any case, Russia has the borders it chooses, as does any large country.
the point is that many countries through the history surrendered very fast and agreed on whatever aggressor demanded.
> It's not like Russia needs any further territory
that's Putin's wish, he wants to become some historical figure, and people have little choice but follow to meat grinder
In fact it is common knowledge that before 2014 Ukraine and Russia were brotherhood nations. Ukraine couldn't imagine being attacked by Russia, that's why the army was a joke at that time and Putin took over Crimea so easily.
It failed, yes. But it succeeded in great many places, eastern europe, large part of south east asia, some african countries.
Russia is just a sorry ass loser, their country is in downward spiral and needs to exert power over its sphere of influence, thing is that countries in that sphere some time ago decided they dont really want to be aligned. Thus Russia decided to punish Ukraine otherwise the rest will also fall out of sphere (ironically I think they accelerated that process even more).
You mean US has. And someone like Trump may decide to not engage in conflict as part of NATO.
If you put various trainer, transportation, support role aircrafts, maybe it will be few thousands.
There is a non-binding convention that member should spend 2% of their GDP on *their* armed forces. That way when other nations call for help they can respond. It's a guideline figure though and some countries do it and some don't.
I didn't feel that strongly about this a few years ago but with the Ukraine war demonstrating how unprepared certain NATO members were (ex: Germany), despite their pledges at the 2014 Whales Summit[1], which was essentially preparing for this possibility. I can't help but view Trump's anger about this as fortelling, even if obnoxious. Still, I'm confused why this is getting re-interpreted as an attempt at disbanding NATO, from my perspective the allies who refuse to follow through with their promises are fundamentally what challenges the alliance's integrity, not the allies who call them out on it...
1. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_Wales_summit#Wales_Pled...
Sweden and Denmark has a VERY violent history. Hundreds of years of wars. It is said to be the worst conflict in all of human history. Now we are allied and committed to defend each other. That's a huge thing for peace.
So maybe, in 50 years from now, Russia will join NATO, too?
if NATO wants America in then they need to do something about an angry orange political candidate...
On top of that, there's inflation and the value-added tax, which mean that, once all the extra costs have been covered, only about €50 to €70 billion will be left over to spend on actual hardware. "The longer you have this money sit around somewhere, the longer factors like inflation and interest payments have to eat away at this pile," Loss said.[0]
There has been some criticism from European allies, and within Germany, that so many big orders have been placed in the United States.
Depriving local industry. And of what use is this anyway. Why on earth would Germany need ballistic missile defense etc.
>quickly
Two years in, the entire West still cannot outproduce Russia. Let alone Russia plus friends. For the most part, dependable large orders—necessary for expansion—aren’t coming. Overall, deindustrialization is only accelerating.
Italy just ordered 132 L2s for 2027–2037. Pathetic timeframe. These tanks will be obsolete by then.
>NATO wants America in
There is no NATO without the US. Something could conceivably carry the same name but it would not be the same thing. NATO is and has always been an instrument of American control over Europe.
>angry orange political candidate
Remember when Trump ordered a reduction of the occupation force in Germany (35k then)? Well, Serious People got Very Nervous and the military stalled the order. In fact, the generals were in a state of barely concealed mutiny then. And now there’s 50k.
So, rest assured: Germany will be Kept Down for the foreseeable future.
[0]: https://www.dw.com/en/what-happened-to-the-german-militarys-...
One and a half years of believing sanctions + weapons + training + the greatest ever kontrastnupol were going to do the trick. They really thought it was going to work.
Really strange seeing people (often gleefully) parrot these talking points, unaware of their own malaise.
Eventually, a generation or two later, the same phenomenon would hit them as well. But it's difficult to reason about what the world will be like even after it gets Europe and Asia. The world economy and geopolitical community would collapse or something, which could influence demographics in yet further weird ways. :O
I don't think it is all the same story.
Americans don't have enough children to sustain their population, but they can make it up with immigration. So do most developed countries, with rare exceptions (consider Israel)
Compare Australia: same story, but with one fundamental difference: US is experiencing uncontrolled mass immigration over its southern land border, immigration to Australia is much more selective, with strong preference given to people like university graduates.
Uncontrolled, non-selective mass immigration is likely to cause much greater problems than controlled selective mass immigration.
And Australia isn't unique here, I think Canada and New Zealand are closer to Australia than to the US in this regard.
Apparently he wanted to fast-track, so it might have hurt his ego somehow, when he was told that Russia is no special.
https://web.archive.org/web/20240228155601/https://www.thegu...
George Robertson, a former Labour defence secretary who led Nato between 1999 and 2003, said Putin made it clear at their first meeting that he wanted Russia to be part of western Europe. “They wanted to be part of that secure, stable prosperous west that Russia was out of at the time,” he said.
The Labour peer recalled an early meeting with Putin, who became Russian president in 2000. “Putin said: ‘When are you going to invite us to join Nato?’ And [Robertson] said: ‘Well, we don’t invite people to join Nato, they apply to join Nato.’ And he said: ‘Well, we’re not standing in line with a lot of countries that don’t matter.’”
Putins views on Russia may have been more widely broadcasted recently because of Carlsons interview, but don’t be fooled; they were no different 24 years ago.
On the other hand, I have witnessed how the Putin's rhetoric made a U-turn over those dozens of years — from "Fukuyama-level" liberal and pro-Western (early Putin), to "geopolitical realist" and pretty much anti-Western (as of today).
I don't know how much this reflects his actual worldview transformation (if there was any), but I have reasons to believe that there is no smoke without fire.
While not technically impossible, practically this is very hard to see. Unless Russia becomes a market liberal, well functioning democracy, it will not happen -- and what are the odds of that?
Russia had the chance after the collapse of the Soviet Union, instead it devolved into a plutocracy and what is essentially a one-party state in anything but name.
Regardless of what some people might think, in no small part due to many people seeing Russia as the spiritual successor to the SU combined with its vast geographical size, Russia is not a superpower, and will not become one in our lifetime.
Yes, they have nukes. So does the UK, and the UK economy is 20% larger than Russia despite is essentially being an island off Europe. How about France? They have nukes too, and their economy is 30% larger.
Russia is a failed state at the tail end of a century long brain drain, crippled by corruption and authoritarian rule, but none of these things are the most deciding factor in why they will never be part of NATO; the primary reason is that Russia quite simply has an empire complex.
What do you get if you combine economical stagnation and a dead empire inferiority complex? You get Hitler, or in this case Putin, and I very much doubt any of us will see a "rehabilitation" of the Russian people like we saw in Germany in our lifetime.
I think the odds are actually pretty good 50 years out in the future.
At the same time, some democratic or benevolent dictator country (e.g. Phillipines or El Salvador) could be totally fucked up (again) in 50 years.
Probably not. Russian history for the last several hundred years is a series of kings, emperors, and dictators. Massacres and purges.
The entire peasantry was only freed from slavery 150 years ago. Being ruled by hereditary monarchs and dictators for so long has fundamentally changed Russian culture to be vastly different from the West.
IMO it would take a radical culture shift for Russia to join the West.
I get the impression Russians would like a more modern system but have a job shifting Putin. But he won't be around for ever.
