If you talk to anyone in Western diplomatic circles, especially in the security, intelligence and defense sectors, what is about to unfold in the coming weeks in Scandinavia ranks among Russia’s worst nightmares.
The inclusion of Finland and possibly Sweden in NATO, politically and militarily the source of everything that is bad for Moscow, will stretch the alliance firmly from the Arctic Ocean to the Black Sea, pressed right up against the border.
It’s the kind of scenario Russian President Vladimir Putin wanted to avoid.
Before unleashing the horror of an all-out invasion of his immediate neighbour, Putin tried to reject NATO expansion and demanded that Ukraine never be allowed to join the Western military alliance. Last December, he went further and insisted that the North Atlantic allies withdraw from eastern Europe to their pre-1997 expansion lines.
To prove his point, Putin waved the nuclear saber.
It is safe to say that in doing so and with everything that happened, he scared his other non-aligned neighbors; Northern nations that for decades took pride and built some of their political identities around their studied neutrality.
“Finland’s accession would strengthen the security and stability of the Baltic Sea region and northern Europe,” Finnish Foreign Minister Pekka Haavisto said on Thursday. “Finland is a provider of regional security and would further strengthen NATO as a future ally.”
The country is expected to apply for membership next week, kicking off a security race against time. A joint statement by the Finnish president and prime minister said “Finland must apply for NATO membership without delay.”
‘Moral hazard’ for NATO
Although Finland has kept its options open for years about joining NATO, the invasion of Ukraine caused a tectonic shift in public opinion. That was the game changer.
“On February 24, that was the moment of change. That was the game changer,” said Terhi Suominen, secretary general of the Finnish Atlantic Council.
Support for joining the alliance traditionally sat around 20 percent of the population, the events of last winter acting like a lightning bolt.
“And then, dramatically, support for NATO membership grew, and it’s actually tripled right now. So, we have 76 percent in favor of NATO membership,” he said.
CLOCK | Finland’s chargé d’affaires in Canada talks to CBC’s Power & Politics about joining NATO
“The non-aligned policy and before that neutral policy has served us well. But Russia’s attack on Ukraine has really profoundly changed the European security climate.” Finnish Chargé d’Affaires in Canada, Kaisa Heikkilä, on the change in public and political will to join NATO.
Suominen said joining the alliance is an issue that both the left and right of the political spectrum agree on.
A senior NATO official, speaking in the background, said the membership process will be speeded up to some extent and the alliance is trying to remove as many obstacles as possible. In the end, it could take until the end of the year because each of the 30 NATO members must ratify the inclusion of countries in their parliaments.
It is that interim period before Finland is fully covered by NATO’s one-for-all and all-for-one security guarantee that worries many experts.
Michael J. Williams, a professor of international relations at Syracuse University, calls the intervening period “moral hazard” for the alliance.
Countries have the support of NATO members
Would the alliance go to war to protect a country, or two countries, that want to join but have not yet been accepted as full members?
“The challenge is if they say they’re going to join the alliance, there’s going to be a gap,” Williams told CBC News recently. “The ability of the Russians to strike between the time they apply and when they join is concerning.”
That concern was partly addressed on Wednesday when the UK signed defensive pacts with Finland and Sweden that committed Britain to coming to their aid in the event of an attack, and vice versa.
There is concern in both Scandinavian nations that approval could be delayed by one or more existing NATO members. However, an alliance official, speaking in the background, said Finnish and Swedish diplomats have been working with the various delegations in Brussels and have received a lot of support.
Not that either country is unknown to NATO. Each contributed troops to Afghanistan in a support role.
Williams said the fact that Finland publicly declared its intention means Sweden is not far behind, even though Stockholm has publicly shown more reluctance.
Steve Saideman, who holds the Paterson Chair in International Affairs at Carleton University’s Norman Paterson School of International Affairs in Ottawa, says both countries have advanced militaries, civilian control of their armies and stable democracies.
“These two countries not only comply with those [NATO] standards, but they exceed them,” he said. between applying for membership and becoming a member is delicate.
If Sweden decides to join, Williams said he thinks it might have more political soul-searching than Finland. Stockholm has declared itself neutral since the beginning of the 19th century and maintained that position even during the existential conflicts of the last century.
“They were neutrals in World War II,” Williams said. “So we’re talking about a very long and deeply ingrained culture of non-alignment.”
Both Williams and Saideman say the two Scandinavian countries bring considerable conventional fighting power to the alliance.
Suominen said his country takes defense very seriously since it was invaded by the former Soviet Union in the early 1940s.
What both countries gain by joining NATO, in addition to the security of the alliance’s Article 5 self-defense clause, is access to advanced cyber and hybrid warfare defense, Saideman said.
The question of how Russia will respond is being hotly debated, now that Finland has signaled a clear direction.
Russia sharply criticized Finland on Thursday, saying it would be “forced” to retaliate if the long-time neutral country joined the alliance.
Saideman said that Russia cannot afford to fight with another neighboring country.
“They have all they can handle having a war with Ukraine,” Saideman said. “It’s not like they can engage in really large-scale aggression against Finland or Sweden because they just don’t have the capability at the moment. They can’t even successfully attack the country next door.”
Reference-www.cbc.ca