Sweden became NATO’s newest member on Thursday (7 March 2024), upon depositing its instrument of accession to the North Atlantic Treaty with the Government of the United States in Washington DC. With Sweden’s accession, NATO now counts 32 countries among its members.
  • SuddenDownpour@sh.itjust.works
    0·
    8 months ago

    I don’t like the expansion of NATO, but due to Russia’s recent imperialism, Sweden’s and Finland’s reactions are completely reasonable. A much healthier alternative would have been actually advancing towards an integrated European defense system involving EU members, with a door open to certain neighbours such as Norway, but it’s pretty hard to do that when the political groups that could actually promote that alternative are schizophrenically tolerating positions such as “I’m a pacifist, so I’m advocating for my own country’s disarmament despite my neighbours starting wars very recently” and “if Ukraine didn’t want to get invaded, they shouldn’t have sought guarantees against Russian aggression from third countries”.

    • asterroid@lemmy.world
      0·
      8 months ago

      but due to Russia’s recent imperialism, Sweden’s and Finland’s reactions are completely reasonable.

      that is, it was not NATO that staged two coups in Ukraine, put its puppet government there and began to push the country into NATO, build bases and create threats to Russia’s security, but this Russia, for no reason, attacked poor Ukraine, which did not exist at all not so long ago, and it was part of Russia

    • rottingleaf@lemmy.zip
      0·
      8 months ago

      I think Europeans in general psychologically still feel themselves weak without NATO, unable to fill the needs of their own defense.

      I’ve been reading about 1st Indochina war yesterday, so - emotionally biased.

      • SuddenDownpour@sh.itjust.works
        0·
        8 months ago

        EU’s population: 448 million

        EU GDP: 19 million dollars

        Russia’s population: 143 million

        Russia’s GDP: 1,78 million dollars

        Simplifying a bit here (I’m obviously taking Morocco and Belarus for granted, assuming that Turkey wouldn’t attack Greece, and so on), but it’s pretty much a “gotta get our shit together” situation, because there’s no reason why we should depend on the US for defense, or anything else.

        • paholg@lemm.eeEnglish
          0·
          8 months ago

          I assume you meant trillion and not million for those gdp figures? Even then, they’re low.

        • rottingleaf@lemmy.zip
          0·
          8 months ago

          That’s about architecture more than resources. “Gotta get our shit together” doesn’t negate the fact that shit isn’t together yet.

          It’s good to have resources, but such a situation is still weakness. Only I think NATO in some sense is a contributing factor, and EU frankly too, both not in the least because of all those veto and consensus rules.

      • Lad@reddthat.com
        0·
        8 months ago

        Russia can’t even conquer a quarter of Ukraine. No chance they’re going to invade Sweden, a country they don’t even share a border with. Is Canada afraid of being invaded by Russia? Is France? Is the UK?

        • Bimfred@lemmy.world
          0·
          8 months ago

          Russia’s inability to conquer any of its neighbors is irrelevant. The possibility of them even attempting is unacceptable if you share a border with Russia. Sure, maybe Putin can’t hope to depose your government, but the destruction and deaths before his failure are still a horrifying reality that’ll take years, possibly decades, to recover from.

          As for why Sweden felt the need to join, despite not having a single meter of border with Russia, it’s because Finland felt the need to join. The two countries are tightly bound and do not want to end up on the opposite sides of a war. Now they’re much less likely to.

          • Lad@reddthat.com
            0·
            8 months ago

            Who says anything about appeasement? That’s your words, not mine. Besides, Russia is already being appeased by NATO not letting Ukraine join.

            Why don’t NATO stop being cowards and admit Ukraine immediately? If they’re serious about “defending Europe and democracy”.

            • wandermind@sopuli.xyz
              0·
              8 months ago

              Also funny how this “appeasement never works” fanaticism never applies to NATO and it’s members

              Yeah, funny how Russia, China and friends haven’t sanctioned the US and other countries. They have the full right to do that instead of continuing to appease them.