Sometimes I wonder what a unified world look like, for example what would it look for Palestine and Israel becoming a single nation? For South Korea and North Korea to merge again in brother hood? For China and Taiwan ? etc.
Like how boring would the news be in complete peace? what we wound be doing instead if we weren't busy killing each other?
Just some questions I ponder sometimes..
By who?
And fun facts: Of the 15 wars Denmark started 11 of them and Sweden won 11 of them. Sug på den danskjävlar ;) Sweden is a peaceful coutry and that contry that have lived longest in the world without war, over 200 years.
All nordic countries are very similar in so many ways and our language are almost the same so we can understand, "almost" each (except the Danish people (rest of the nordic countries understand what I mean :), maybe that why there have been conflicts ;) We, the nordic countries see ourself more like a family, like siblings that love each outer but also love to tease each other :D
And about "Hundreds of years of wars." I counted for fun how many years in total Sweden and Danmark was in war with each other between 1207 when the first war started to 1814 when the last one ended, and it was around 54 years in total, over a period of 4 centuries. (54 years are dependent how you count, if a war started 1207 and ended 1208 it could have been both 1 and 2 years long, so I counted 1,5 for all wars. So at best it was 47 years or at worst 64 with a mean time of 3,6 year per war).
I feel a new war brewing and just started stacking cannon balls at Bohus fästning [1].
Also a very interesting distributed defense doctrine: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bas_90
Yes, I'm fun at parties.
and boy howdy do those NLAWs work.
I know. I'm always in pain when my NLAWS come to visit.
Also, a bigger alliance requires each member to contribute fewer troops to manage a common defense.
Sweden is a fairly wealthy country that can contribute the required amount to NATO.
Sweden's ports are beneficial in a potential Arctic conflict.
Finally, Sweden does not bring any new potential conflicts/enemies with it.
https://www.uso.org/stories/3518-one-year-later-how-the-uso-...
https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_136388.htm
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-...
But in same time European allies has also increased their NATO soldiers.
The fact that Ukraine hasn't been easy for him makes it less likely that Putin will attempt that, but it's clearly been on his mind.
Even the good relations between EU and Russia pre-2014 were just theater on Russia's part. Here in Finland during those years shady Russian businessmen kept buying properties that made no financial sense, but were located close to critical infrastructure or military locations. They have never acted in good faith.
AFAICT this topic has been mostly avoided by the Finnish media. I guess everyone just kinda trusts that the government is on top of the situation.
Baltics have always been the biggest risk. They are very small population-wise and can be "easily" cut off (Suwalki gap). But the addition of Sweden and Finland to the alliance will significantly improve the defense posture (airfields, maritime logistics).
There is a reason forces of core NATO states farther from the Eastern flank are deployed to Poland and the Baltic states; it is practically impossible for Russia to attack them without attacking the forces of core NATO states, not just in a "legally, under Article 5, we must treat this as an attack" way, but in a "Russian troops are killing troops of those states" way.
Except the part where Trump said he'd pull the US out of NATO if elected.
But who knows, maybe he can sabotage the alliance in other ways, or find some other way out.
Congress blocked his ability to do that without their approval: https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/12/16/...
EDIT: since other commenters don't know, yes it was signed into law, Sec 1250A of the 2024 NDAA:
>The President shall not suspend, terminate, denounce, or withdraw the United States from the North Atlantic Treaty, done at Washington, DC, April 4, 1949, except by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, provided that two-thirds of the Senators present concur, or pursuant to an Act of Congress.
For example if the US were to leave NATO, they miss out on all the benefits that European NATO members provide, but also would not need to defend Europe, which is where any war involving NATO members is likely to happen.
It seems to me that the US gains very little from being in NATO.
NATO is the only reason why the EU buys so much US weapons in the first place, the benefit to the US is enormous.
In other words, there has been a strong streak of national self-interest (correctly calculated IMHO -- at least until the end of the Warsaw Pact and the Soviet Union) in the US's contributions to NATO.
So far Europeans died in USA conflicts around the world , how many conflicts did Europe start and USA had to get involved so far ?
From me a Romanian, feels very shitty that our soldiers died in Iraq and Afghanistan for America but now if we will need help Trumpists will not help back.
Setting aside for a moment the rather large conflict that ended in 1945 - if you're in your late 20s or older, both Libya and Kosovo happened within your lifetime and meet your criteria.
1 That was not an Article 5 thing,
2 how many USA soldiers gave their life in Kosovoa?
3 1945/ww2 I think USA was attacked by Japan, americans did not enter the world to protect Europe, they were forced in the war so they had no choice then to fight their enemies wherever they are.
The American strategy in WWII was "Germany First" despite it having been the Japanese that attacked us.
Anyway we talking about NATO, USA used Art5 and Europeans died for USA, but now Trumpists complain that we are not doing enough and USA will not return the favor
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declarations_of_war_during_W...
Based on a quick wiki scan looks like two. This accounts for all NATO casualties. No Romanians were killed in Kosovo.
A combined total of 30 Romanians were killed in Iraq and Afghanistan.
NATO membership also means NATO equipment, which the US's military-industrial complex disproportionate benefits from, but also serves as lock-in: those extremely expensive aircraft are basically scrap without the appropriate service contracts and part availability, meaning any military that aligns itself with the US's tech is far less likely to be able to wage wars we don't approve of.
NATO also brings stability: nuclear red-line borders are unlikely to be invaded, reducing the chances of conflicts that are bad for business. A peaceful world is a profitable world, and those profits disproportionately go to the US.
NATO also provides soft power projection: NATO membership is a huge boon to its members, which grants the US leverage politically to encourage member states to adopt pro-US policies.
How? Norway (long a member) has Arctic ports, Sweden does not touch the Arctic.
Not since the 1940s.
Examples: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saab_JAS_39_Gripen https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stridsvagn_103 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ground_Launched_Small_Diamet...
PS: Not sure why parent is getting down voted for asking a neutral question. Curiosity!
Phrasing of that question is a classic bait for flame wars.
At some point {subject} {verb} is just {subject} {verb}.
And given the abnormally terse formulation, I'd expect GP was explicitly trying to decolor their interrogative.
And it's a lot easier to justify military spending than it is research.
Same reason NASA is the way it is, but we still have a space program.
Of course, Sweden was already a member of the EU and a NATO partner, so it's not a huge difference in practice.
Tidal flows. Hull detection. Passage protocols.
As a kid, I used to loooooove spending the day at Ikea, bouncing around all the beds and hiding in the fake rooms, but mostly just because we'd end up at the food court at the end... mmmm.
As opposed to countries that do not design and manufacture such things themselves.
It also means NATO controls the Baltic Sea completely.
A defense pact, in case shit hits the fan.
A deterrence, to make war too difficult to undertake.
Adding additional countries around the edge of NATO does two things for the countries currently in the pact, even if they aren't economic or military powerhouses. First, those countries are less likely to be attacked, and not having your neighbors be embroiled in war is good. Germany is much happier if there is no land war going on next door in Poland, bombs occasionally falling on the wrong side of the border, civilian refugees looking to them for safety.
