Northern Europe Thread

Oh, I don't want Sweden to just ignore what Russia is doing and trade like nothing is happening. Even before the invasion of Ukraine, Putin's regime was a collection of ragingly homophobic, nationalistic, murderous scumbags that we europeans should feel ashamed of for tacitly endorsing through those strengthened economic ties. But his regime isn't the only shitty one even in Europe - see again Poland, Hungary and Turkey. And I'm worried that membership in NATO will put pressure on us to just shut up and smile while those governments hurt their people and others. Sure, the EU has a LOT of problems with this too, but at least there has been some pressure within it against Poland and Hungary. And I hate on principle the idea of having to "play nice" with shitty governments simply because "they're on our team". We should be able to have the moral high ground over Russia, rather than only being better because our allies aren't as bad as them (yet).

Edit: To be clear, I'm well aware that there's a difference between moral principles and what's possible to do in a practical sense. Hence why I'm ready to accept a NATO membership despite my moral objections. But we should also not abandon our moral principles entirely just to get "the one bad guy".

Edited by Kardavnil on May 17th 2022 at 3:11:07 AM

A lot of that is in line with my own thinking on the subject - I'm not a fan of NATO as an existing organization, and it's going to run into problems whether or not it wants to in the near-term. That said, I thought this article was very illuminating in terms of formulating how the center-left democracies of NATO can help make it better.

The broad gist of it is sort of exactly what you said - that if NATO wants to be an organization to safeguard peace in the North Atlantic, then it needs to be committed not just to the sovereignty of its members, but also to their resilience to authoritarian overreach.

Edited by math792d on May 17th 2022 at 1:05:50 PM

So has their been any official response in Finland or Sweden to Turkey's demands? What's the general buzz in the public?

For the moment the government is refusing to elaborate beyond stating that talks are "ongoing" with Turkey. Also, in possibly related news, our prime minister is going to meet with Biden about Sweden's application on May 19.

It won’t. The joining process might, but membership can’t be revoked. Once a country is part of NATO the other NATO members can’t do anything about it, so you can talk all the shit you like as long as you still stand by the principle of collective defence.

Greece and Turkey have had an ungodly number of spats with each other over the years, they’re obliged to defend each other, not like each other.

That's something then, at least. Although there will probably still be the issue of people here considering any criticism of other NATO members, even if it's valid, as borderline treasonous and/or pro-russian propaganda not worth listening to.

Urgh, I have a feeling dinner conversations with my older brother and/or grandpa are going to be even more infuriating than they already are . . .

The Turkey issue might be much bigger than we think, as its possible that their demands cannot be accommodated, being illegal under local and/or international law. Political prisoners and all that.

Really comes down to which of their demands are actually important to them and who they're actually meant for.

Edited by TerminusEst on May 18th 2022 at 7:44:08 AM

Well technically NATO could accept Turkey's terms to let Sweden and Finland in... And then just not follow up on them.

But won't that make Erdogan cut a deal with Putin in secret to stick it to NATO if they don't concede to his demands if they let Sweden and Finland join NATO?

Theoretically, but that still leaves Erdogan with a couple of significant problems.

The first one is that the Russians don't like him very much - the support of Azerbaijan in the Nagorno-Karabakh War was the first hint that things aren't as rosy between the two as it seems at first.

The second is that their relationship is very much conditional on continued Russian engagement in Syria/against Kurdish forces, and if Russia burns itself out fighting in Ukraine, it has nothing to offer Ankara besides its export of military technology...which doesn't exactly have a sterling reputation these days either, even if some part of that is fog of war.

So it would leave Turkey politically and militarily isolated, at which point Erdogan's only real leverage is his control of refugee flows into Europe.

Edited by math792d on May 18th 2022 at 5:15:56 PM

Wouldn't the supply of Baryaktrs be something Erdogan use a leverage to stick it to NATO? Doing something heinous to them should be worth Putin's attention, wouldn't time?

@Silas - It seems Erdogan is aware of the idea that they could say whatever they want during ascension and go back to how they were as soon as they are members; Ankara is using the Greece rejoining NATO back in the 1980s and then going right back to being blood enemies with Turkey as an example of why they might never agree.

Which of course could just be a negotiating tactic, but Erdogan is not unaware of the scenario.

Greece didn’t actually quit NATO, it did the France trick of withdrawing from the unified military command but staying in the treaty.

Nobody has ever actually quit NATO, a withdrawal from the unified military command is more akin to going on strike than quitting.

I recall reading somewhere that this may be a tactic Erdogan is using to galvanize his base, since it's an "election" year. It's a bit disturbing to think that these ethno nationalists can't accept Kurds existing anywhere, not in Turkey or Syria or even Sweden.

Edited by Xopher001 on May 19th 2022 at 6:14:11 AM

Perhaps so, but the point stands: Turkey helped them and it did not help whatever disputes they have with them. And so they take the lesson that nothing they'll do will go rewarded.

