Dem
51
GOP
49
Finland already had mountains so lofty, and treetops so tall. And, as of today, the country also has membership in NATO. There will be a ceremony to make it official this afternoon (Finnish time); this follows the decisions by Hungary and Turkey last week to grant their support for the move.
This is obviously a sizable setback for Vladimir Putin and Russia. In terms of its national culture and its economy, Finland is much more aligned with the West than it is with Russia. However, the Finns are also next door to Russia, and at risk of being a target of Russian aggression. Consequently, the nation's general strategic posture, for decades, has been armed neutrality. That is to say, Finland has a rather significant military capacity, but has tried to avoid taking sides. Now, it's come down squarely on the side of the West, and it will presumably remain there.
That's a big PR loss for Putin, but it's also a big loss in terms of Russia's national security. Yesterday, there were five NATO nations (Norway, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania and Poland) sharing a border with Russia; the total length of those shared borders is 754 miles. As of today, there will be six such nations, and the border mileage will more than double, to 1,584 miles. That means that Russia, which has already moved to shore up its forces along the Finnish border, will be spread much more thinly. Further, at its closest point, Finland is just 520 miles from Moscow. There are other NATO nations that are closer (Latvia and Estonia), but none with anything approaching the Finns' military capacity.
The next question is whether Sweden will join the party. They have applied, and have been approved by all the NATO members, except for... Hungary and Turkey. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has promised that Sweden will be approved, and presumably he's in a position to know. While the Swedes don't have a border with Russia, they're not too far away (a couple hundred miles, at the closest point), and they are pretty wealthy and pretty well-armed, too. They are also in a position to supply NATO forces with a near-endless quantity of moderate-quality home furnishings.
As chance would have it, Finland just cashiered its prime minister, Sanna Marin, this week. However, that is not connected to the NATO maneuvering. Marin's been enmeshed in a scandal involving videos of her letting loose at various parties. Further, like nearly all world leaders, she's being blamed for the economic upheavals of the last few years. So, in the Finnish elections this weekend, Marin and her Social Democratic Party lost their position as the largest party in Parliament. It looks like the new PM will come from the right-wing National Coalition Party. And the leader of that party, Petteri Orpo, says he and his colleagues plan to stick with NATO.
That, then, is the news out of the north. We still await a ruling on whether Finland remains a poor second to Belgium when going abroad, however. (Z)