Second, adding someone else to the pact puts someone else on the front lines to test the defense provided by the pact, if shit hits the fan. Sure, if Russia wanted to, they could try to bypass Poland on the way to Germany, but practically speaking with Poland in NATO, Germany will get to see how NATO responds to an invasion of Poland, rather than finding out how they respond to an invasion of Germany. Poland, likewise, would be much happier seeing how NATO responded to the invasion of Ukraine-the-NATO-member, rather than watching the invasion of Ukraine and wondering how NATO will respond to the invasion of Poland if Ukraine falls.
It completely neutralizes the Russian Baltic Fleet.
The only railway line supporting Murmansk is less than 200km beyond the finnish border, which means the Nordic Fleet is also compromised.
Potential disadvantages of additional members are added political instability as can be seen with Hungary and Turkey. There is little chance of this with both countries.
Basically you dont defend members, you defend borders and adding Finland and Sweden to the pact makes for a far easier and better developed front. The Finns have been building bunkers and training their population for the next Russian invasion since WW2.
Having Finland as a member strengthens the position of the Baltics, who are threatened by the Suwalki corridor.
Basically it strengthens and stabilizes the northern border to Russia/Belarus.
I wouldn't say it doesn't exist. To me, it's always more of that "we'll let you guys muck about until it's totally obvious you're not going to fix it, then we'll ride in to save the day" attitude. Not saying that's accurate, but that's how it's portrayed by Hollywood
It's fairly accurate
Speaking as a Canadian, whose country doesn't.
How much do they weigh in comparison to the 800lb gorilla that is the United States?
In this way, NATO/UN is interchangeable from the US point of view.
This hypothetical doesn't advance the original claim. Sweden might punch well above its weight. But that hardly matters in absolute terms.
The flip side of this is watching European shows, and they all feel like US law enforcement is just a bunch of gung ho gun toting cowboys. Neither view is entirely accurate, nor are they inaccurate as they are just stereotypes
Granted, a widespread problem, but, in my experience, nowhere as bad as in contemporary Germany. Why is that?
2. If it does, it will do that regardless of whether or not NATO enters the war or not. Russia has signalled it has no intentions of stopping its war of conquest
So, the question is: what do you do? Sit back and let it take whatever it wants?
Also, they signaled wish to expand beyond Ukraine multiple times last year.
Regarding #1, do you think this is the case if Ukraine, for example, gains enough traction to attack Russian border cities as a means of preventing a Russian regrouping and counter-attack? Or is the word "commit" doing a lot of heavy lifting here?
Regarding #2, I've heard two scenarios that would counter this. If Russia wins in Ukraine, they likely have an interest in further expansion. If they think NATO isn't really as committed as they claim, a nuclear exchange into someplace like Poland would prove that, as well as giving the US a plausible way to back out of NATO commitments. That's a huge win for Russia. The previous statement about Ukrainian success provides the other example. Both cases are conditional on NATO activities.
That has already happened.
https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-drones-a9fc4dd...
Too much in Russia depends on the West. I'm not even talking about its industrial capacity which can't even produce military equipment without foreign components.
Their children study and live in Europe and the US. Their families live in Europe. Their business interests are in Europe.
I really doubt any of them will risk a nuclear war.
> Regarding #2
They've been quite vocal about this for a long time: they will continue war until stopped. At least until they claim all/most of the former USSR territories. Some of those territories (the Baltic states) are in NATO.
Democracy may be slow, but it's still the best system.
Additionally, now support for Ukraine can increase and it should go faster.
God, I really hope it goes a lot faster...
And one point generally - please lets stop calling whats happening in Ukraine in any other way than War. putin's war - its a perfect name I'll keep repeating till it sticks around, or I'll die trying.
Its relatively personal to me, my home country (former Czechoslovakia) was basically enslaved by russian cough cough soviet forces for decades, people shot or electrocuted when trying to escape (around 500 recorded officially), tens of thousands murdered in other indirect ways (gulags or uranium mines with no ticket back, or just beaten to death in some cold dungeon). I see basically 0 change from that russia to modern one and how it values things like human life, freedom etc.
It looked briefly better, much better, but those times are over for good and russia is firmly back at cold/not so cold war with whole western world. Currently trying to subvert quite a few places in Africa. I hope western 3-letter agencies are few steps ahead.
In the US, only wingnuts and "useful idiots" (really the same group) are repeating this talking point.
Even people pretty forgiving of his essays acknowledge he's habitually at odds with basic facts and history.
Not a wingnut, per se, but on the same spectrum of people divorced from reality. It's too bad as well, because US foreign policy is deserving of more scrutiny than it gets, and it gets a fair amount.
I think he errs a bit in suggesting such behaviour is normal for all great powers. The Americans and Chinese while imperfect aren't that bad. And the EU if you can call it a great power does nothing like that - the rape pillage invade stuff. Though of course a couple of centuries ago Europe was invading all over the place. It goes to show these things can change. Probably with Russia we need to make things enough of a pain the the neck for them that they'll see the wisdom of changing eventually also.
Which is at odds with what Putin has said many times, that Ukraine is not a real nation, but a part of Russia, and Kyiv historically was central to the Russian empire. It's really clear that Putin wants all of Ukraine, not just bits of it. Putin has almost (but not quite) come out and said it. It's an open question on whether Putin would stop with Ukraine (we'll find out only if he takes Ukraine), but there's things he's said which hint that he won't.
> On the other hand he's predicted Putin/Russia's action quite accurately.
So far. At some point, he's going to have to reckon with all the stuff Putin has said about his ambitions that he ignored.
And yes, I understand Turkey's geographical position giving it power over sea routes, and why that was desirable to NATO. But choosing to include a fickle ruler in a unanimous-decisions-only organization is just asking for trouble.
(The Baltics wanted in on NATO, and it's good that they got in. They're largely decently run small countries in a tough spot, not world stage bullies.)
edit: note if you're trying to find Turkey by searching on that site, it uses the endonym Türkiye
It's better for Turkey and NATO, that Turkey is in NATO. I would say it's far more important than Sweden or Finland being in NATO.
Regarding change from "that Russia" to the modern one, I'm afraid there has been change, to the worse. The Soviet incarnation of the empire was at least nominally bound to the progressive ideas of socialism (which is completely orthogonal to wether those ideas are workable or not), whereas the current incarnation is openly worshipping the fascist ideas of strength and domination, and the struggle to get there.
When Russians claim that they don't understand why someone would willingly ally with others who don't prove worthy by actively coercing them, chances are it's genuine, they really don't understand. Sometimes I wonder if their language even has a word for friendship based on equality that is separate from an asymmetric allegiance based on status gradient. Perhaps all the non-gradient terminology was gobbled up by socialist ideology and now the very idea of peers is out, except where seeing it through the socialist lense still fits?
There are good meticulously researched articles about their businesses here (one of the few remaining independent, reliable sources in Hungary): https://www.direkt36.hu/en/
It is clear from listening to the podcast that Russia has always been nightmare to live in (unless you perhaps belonged to a tiny elite) or have as a neighbour. Serfdom wasn't abolished until 1861.
The biggest issue is that the majority of the media is controlled by the government. Also they own jurisdiction and have been gradually rewritten the constitution. Most people who support this regime do that because they believe the propaganda. Many people I know have been bitterly trying to tell their family members that they are watching / listening propaganda (unsuccessfully, for years). Most of Orban's supporters don't know much about politics, they just want to live their lives, so they believe whatever is on TV, radio, online media, posters, etc. For many it is very hard to see what is true and what is lie.