          • rottingleaf@lemmy.zip
            0·
            8 months ago

            There are other things to learn in history too, such as some countries, like Russia, simply lucking resources to fight wars this big. As the other commenter said, they can’t get past Ukraine.

            Hitler comparison is really out of place here. It’s more similar to some of the wars in Africa and Latin America.

          • OurToothbrush@lemmy.mlM
            0·
            8 months ago

            I agree, the USSR assumed too much good faith on the part of NATO. Millions of casualties from economic devastation later, nationalist wars are still breaking out between former soviet states, and Nazism is on the rise.

              • OurToothbrush@lemmy.mlM
                0·
                8 months ago

                It literally doesn’t matter who is invading who, it wouldn’t have happened without the western backed coup of soviet democracy.

            • someguy3@lemmy.caEnglish
              0·
              8 months ago

              Notice you don’t actually address appeasement doesn’t work?

              But as for military defence alliance (notice how you tried to misportray that?): Points to cold war.

              Something tells me you’re a Putin apologist.

              You should listen to Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History. WW1 was interesting.

        • wandermind@sopuli.xyz
          0·
          8 months ago

          Russia can’t conquer even a quarter of Ukraine, and they still invaded Ukraine. Sweden and Finland know that Russia can’t conquer them, and that knowledge has made them stay neutral in the past. But Russia has just shown with Ukraine that they might try anyway just because, and it’s a huge pain in the ass for Ukraine and for everybody else in Europe too. So it’s only natural that Sweden and Finland would like to avoid even being tried to be conquered by Russia.

          And like we can see, the Russian invasion of Ukraine also impacts France, the UK, and Canada. It’s not that these countries have decided to brainlessly follow the US. They want to support other countries who are at more risk of being invaded by Russia because countries being invaded by Russia is a huge pain in the ass for everybody in the region, not just the country being invaded. So their foreign policy goals simply happen to line up with the US goals.

    • magic_lobster_party@kbin.run
      0·
      8 months ago

      NATO membership comes with guarantees and responsibilities.

      The guarantee is that if Sweden would be attacked, other members will support with their troops. The responsibility is that Sweden must expand their military.

      • rottingleaf@lemmy.zip
        0·
        8 months ago

        The guarantee is that if Sweden would be attacked, other members will support with their troops.

        Allied guarantees are not something to rely on really. The de-facto participation was something more honest for expectations IMHO.

        The responsibility is that Sweden must expand their military.

        I don’t think that’s a problem for them, they never turned it into some bureaucratized rudimentary institution in the first place and they had a nice military during the Cold War.

      • REEEEvolution@lemmygrad.ml
        0·
        8 months ago

        The former won’t happen. Sweden is sorrounded by friendly countries. The second is a downside for Sweden.

        So globally it is a nothing burger and locally it is a negative development for Sweden.

        • magic_lobster_party@kbin.run
          0·
          8 months ago

          Russia has access to Sweden through the Baltic Sea via Kaliningrad and St. Petersburg.

          There has been a concern that Russia wants to get Gotland. If they get Gotland, which is a good strategic island in the Baltic Sea. Now that island is under NATO.

                • magic_lobster_party@kbin.run
                  0·
                  8 months ago

                  Based on Russian presence in the Baltic Sea the past few years. There has even been reports of Russian exercises training to use nuclear warheads against Sweden. Lots of military exercises in Sweden has been stationed in Gotland due to its strategic importance. I’ve heard it be jokingly called “Sweden’s largest aircraft carrier”.

                  I’m a Swede, and it has been quite frequent with news about Russian presence the past decade or so. The sentiment has for a long time been that Sweden should remain neutral despite all these threats. This sentiment changed by the invasion of Ukraine when it became clear Russia is ready to attack non-NATO members in Europe.

  • Troy@lemmy.ca
    0·
    8 months ago

    We (the western world) really needs to deal with Orban eventually. At least when other countries kept re-electing someone (like Merkel), you had the confidence that the system still allowed someone else to be elected and democracy was still working.