A jaundiced view, perhaps, but self-interest is a thing that has to be taken into account among the existing members.

A potentially interesting wrinkle regarding Sweden's NATO application and Turkey's objection: https://svt.se/nyheter/utrikes/finland-ger-natobesked

Unfortunately only have a source in swedish for this (and the link leads to an updating feed of related news, hence why the url says "Finland announces its NATO decision rather than what I'm about to say), but the TL;DR is: we have our current Prime Minister (Social Democrat Magdalena Andersson) due to the support of a "wild card" parliamentarian, Amineh Kakabaveh, who is now threatening to withdraw her support for the government (which could complicate or outright prevent passing the Spring Budget and a promised bill on travel fares). The reason for this is that one of her demands to support Andersson was to deepen Sweden's cooperation with the Kurdish forces and authorities in Syria, and she feels like the government has not honored that agreement. Furthermore, she disapproves of how YPG members and sympathizers are being treated in Sweden at the moment (not sure what exactly she is referring to here, but maybe the government has been signalling a willingness to hand over/deport such people to Turkey?).

Goes to show that it could be very costly on a domestic level for the government if they decide to try and win over Turkey with concessions. Unsurprising, there are likely still many of kurdish descent still living in Sweden, many of whom almost certainly have a ton of relatives and friends in Turkey and Syria, with all the bad blood with the Turkish government that entails. And I might be wrong, but I believe public sympathy for kurds here in Sweden is (or at least was) relatively high (compared to the latest waves of mainly Syrian refugees, that is).

One thing that's interesting in the context of discussing the security situation in Northern Europe with Sweden and Finland applying for NATO membership: it completely changes the nature of defense planning for the Nordic countries.

Essentially since the end of World War 2, the security architecture of the Nordic countries (that is, Finland, Sweden, Denmark and Norway for the purposes of this conversation) have been split into two blocs. On the one hand, you have Denmark and Norway, who are founding members of NATO ^note a decision that makes a lot of sense when you realize the combined population of the two is just shy of one eighth of a Germany and who spent most of the Cold War primarily worrying about naval threats in the Baltic Sea and the same land threats as everyone else. They couldn't really realistically plan for a war scenario in which Sweden and Finland were also under threat, and so the Danish Army spent most of the Cold War as a slightly underequipped Bundeswehr division.

Meanwhile, Sweden spent the Cold War as a very prickly, heavily armed, technically neutral hedgehog while Finland was bound by the terms of its peace agreement with the Soviet Union not to seek military assurances from other powers, and they chose the path of least resistance and somewhat normalized relations after the end of the war.

And this uncertain strategic picture just sort of...continued after the war, complicated by Norway not joining the European Union and Denmark being exempted from any security measures taken directly by the European Union, favoring NATO-sponsored missions. There was an attempt to patch it via the informal NORDEFCO, but that was always a bit of a patchwork solution. NATO membership means that the Nordic countries can knock their heads together and come up with better defense plans, particularly as pertains to the Baltic.

There's also Iceland, but they are separated from the rest of the Nordic countries by a lot of ocean, isolated from most of the world, and don't have a military.

Edited by CookingCat on May 26th 2022 at 4:11:48 AM

Militarily strategic, though, due to its position in the North Atlantic.

"Pre-emptive self defense." - the US in WWII.

Edited by Ramidel on May 26th 2022 at 5:13:20 AM

The first attempt to negotiate ascension with the Turks didn't produce the desired result. Unknown when they will meet again.

EDIT-

Thanks for that.

Edited by FFShinra on May 28th 2022 at 12:53:21 PM

"Didn't".

Getting reports that Sweden has lifted the weapons ban to Turkey.

I don't expect Erdogan to roll over for just that though.

Not really much else that they can do, without going into blatant illegality. Erdogan probably knows this.

Edited by TerminusEst on May 29th 2022 at 12:54:45 PM

Cross-posting from the Canada thread:

In lighthearted news, Canada will share a land border with Denmark tomorrow.

Hans Island, or Tartupaluk in the Inuit language, has been the centerpiece of a border dispute since 1933, as it lays between Greenland and Nunavut. The island is however of little value, so the dispute has basically been Canada and Denmark taking turns occupying it and leaving a bottle of alcohol behind for the other country's next shift on it (this tradition was nicknamed the Whisky War). Because maritime rights around the island have been settled since 1973, there wasn't really any hurry for either country to decide who should own the island, but following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, they decided to settle this long-running dispute in a peaceful way to send a diplomatic message to the world.

Starting June 14, the island will be half-Canadian, half-Danish territory.

This makes Canada the only North American country to border a European one, too, and vice-versa with Denmark.

Edited by CookingCat on Jun 13th 2022 at 4:11:05 AM