But there are many, many people here who don't like this and want a change. The country is in a state where positive change towards democracy is really hard at the moment, many of us still want to believe it is possible.
By the way, we could see this madness around the world in the past years: Brexit, Trump, Bolsonaro… many people can be led by their nose. Not just in Hungary. I really whish if people would learn from Hungary's mistakes, and don't let the same thing to happen in their countries.
Many people actually do that, because in their minds alternative is "left" that will do the same but with added bonus of supporting LGBT, fight against climate change, unrestricted immigration and such. And getting traditional true patriot of country X rich is preferred to fattening this dirty commies traitors on the "left".
https://www.journalofdemocracy.org/articles/how-viktor-orban...
Nonetheless, in 2014, five center-left parties formed the Unity Alliance. One center-left party (LMP) refused to join, splitting the center-left opposition vote. This cut in half the number of constituencies that the opposition would have won that year, allowing Fidesz to capture 91 percent of the constituencies with just 45 percent of the vote. Still plagued by infighting, the opposition remained fragmented in 2018, even as it gained strength in Budapest. With 49 percent of the vote in 2018, Orbán won 86 percent of the constituencies, losing in Budapest but winning almost everywhere else. The 2014 and 2018 results showed that only a unified opposition that spanned the political spectrum could defeat Orbán’s system.
Imagine if you could allow users to delete comments they don’t agree with. That would create the antithesis of a curious discussion, so that feature isn’t available. So, yes, a good system can constrain what users are allowed to do with intelligent guardrails.
Of all the takes I've heard in my life, that is certainly one of them.
Sweden has been using Nato standards and running occasional exercises with Nato for a while now. They didn’t want to be officially part of it because of their unique perspective on War and Peace (see Olof Palme, sending Blue helmets in Cyprus), but there wasn’t a lack of desire to join. I’d compare it to Switzerland and the EU: the de-facto alliance is obviously beneficial, but principles have kept things separated on paper.
Finland, that’s more complicated: unlike Baltic countries and the Kaliningrad exclave, they were not in the Soviet Union. That meant a lot of pressure to remain neutral, translated until last year into “Finlandization”: a refusal to take either side. That pressure ended with the Fall of the Berlin Wall, but Finland (like Sweden) saw no reason to change their official neutral position.
When Russia started to mess with Estonia, the need to ally with Nato, in particular on cyber-defense questions, became a lot more present for everyone nearby. I suspect that Finland wanted to be ready, adopt Nato standards, training, methods, etc., and pick the right moment to join officially. Like the Baltic trio, the Russian presence looms high in the East, and I’d be surprised if there were not regular overtures and unofficial promises of support. The USA and Canada care a lot about the Arctic, and it’s not hard to count the allies there.
So, I don’t think it was a major shift—like Italy changing sides at the end of WW2. It’s more a gradual rapprochement, matching Putin’s increasingly concerning policies, that hit a very good reason to accelerate. The process has been mostly political and official. Neither Sweden nor Finland had to change guns, tactics, or radio signals.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweden%E2%80%93NATO_relations#...
Maybe compare it to a couple who live together but aren’t married and are opposed to it because one of them sees it as an encroachment of religion.
Wait. Putin got voted person of the year 2007?
There's nothing inherently wrong with an administration exercising soft power to help a favoured politician in another country – even if they sometimes turn out to be dictators – but in this instance I think it's disingenuous to suggest that the United States "put [Putin into power]", assuming you're referring to the United States' inaction after the FSB apartment bombings?
> Wait. Putin got voted person of the year 2007?
Time's Person of the Year Award is specifically scoped to not be an endorsement or celebration of the winner. Think of it more as a measure of outsized impact on the world in a given year.
You know. It would be fine if it was a few times thing. But US has a long history of putting dictators into power, calling them allies, then turning against them and invading/killing them. Which only seems to benefit the military and cause chaos everywhere else.
> That the United States "put [Putin into power]" assuming you're referring to the United States' inaction after the FSB apartment bombings?
No. The economic shock therapy.
Ah, so you mean the United States' inaction in providing aid to Russia after Yeltsin and the IMF began to aggressively reform Russia's economy?
Your logic is that the United States installed Putin by not interfering more?
> You know. It would be fine if it was a few times thing. But US has a long history of putting dictators into power, calling them allies, then turning against them and invading/killing them. Which only seems to benefit the military and cause chaos everywhere else.
It's notable that your own cartoonish straw man bears no resemblance whatsoever to the specific case you're trying to illustrate, unless I'm missing the part where the US installed Putin, allied with him, and then invaded/killed him.
How many dictators has the United States installed, allied with, and then invaded or killed in your lifetime?
US is largest contributor to IMF it would be a joke to suggest their opinion has no sway. Especially application of neo liberal way of things.
> How many dictators has the United States installed, allied with, and then invaded or killed in your lifetime?
Two at least I can recall on the top of my head. Saddam in Iraq and Gaddafi in Libya.
Granted not all dictators are dumb enough to trust US, nor are their circumstances the same, for example some have nukes.
Russia was pursuing this strategy prior to IMF involvement. The membership of the IMF was supportive of the strategy. The United States' Treasury Department did not intervene. Tell me again how this had anything to do with Putin? You make it sound as if the US was providing weapons to Putin or something.
> Saddam in Iraq
I think you have some reading to do if you believe the United States "installed" Saddam. It was the Ba’athists.
> Yeltsin turned to the Russian economists Yegor Gaidar and Anatoly Chubais, who, with the aid of Western advisers, hammered out the details.
Jeez, wonder who gave them that idea.
> I think you have some reading to do if you believe the United States "installed" Saddam. It was the Ba’athists.
Think you are placing too much weight on installed. Installed in as in supported materially, financially, or militarily. Helped get into power or remain there.
Whilst I'm impressed with the speed of your climbdown, you have now broadened your definition of "installed" to the point where it is utterly meaningless.
I was Time's Person of the Year in 2006, all i did was get in arguments with people i didn't even know.
Other notable winners include Hitler, Stalin (twice!), Khrushchev and Trump.
I don't think it's an indication that the west likes them. Even in recent times, I'm not sure it's even an indication that time magazine likes them (see Trump)
Edit: for everyone telling me to read article 5: I already have, hence this question. It says each member "will assist [...] by taking [...] such action as it deems necessary". That very much doesn't appear to obligate a military response, or any response at all.
To put it another way, the treaty really doesn't seem to mean much, so far as I can tell? Countries could already help each other out (or not) anyway... no?
https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/official_texts_17120.ht...
So yes, if Russia attacks Latvia, you better believe the US is gonna send everything they have against Russia. That's the whole point of NATO.
If the republican war hawks or moderate Democrats are in power they would support Latvia, but libertarians and far leftists would say "it's not our problem".
I cannot speak to how the US would behave in 50 years, but being true to its word it is mandatory for the US to project itself as the "world leader". The day the Oval Office is able to ignore its allies, it is the day the US is no longer a global leader.
That's simply the cost to pay to be seen as the leader of the free world. The fact that some US politicians openly want to go down the route of reneging its allies speaks volumes about how long the US empire will last.
So would a lot of the US. I'm not sure Americans would want to die over this.