    Turkey might be a lost cause.

    Term limits should really be a default position if one is to defend their democracy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_current_state_leaders_by_date_of_assumption_of_office – the two NATO members causing issues? Two longest serving heads of state within NATO (excluding ceremonial monarchs).

      • sheogorath@lemmy.world
        0·
        8 months ago

        That is an L take. Having a term limit helps increase the difficulty of making political dynasties. It doesn’t make it impossible, but it sure is gonna make it harder for a certain person or group to solidify their power base.

      • rottingleaf@lemmy.zip
        0·
        8 months ago

        Not really, the difference between two people of the same ideology to fulfill your democratic needs whom one can find in a population of a few million can be very small.

          • rottingleaf@lemmy.zip
            0·
            8 months ago

            Doesn’t change the fact that banning people from running for election is inherently undemocratic.

            Something being democratic is not the only criterion, because you wouldn’t want your neighbors to vote in favor of collectively owning you as a slave, even if your vote against gets counted.

            It’s just one safety measure - if a politician still would win an election after 8 years (life changes entirely in only 1 year), for example, that’s likely for wrong reasons. Like using administrative resource, pro-government mass media, crooked elites etc.

    • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
      0·
      8 months ago

      I blame the fact they built all these institutions with no clause to expel members, or which require total unanimity to do so. They really bought in to the whole “end of history” thing, I guess.

      • Troy@lemmy.ca
        0·
        8 months ago

        Yeah, this is an interesting element. Historically, allowing all members a veto, while also having no way to expel a member, means that any such institution is liable to outside meddling. The classic example is the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberum_veto – in the Polish Lithuanian Commonwealth, any noble could veto anything. So all it took was buying a few nobles and it shattered.

        • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
          0·
          8 months ago

          Apparently, based on that Wikipedia article, they also ended up making a new version with less strict veto rules, called the confederated sejm, which is where I expect all these Western institutions to go eventually. TIL.

    • ComradeChairmanKGB@lemmygrad.ml
      0·
      8 months ago

      We (the western world) really needs to deal with Orban eventually.

      Incredible display of chauvinism. Cause it’s worked out so well every other time you Westside have stepped in to decide another countries leadership for them. Stfu and stay home before you collapse yet another nation and restart the slave trade there.

      • zik@lemmy.world
        0·
        8 months ago

        Kaliningrad’s fairly strategically useless to them now that every surrounding country’s NATO though. The Suwałki Gap between Kaliningrad and Belarus used to be pivotal in potentially re-taking control of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. It would have been very difficult for NATO defend them if Russia took the gap. But now those countries are protected by NATO countries all around so Kaliningrad’s a lot less useful strategically. Not to mention that there’s a strong Kaliningrad independence movement so they’re struggling to control it internally as well.

        More here.

    • BombOmOm@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      8 months ago

      Reignited the West’s arms industry as well! We had gotten complacent until Putin started the largest war in Europe since WWII.

        • SwagGaribaldi@lemmy.zipEnglish
          0·
          8 months ago

          Brother, you are literally falling for misinformation.

          First of all, there are not nearly that many NATO bases. The image is completely false.

          Secondly, the second image is misleading. In the wake of the formation of East Germany, 10% of its population were former Nazi party members. A third of its public administration were members of the NSDAP. The public officials didn’t just disappear overnight.

          Tankies (then and now) like to perpetuate this myth that East Germany was a successful Nazi-free society while West Germany was a Nazi stronghold despite the overwhelming evidence against it.

            • Enoril@jlai.lu
              0·
              8 months ago

              Why do you expect to be treated like a Human by someone you’ve just insulted in the worse way (in a very uneducated way)?

              If someone called me nazi (knowing my direct family figthed against and some family members die doing it), i would certainly not bother to look at its profile and try to be nice by using the rigth pronoums. You can’t expect being treated nice while shitting dog shit on people face.

              If you act like a garbage bin, assume it.