Even neutral parties grasp that joining NATO is a foolish action by Finland and Sweden:
NATO membership won’t make Finland and Sweden more secure, but would likely see them fighting somebody else’s wars and hosting American bases, Dr. Jan Oberg, director of the Transnational Foundation for Peace and Future Research, has told RT.
“It’s a disastrous decision,” Oberg said on Sunday, following an official declaration by the Finnish government that it is planning to join the US-led military bloc. Hours later, a similar announcement was made by the ruling party in Sweden. The two Nordic nations stayed out of NATO during the Cold War, but their governments said Russia’s military operation in Ukraine has become a game-changer.
Finland and Sweden have failed to carry out “long-term consequence analysis,” he added. “Nobody seems to ask whether NATO is the right thing to join. After all these years since 1945, NATO has proven that it’s not able to deliver what taxpayers are paying for, namely stability, peace and security… and then Finland and Sweden say: ‘We’ll join this failed organization,’” he remarked.
One has to be almost completely ignorant of military history to conclude that joining a military alliance makes war LESS likely. The history of war is literally the history of military alliances, from the Delian League and the Latin League to the League of Cambrai and the Triple Entente. Only neutral nations such as Spain, Switzerland, and Ireland managed to stay out of WWII, which is why it is absolutely counterproductive for formerly neutral nations such as Switzerland to impose sanctions on Russia and totally insane for formerly neutral nations such as Finland and Sweden to voluntarily sign up as co-belligerents to engage in a war against both Russia and China.
Because that’s what they’re signing up for, even if they don’t realize it yet.
UPDATE: Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.
Russia appears to have started moving nuclear-capable missiles to Finland’s border just a day after the country announced it will bid to join NATO. Video posted on Russian social media today shows trucks carrying Iskander ballistic missiles – which can be tipped with nuclear warheads – moving through the country, reportedly on a highway to Vyborg, on the Finnish border. ‘As soon as the president of Finland said they were joining NATO, a whole division of Iskanders, seven of them… is moving towards Vyborg,’ the video’s narrator says.
UPDATE: Sweden boards the geopolitical short bus.
Sweden has said it will join Finland in bidding for membership of NATO, after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine prompted an ‘historic’ shift away from decades of neutrality. Magdalena Andersson, the Swedish prime minister, announced the move on Monday – just a day after Finnish counterpart Sanna Marin tabled her own bid. Andersson said the move was being made in conjunction with Helsinki and marks ‘a historic change in our country’s security policy’ which has relied on a pledge of neutrality to deter attacks since the Napoleonic era.