To say nothing of the fact that it'd just be an invite to Russia to invade more countries.
The seeds of WWII were sown by the appeasement of Hitler, which merely emboldened him.
A lot of people seem to think that if article 5 is brandished, war will result, it absolutely depends on what the council will agree upon.
And there is Article 4 collective regional security, which has ultimately resulted in more NATO combat operations than Article 5, which has been invoked exactly once, even though the former has even less explicit obligation than Article 5.
Most of the European nations with F-35 currently either joined the program from the beginning decades ago, or want to participate in nuclear deterrent and have no other option (unless France decides to share their nukes, but that hasn't happened yet, and you can bet they'll want you to buy Rafale for the privilege if they do), or want stealth capabilities which nobody else can offer right now, or want greater compatibility with the US munitions stockpile which is vastly larger than what Europe has available... etc.
Jets take a long time to develop, the time for Europe to get serious about "strategic autonomy" in that respect was 2 decades ago. That didn't happen, so now the F-35 is the only option if they want the capability to penetrate Russian ground-based air defenses and consistently beat the Su-57 (cough all 8 of them, but it's possible they scale up eventually).
The Gripen's problem is that it is expensive for a light fighter. The other problem is that uses an American engine and US can control export. There aren't many countries that can't buy F-35 but can buy Gripen. Brazil is the big one.
The French Rafale is having more success because it isn't export limited. It is better than Gripen and same price.
In terms of operating costs, yes the Rafale is cheaper, mostly because it's not stealth.
The fact that France is spending their money in France helps make up the difference - for France. But if you aren't France, the F-35 is a good deal.
The state agency RIA Novosti on Thursday reported on an article by Vladimir Zarudnitsky, head of the Military Academy of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation. The article was written in the departmental magazine “Military Thought” and was “at the disposal” of the agency.
The possibility of an escalation of the conflict in Ukraine into a large-scale war in Europe cannot be ruled out; the likelihood of Russia being drawn into new military conflicts is increasing, the main idea of the RIA Novosti article is retold.
“The possibility of an escalation of the conflict in Ukraine cannot be ruled out - from the expansion of participants in the ‘proxy forces’ used for military confrontation with Russia to a large-scale war in Europe,” wrote General Zarudnitsky.
“The main source of military threats to our state is the anti-Russian policy of the United States and its allies, waging a new type of hybrid war in order to completely weaken Russia, limit its sovereignty and destroy territorial integrity,” the general was quoted by Reuters, which also noted that a high-ranking A Russian military officer warned of the threat of the conflict in Ukraine escalating into a full-scale war in Europe.
Zarudnitsky's comments come as the West struggles to help Ukraine with more weapons and money after a failed counteroffensive, Reuters noted."
I wonder what was the debate in Sweden all this time (beyond the waiting for some dictators to give them the final approval)
There was some debate in the past couple of decades however.
But the anti-Nato people are butthurt and feel the need to rewrite history to foreigners.
Din jävla fjant.
In what forum would you want to see more debates on the topic? Hearing a debate between two guys who wants the same thing seems pointless.
There is this major pretend that they have popular backing of joining NATO eventhough the sentiment against it is really strong. There was some demands for a referendum, but it was shut down in fear of "fake news" etc.
https://www.scb.se/hitta-statistik/statistik-efter-amne/demo...
Otherwise, congratulations. Same as Finland, Sweden is hige NET benefit for alliance, welcome friends!
I'm my view, with the recent events, Sweden would need to spend at least 2% with or without NATO. Now we can spend 2% but get a lot more value out of it.
1. It suggests that there's a distinct objective/legalistic blocker to Ukraine's membership, when in reality the bar is "whatever existing NATO members want."
2. Even if #1 and Ukraine tried it, the benchmark is fundamentally unfair/unrealistic/unworkable. In this particular case, Putin would instantly declare-ownership over more Ukrainian territory, over and over, indefinitely.
If anything it's the opposite: There's no point trying to avoid provoking Putin because (A) he's a dishonest actor and has/will feign a grievance for any reason that benefits him and (B) Ukraine from forming alliances with its neighbors is one of his primary goals, so it's impossible to get that with land-deals or conciliatory gestures.
Even if that meant that NATO would be in direct conflict with Russia, then it would be solved between NATO and Russia.
>2. Even if #1 and Ukraine tried it, the benchmark is fundamentally unfair/unrealistic/unworkable. In this particular case, Putin would instantly declare-ownership over more Ukrainian territory, over and over, indefinitely.
If sovereign countries' security depends on what delusional dictators write on a piece of paper, then this isn't much of a world worth living in.
Long story short, Putin can claim whatever it wants, in the eyes of the UN, Ukraine has its 1991 borders and that's where they should remain no matter what - even if it means a direct conflict with NATO. Enough with this bluff bullsht.
Are Russians, who live in one of the largest countries in the world filled with resources, going to commit collective suicide because of Ukraine?
No, it wouldn't.
NATO deciding it was willing to piss off Russia (which is why, without those active conflicts, Ukraine and Georgia were denied MAPs in 2008) would allow NATO membership. There's no actual rule that would prevent Ukraine from joining during the invasion (and even if there was, any NATO rule can be changed, either in a general way or to add a sui generis exception, by the same group -- all NATO members agreeing together -- required to admit a new member under the existing rule, so the rule would not actually be an additional barrier.)
"But," you might object, "even if there is not a rule preventing it, Ukraine joining while the Russian invasion continues would be impractical because it would immediately trigger Article 5, as long as Russian forces were engaging Ukrainian forces anywhere in the country, or even occupying any part of the country."
That could be managed, though, by admitting Ukraine while adopting either a general (for later review) or temporary with explicit time limits or other terminating conditions exclusion of some parts of its territory from Article 5 (not all the territory of all NATO members is covered by Article 5 now.)
Ukraines problems are logistical and attrition and they have very strong NATO support. The red lines about prodding Russia will still exist and the supply shortages across the EU will as well.
Joining NATO makes sense in peace time and so diplomats can hang out at conferences and get formally connected to intelligence data. But how different is that to the data feeds Ukraine gets today?
Depends on the terms.
If, say, Article 5 excluded defined territories whose control was actively contested at the time or which were occupied by Russia with an explicit time limit, and applied fully to the rest of the country (including places Russia likes to lob missiles but cannot yet effectively contest for control of), that would pretty substantially change the Russian calculus of the war.
And especially if it also came with the kind of forward deployment (to the covered part of Ukraine) of NATO troops made to other eastern-flank countries, it would free up Ukrainian forces to deal with the contested and currently-occupied areas.
For example, fostering trade of military goods and technologies between members (especially for the USA as a major exporter) and smoothing out their national budgeting since it's kind of like buying insurance.
2008 is not 2024.
I know the Baltic is probably colder than Lake Superior, but it sounds like it works anyway.
If you look at the prevailing winds off of the eastern atlantic, it looks a lot like Southern Sweden gets the same air that London does. Plus there's a couple of considerable lakes along that path, so grapes do seem plausible.
https://www.reuters.com/world/turkey-set-approve-swedens-nat...
The problem was then that this lie was just a bit too credible, so people started to believe in it.
This sovereign decision is in perfect alignment with Sweden's value and security needs. Yet, that the decision involved kissing the rings of other no-good men (Erdogan and Orban) tells me we need a paradigm shift.
