New Best Friends? Finland Joins NATO
Image courtesy of Tapio Haaja on Unsplash
After applying for membership last year in 2022, Finland has now entered NATO, posing questions for the future of Nordic-Western alliances and the relationship’s potential consequences during international conflicts, such as the Ukraine War. Since 1944, the country’s eastern border with Russia is the second-longest border that Russia has with any country. Upon Finland’s accession to NATO, the western-dominated alliance will expand its boundary with Russia and gain footholds much closer to some of Russia’s most geographically-strategic cities, such as St. Petersburg.
Unlike nearby Ukraine, which Russia invaded in 2022 due to historic territorial disputes and neocolonial ambitions, Finland has avoided Russian land claims since adjusting their borders to cede the areas around Vyborg in 1944. When Ukraine started to drift to the West, Russia responded by invading Ukraine in February 2022. This aggression did not deter Finland in some threat of a similar fate – instead Finland rapidly applied for NATO membership in May 2022. Upon accession in April 2023, Finland moves inside a protective buffer zone formed by some of Russia’s most powerful geopolitical adversaries, including the United States and the United Kingdom.
Another important player still hanging in limbo, Sweden applied to join NATO around the same time as Finland but is still awaiting acceptance. Even though both Sweden and Finland broke decades of non alliance to seek NATO membership, the process would not be simple or easy to do pre-existing members of NATO’s opposition. Hungary and Turkey have voted against Sweden’s entry, who accused Sweden of supporting Kurdish separatists and members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). While Turkey also held reservations about Finland joining the alliance, in part due to Finland and Sweden’s joint defense cooperation, the Finnish government sufficiently appeased the Turkish side by lifting a nearly three-year arms embargo on Turkey.
Sweden has a pressing reason for wanting to join NATO as well, with heightened importance during the current war in Ukraine– security. The Swedish island of Gotland is 186 miles from Kaliningrad, where the Russian Baltic Fleet resides. Furthermore, Sweden has a tense political history with Russia as well, having endured crushing defeat in its last armed conflict with Imperial Russia in 1809. Since then, particularly during the Cold War, Sweden and Russia have avoided outright war but have come close due to conflicts over mistakenly shot down aircraft, submarine infringements, and Sweden’s closer relationship with the United States. In breaking their diplomatic neutrality Finland and Sweden have risked another armed conflict with Russia, perhaps only avoiding one due to Russia’s preoccupation with the current war in Ukraine.
Russia is not idle, however, in wake of NATO’s most recent expansion. Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko claims "In the event that the forces and resources of other NATO members are deployed in Finland, we will take additional steps to reliably ensure Russia's military security." Rather than deterring the Kremlin from military action,, it appears that Finnish entry to NATO could precipitate greater instability to the already tense region. Regardless of NATO's decision on Sweden's potential membership, heightened Nordic interests in the West mark a dramatic shift in geopolitical alliances, and could lay the foundation for a larger preparation by NATO for an expansion of armed conflict with Russia in the near future.
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