Is it legal to crowdfund Putin's early retirement? I'm sure there's a number that will guarantee getting him out of office. Asking for a friend. ;-)
The money required would be not less than a couple of orders of magnitude larger than John Oliver's offer to Clarence Thomas.
Same root as the more common words belligerent and antebellum.
You may have also heard of “casus belli” (rationale for declaring war).
We're rapidly approaching a century with 0 major and unrestrained wars between two nuclear powers. That's completely unprecedented in the entirety of our history, and it's not a coincidence.
>> The Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all and consequently they agree that, if such an armed attack occurs, each of them, in exercise of the right of individual or collective self-defence recognised by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and maintain the security of the North Atlantic area.
>> such action as it seems necessary, including the use of armed force
There's no mandatory requirement to deploy specific weapons, but I believe all NATO forces would be subordinate to CMC (rotating) and SACEUR (has always been a US leader)? Inasmuch as multinational command structures work.
I don’t see how it helps Germany (or Finland, Poland etc etc) that France and UK have nuclear weapons, apart from deterrence against specifically nuclear Russian attacks. A conventional land invasion against a non nuclear NATO power would likely be very difficult to stop without US support, at current defense levels, or without UK or France threatening a universal nuclear defense of other nato members.
But it's definitely shy of 'never'
I know during the 80s there were detailed plans to tactically nuke the larg(er) Soviet armored formations in eastern Germany et al. in the event of hostilities. I believe even before Soviet nuclear escalation.
We focused on taking out Soviet air forces (to eliminate their ability to deliver nukes of their own - as this was before the USSR had developed ICBMs), but also focused on targets marked simply as "population" as well as medical production facilities. The goal was not to just defeat the military, but to literally destroy the nation. And I'm certain the USSR had, more or less, identical plans. And I suspect those still remain the plans for both sides to this day.
Nukes aren't going to falling out in the middle of nowhere trying to take out military bases, they're going to be falling in NYC, San Francisco, Moscow, and St. Petersburg - to try to completely take out the other country's population and economy. Nuclear war is do or die. The goal is going to be to eliminate the enemy's country from the face of this Earth, so that they can't just recover to become a threat 10 years down the line.
[1] - https://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/23/us/politics/1950s-us-nucl...
Much less once ICBMs become common.
And at that point, the only requirement for a total war / civilian+industry apocalypse plan is that your potential opponent might also have such a plan.
It's tremendously unlikely to be used except in a "like for like" response scenario (absent an insane president), but if the US saw the Soviets throwing everything they had up with population centers targeted... there'd better be a ready to go plan to respond similarly.
And, as Dr Strangelove memorably quips, indeed the most effective deterrence effect of such a plan is to loudly tell everyone you have such a plan -- so they will have to consider that's one of your response options, and thus be disincentivized from starting a nuclear exchange.
By which it makes a lot of sense that even if the US didn't have such a plan, they fabricated one and announced they did!
(Not that I think they didn't. The Cold War was way too real to bet on a 0% chance that superpowers weren't going to escalate to total war)
Remember, there's only one country that's ever nuked another country.
To me, it's mostly about being able to stand up for ourselves on a world stage - ideally through a common EU military that is strong enough to deter adversaries even without US support.
My main reason is the instability of the American political climate and the way every four years there's an election between a centrist and an extremist. Trump has already threatened to invite Putin to invade other NATO countries [0]. We can't risk being dependent on this madman.
Also, I like Europe. I don’t want to see it falter.
I had a good Kurdish friend who came over on a US carrier after we abandoned them after the Gulf War...
I'm guessing it would be something approaching "associated peoples who are part of a state, but who have collectively demonstrated a desire for an independent state"?
There are ~40M Kurds.
Off the top of my head, Palestinians, Uyghurs, Basques, but I'm sure I'm missing a ton.
There are 70M+ Tamils.
(And yeah the US struggled with artillery shells too, the difference is that the US has so much airpower it had a legit reason to believe it wouldn't need them very much)
Of course, since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, that's changed for a lot of them. There's renewed interest in taking the defense budget seriously.
So did the US until the 2001 (and, actually, the free fall in US military spending relative to GDP started well before the end of the cold war), and by the 2010s it was back falling in the US, too.
> Of course, since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, that's changed for a lot of them.
It actually changed since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014 for the non-US members of NATO (which was also the trigger for the NATO defense spending target.) It changed for the US after the 2022 escalation (US defense spending as a share of GDP declined between 2014 and the 2022 escalation.)
> by the 2010s it was back falling in the US, too.
Because of the wars in Iraq/Afghanistan winding down, no?
> It actually changed since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014 for the non-US members of NATO (which was also the trigger for the NATO defense spending target.) It changed for the US after the 2022 escalation (US defense spending as a share of GDP declined between 2014 and the 2022 escalation.)
Not really, no. The US took Russia's 2014 invasion more seriously than most of Western Europe did.
European militaries didn't have to consider a large production capacity, neither stockpiling weapons since mostly weren't involved in large military actions (exceptions probably are France and the UK). In terms of efficiency that is what is expected, why waste taxes for stockpiling unused weapons?
Europe dropped the ball after 2014 on not taking note that Russia was going in a new direction, Georgia 2008 was an early warning but Ukraine 2014 should've been a massive alarm that at least some production capacity was needed. Still, it wasn't at all politically viable at the time, it'd be political suicide for any politician outside of Eastern Europe to spend more money on the military and its industry rather than education, healthcare, etc.
Since 2022 everything has changed, the change is slow but steady and will only keep happening, Rheinmetall is steadily growing production, and many other military industries are expanding across the continent, Putin made politically viable for Europe to spend on its military again.
You brought up the dependence on the USA first, I explained why that is:
> In most ways yes, but militarily there's definitely some dependence on the US. A lot of European militaries were found to have relatively bare cupboards when the time to donate things to Ukraine came.
Europe ignored it because it was politically untenable to push for military spending until 2022 when it became very clear there is a threat escalating conflicts in the continent.
I really don't understand what else I should've done with my comment... Give a solution? What else did you expect?
No, I didn't. Go back and read the chain again if you think I'm the first one to bring it up.
Heh, which of these was Grenada ?
Cynical take: Probably a military maneuver. When the world is quiet, the USA has to pick a fight somewhere to run a shakedown of its newest toys.
European defense contractors completely skipped making fifth gen fighters (other than some partnerships with the US on theirs), so there are literally no European fifth gen options on the table to even consider. This makes it pretty easy for the F-35 to cruise to victory in competitive selection processes, it's simply more advanced.
Hopefully this changes for sixth gen, with the two different European programs there. While I'm American myself, I think things work out better if there's some friendly competition.
Does Europe want to project force around the world? If so, why? It's much more cost-efficient to let the US taxpayer foot the majority of the bill for navigable seas.
I can't think of a war following a long peace where this hasn't been the case.
And unfortunately, incompetence is difficult to quickly discover and replace.
That would require European countries to actually fund their militaries at a level where they could realistically have independence. Which isn't going to happen over the long term.
The only reason for the current surge in funding is the active war in Europe. Once that is settled, however it happens, European countries will go back to their old ways (with the possible exception of countries that actually border Russia/Belarus).
The tricky thing with politics is that there are always way more hungry stomachs than seats at the table. And people learned a long time ago to frame their pet issue as critical.
And the trouble with military spending is that it's never critical. Until it is. But at that point, it's way too late.
I just don't think that the Ukraine war is a big enough deal to act as a catalyst for permanent change. People have remarkably short memories when it comes to things like that - most European countries were on their way to completely normalized relations with Russia around 2020/2021; not that long after the annexation of Crimea.
I don't expect the exact same thing to happen - trade with Russia will probably be severely restricted for a very long time. But it's really easy to chip away at the military budget in favor of social programs. Especially since the benefit of the latter is obvious and immediate. And those programs will always be strained.
There is simply no EU army, the EU is not a nation, the EU is not a defense union. Several EU countries are neutral, several countries make their own military decisions, based on the constitutional law, etc.
For most purposes, NATO is the main international military organization for European countries, not the EU.
Not really.
> The combined wealth of the non-US Allies, measured in GDP, is almost equal to that of the United States. ... The volume of US defence expenditure represents approximately two thirds of the defence spending of the Alliance as a whole.
https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_67655.htm
While non-US allies in NATO doesn't cover every European country, it does cover most of them, particularly the large and wealthy ones.
The US spends more, but for its world-wide empire, much of which has nothing to do with defending Europe or even NATO.
That's not what Europe needs do.
Have you ever heard of the military-industrial complex? If the EU wants to be independent they need to develop their own at great cost. (note that the US is already depending on EU's military industrial complex for various things, so you would also force the US to take those in-house) Which is why despite differences the US and EU are likely to remain allies for a long time - you cannot afford to go alone.
Or maybe you're not confused and you just object to the US and/or EU, but that's your problem, not theirs.
Terminology note: 'independency' is an archaic form of 'independence' which in this context means a self-governing state as opposed to being controlled by another state. This might be confused with 'interdependence' which is a natural reality of almost everything on earth, but especially those who cooperate and work and trade together.
They aren't, right?
Is a marriage unequal because the male could beat the female at any time because he's stronger?
I'm no expert, but I'm pretty sure the US is still the leading superpower by quite a margin. It may not be brought up explicitly in negotiations, but that fact is always there.
Maybe I'm wrong and the EU wields an equal amount of influence over the US. It certainly sounds a little odd saying it though.
The US doesn't threaten or intimidate the EU or vica versa (Trump is an aberration).
To further make the point: NATO membership means they've undertaken to fight and die for each other's protection, how much more friendly can you get?
Sure (although a reasonable person might quibble that the EU is not a nation). It's just that friendly nations doesn't mean what you think it means.
Relevant terms are things like "realpolitik" and "realism". Basically, countries don't do things out of the good of their hearts, because they don't have hearts, they're not people.
For example, it's wild to me that there's no bilateral trade agreement between the US and EU. It seems like the most obvious no-brainer you can imagine.
These sorts of big complex trade agreements take _ages_ to negotiate and require a certain degree of stability; given the US's current hyper-partisanship it's probably not happening any time soon. Realistically TTIP was dead the day Trump was elected.
Putin is yet another fabulous counterexample for the anti-democracy crowd. He spent hundreds of thousands of Russian lives, hundreds of billions, tons of military hardware, and incurred sanctions to earn... a massive increase in the strength and prestige of one of his (again supposed) major adversaries. Not only is NATO growing but the EU is ramping up its own domestic military industries. Absolutely massive own-goal. Even if he "wins" in Ukraine to some extent it's a strategic net loss at this point.
Starting to wonder if China is going to do the same thing with Taiwan: invade and set gigantic amounts of money on fire and implode their economy. Even if they "win" the damage might far exceed the gain.
never interrupt your enemy when they're making a mistake
What does this sentence actually mean? What is an instrument of accession? What does it mean for it to be "deposited with the US government"?
If he wins the election, NATO is toast and Putin has carte blanche over East Europe.
Most of the air traffic for the US wars in the middle east goes through Germany, and most injured soldiers go back through Germany [0] Many US soldiers survive because they get through Landstuhl.
Ramstein is also rumored to be the primary operation center for drone strikes, although the US military denies this.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landstuhl_Regional_Medical_Cen...
The US has military bases in Qatar, Seychelles, and the Philippines. It's almost as if NATO membership has nothing to do with it.
Right now, the US is the leader in a unilateral world. It is absolutely naive to think that this doesn’t come with huge advantages.
The lack of morals is stunning.
Reagan was the last defender of Europe (you can like him or not, having grown up in a left political climate in the 70s of Germany, I didn't), and Reforger '93 was the last time the US seriously considered defending Western Europe. It's clear that at least from Clinton on, the defense of Europe as a necessity for balancing world power was no longer on the table, "It's the economy, stupid!".
Putin will create a crisis in the baltics and invade Poland over the Suwałki Gap, gets his ass kicked, troops getting stuck, there will be negotiations and that's that. Putin couldn't get weak Ukraine (Crimea was a coup) - Russia has 3.5x times the people and 100x the money - it's funny how people in the West still believe in the Soviet Union and the Red Army, against all evidence. The best troops of the Warsaw Pact were East Germanys NVA, and losing that and all other satelite states like Poland, there is no more Red Army.
The 9/11 attacks triggered article 5. It's also the only time that article has been triggered. So far...
I think from Clinton's point of view, at least for a large portion of his term, there was no one to defend europe _from_. Russia was in shambles and retreating everywhere.
Hopefully the traffic through the Panama canal goes down so Europe can still get US LNG that would otherwise end up in Asia.
[0] https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/us-lng-export-pause-...
Seems like there wasn't a better other option anyway, was there?
Before invading Ukraine, Putin was arguably banking on the fact that he had Europe on his hands, not only for economic activity, but for survival during winter. He clearly didn't expect the way Europe responded.
Maybe the invasion wouldn't have happened in the first place if Europe would have already demonstrated strength and energy independence in the first place?
[1] https://www.eia.gov/dnav/ng/NG_MOVE_POE2_DCU_NUS-NGM_A.htm
Unfortunately they're nothing but a vassal NATO outpost by now so the deindustrialization is probably going to continue until some far right party takes over.
Trump lies, postures, hyperbolizes, boasts and self-promotes. More shamelessly than most politicians. We all know this.
Trump isn't going to pull the U.S. out of NATO. He probably couldn't, even if he wanted to, which he doesn't. He just wants to force other countries to pay more, that's all. Stop with this nonsense already.
https://lite.cnn.com/2024/02/12/politics/us-out-nato-second-...
> “NATO would be in real jeopardy,” John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser, agreed. “I think he would try to get out.”
So how's he going to reign free over all of Eastern Europe?
Sweden had a policy of neutrality in armed conflicts from the early 19th century, until 2009, when it entered into various mutual defence treaties with the European Union (EU), and other Nordic countries.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swedish_neutrality
Can you expand on your comment at all?
I would argue this makes any further move by Russia in that space quite problematic.
Well, there's Eurocorps for the last few decades, but that's not an army, just a corps-level HQ unit under which component-state forces can be slotted.
OTOH, that's not a particularly poor model for a fairly loose multi-state federation.
On the other other hand, its not actually an EU force, its a force of a particular group of EU states that is made available to both the EU and NATO, and has conducted operations on behalf of each.
Membership of NATO also guarantees help from US and other non-EU NATO members of course.
What changed was USA having people like Trump and the Republican party talk about not protecting NATO countries anymore. It made us realize that we can't continue to count on US help as the premise is based on the US having absolute control of the nuclear weapons, but loading them on NATO ally dual capable airplanes to launch the nukes.
If Europe is not convinced that the US will not share the nukes as agreed, then Europe has to actually rearm and might even casue a nuclear proliferation with France and UK restarting their nuclear programs.
so yeah it changes and not changes the geopolitics.
"Why are we shocked? Of course if a country has a weapon it also conceives a situation where it would use it. If a country would never under no circumstance use a weapon it would not have the weapon at all. Every country who has a weapon also conceives a scenario when to use it. Even if they don't issue reminders"
-- My own translation from an interview to Alessandro Barbero
For that reason, it is difficult to get rid of inherited weapons. A plausible justification is required.
With Putin, however, Russia is strenghtening an army. It is correct in this case, I think, to verbally remind your enemies of the threat they represent. E.g.Trump, in the US, has a strong discourse position to pull the US from conflict, because his supporters want "To make America great again", the world be damned.
I recommend this video on French defence strategy https://youtu.be/n5eUh3_eo9E?si=k19OmbQiGVdw2LXB
And this one on Germany's very cumbersome procurement tgat is part of why Germany is not keen on rearmament (apart from the obvious: they know what they did) https://youtu.be/8jDUVtUA7rg?si=Du6Rrq2TolbIIaw5
that said Macron is at the moment the only European leader outside of the Baltics that is keen on sending people to Ukraine.
It means that Sweden would also take part in more joint training exercises, share more intelligence, etc. with other NATO members.
[1] And Finland, which is also coming over.
NATO or not, I have my doubts here. Does anyone believe any sane US president would risk a destruction of the USA to revenge / protect Sweden?
It's of course unclear what would happen, but I don't think Russian strategy can rely on US not responding.
Equivalent retaliation would be targeting a city of some of the Russian allies, but it's not possible since Russia doesn't have allies ;)
If the decision makers think "we can use as many nukes as we want because we have a huge stockpile and can level anyone who even tries to respond in kind", we're already on borrowed time.
I think it is in Russian elites’ and Putin’s self interest to continue the status quo and grind down the West in Ukraine, plunder it, and leave the long-term consequences to Russia in someone else’s hands. I’m doubtful they’ll actually use atomics unless the walls are violently closing in. Even China backed way off when Putin loosely waved around nuclear rhetoric in the opening months of the war, and asked in nervous diplomatic speak, “chill, broseph”.
In an actual attack, they may see fit to do nothing - it will come down to the circumstances.
In other words, if Russia attacks Sweden and the US decides to ignore it, there's not much NATO can do but kick the US out.
This war is not just about Russias energy politics, it's also very much about their need for more maritime access. THis map shows where Russia has their ports, and now 4 important ports are pretty much neutralised. Kaliningrad, St Peterburg, and the Krimean Naval Complex are all locked in by NATO countries which means a naval blocade of Russia is very very easy and would completely render their navy's impotent. THe fourth one is on the Kola peninsula and this is why Finland is important as a staging ground to attack the railways to make the Murmansk complex isolated and within medium range missile range from Nelim and Kirkenes.
https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1h5ZK8Z4Ft06VV4ifg6...
THis leaves Petrapavlovsk-Kamchatskiyiv (North of Japan) and Valdivodstock (Next to North Korea) the only Free Water ports that are not affected by NATO.
Real Life lore has a gret video on this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=si9Phc9ArpU
So, I was hoping to solicit your opinion on where you think Kaliningrad will be in a couple of years? (Say 5)
It probably won't be called "Koningsberg", but would you say it's probable it will become independent? Part of Lithuania, Poland? Or will it remain firmly Russian and (economically) isolated?
Curious to hear your thoughts.
That rhymes with the sentiment I gauged (anecdotally) from (West) Ukrainians, Belarusians and even some folk in St Petersburg.
I think that may be okay in theory but is a bit of an over simplification for any real life scenario that deals with the wildcard dictator of Russia. Nothing is very very easy.
Just think about it. They won't even have decided which country or city to hit.
While the only one in Russia that matters is Moscow.
Or putin's castles, but that's no city.
As a Swedish citizen, I think this means in the future Sweden's forces will be dragged into another Iraq-like war down the line.
Sooner or later the US or NATO will be the Putin of today, and I don't look forward to that.
edit: Also wasn't article 5 invoked by the US against Afghanistan and not Iraq? (Maybe I'm not remembering right.)
In Afghanistan there was the necessary consensus (and Article 5 was invoked) so NATO took an active role and ran ISAF - to which Sweden contributed quite significant troops.
We can also leave NATO if it somehow transforms into Putin.
This doesn't follow from the NATO treaty.
Perhaps the U.S. will have it's freedom herring moment: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_fries
Article 5 only says every other member "will assist" with "such action as it deems necessary"
International law is in many ways a ghost of what we think of as law. There are no enforcement mechanisms. If Sweden failed to involve itself and the USA/NATO wanted to push the point, we'd just apply trade pressure & sanctions to them. But we could and would do that same thing without Sweden being in NATO. (That's how we established the 'coalition of the willing' for the Iraq invasion, and how UN votes are organized)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_involving_Sweden#...
The Riksdag voted 269–37 to pass the NATO accession bill, and my understanding is that this is representative of the majority of the Swedish population.
Since NATO’s rules regarding military conflict are a rather conspicuous part of NATO membership, I’d hazard to say the Swedes are being quite explicit about the sort of involvement they desire.
Anyone reading the news in sweden knew they were on the lookout for a casus belli to join NATO… Ukraine invasion was as good as any.
you seeing this u/dang? GPT is a genie out of the bottle and it's an election year, so it's only going to get worse.
I don't see how it could be. If I were Russia, or an ally of Russia, an expansionist NATO would be galvanizing for me and would accelerate a counterbalance alliance. Creating a potentially entrenched conflict in countries that have surface-to-surface access to Moscow would be in my benefit. Ukraine falls into that category.
Not protecting yourself, and letting Russia do whatever they want, is what countries did to Nazi Germany for years. Have we learned nothing from history?
Russia had that in CSTO.
After Russia ignored Armenia’s request for help, it’s worthless.
And Russia has already created entrenched conflicts in a number of countries for exactly that reason.
For example, Georgia is a candidate member, and it's technically in both Asia & Europe.
The US used to have treaty with Taiwan. There was proposed NEATO in the 50s, but Korea wasn't over WW2, and Japan is defense-only in constitution.
The big problem is that signing defense treaty with Taiwan would require change to the status quo and probably kick off a war.
This is either irony or insanity. What good did the two previous US/Nato wars in the region accomplish? Very little if anything at all.
Imagine a world where the US had not sullied its international reputation by invading countries and killing hundreds of thousands.
Russia has threatened Sweden with nukes.
> We should be adding backwards countries that share borders with or are targets of major enemies
Sweden serves a very strategic purpose against Russia, the old enemy of USA, by making Östersjön a NATO sea and with the island of Gotland as a base.