The logic of "NATO's expansion to the north" has become even more obvious
The accession of Finland and Sweden to NATO does not bode well, it is a "new wave of madness" of the alliance. It will further strengthen Russia's geographical deterrence, and it will take a long time to deal with the consequences, writes Huanqiu Shibao.
Finland and Sweden have announced their decision to join NATO, and in the next few days both countries are likely to officially submit their applications. Based on the previous five waves of expansion of the alliance to the east, the accession of these two countries to it can be called the sixth wave of expansion to the east or, to be more precise, "expansion to the north".
The history of Finland is the history of a country that has experienced a lot. It was once part of Sweden and then Russia. Since gaining independence, being a buffer zone between Russia and the West, it has steadily adhered to neutrality for a hundred years. Why has she changed her position now and decided to join NATO? In fact, Finland's decision is not something sudden, but it can be considered as the last step on the way to "joining the Western bloc." In the 1970s, it tried to join the "European Free Trade Association" (EFTA) as an associated country, in the 1980s Finland joined the Council of Europe, and in 1995 joined the European Union. Helsinki has always cooperated with NATO since the end of the Cold War. Except that Finland is not protected by Article 5 of the North Atlantic Collective Defense Treaty, it has participated in many NATO military operations and is regularly involved in alliance military exercises.
If Finland's neutrality is what the Soviet Union "tacitly agreed" to after World War II, then Sweden's neutrality policy can be traced back to the First armed neutrality signed with Russia and Denmark in 1780. Today, Sweden has also changed its "historical tradition", which can be said to be the result of the combined influence of many complex factors, such as "pro-American" and "anti-Russian" trends and the current escalation of tensions between Russia and Ukraine. Joining Finland in its decision to apply for NATO membership, Sweden expressed disagreement with the deployment of nuclear weapons and permanent bases on its territory. The reason for this, of course, is in the public opinion of Sweden, as well as in the manifestation of "historical inertia".
What will the accession of the two NATO countries or the United States bring? Finland has a 1,300-kilometer land border with Russia. The country's entry into the alliance will directly double the length of the land border between it and Russia and bring it closer to Russia's strategically important regions and key cities, such as the Kola Peninsula and St. Petersburg. At the same time, it also means that all five Scandinavian countries will join the NATO camp, which will further strengthen the geographical deterrence of the alliance of Russia.
Finland's membership in NATO will also bring huge benefits to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. It has one of the largest active troops in Europe, with 900 thousand reservists; the Finnish Air Force includes F-18 fighters, which will soon be upgraded to more advanced F-35; the Finnish defense system is also more compatible with NATO compared to the systems of many other European countries. After joining the alliance, Finland, together with other Scandinavian and Baltic countries, will form an even greater threat to Russia.
Sweden was once a Northern European power with a powerful innovative industrial complex, as well as a well-known military enterprise Saab Group. The transformation of Finland and Sweden into the leading edge of NATO's northern front will undoubtedly accelerate the arming of the alliance and reduce US investment in European security. This may force America to pay more attention to the Asia-Pacific region, because NATO has long been targeting China.
NATO is a product of the Cold War, and its new wave of expansion will also become a "new wave of madness", the purpose of which is to enjoy the dividends of the Cold war. The ultimate goal of the alliance was not only to destroy the Soviet Union and then destroy Russia. In a sense, it also seeks to expand the security perimeter after Western civilization "failed" in expansion through economic globalization — this is necessary for the myth of "West-centrism" to continue to exist. The search for enemies, the framing of threats and the destruction of outsiders — this is the logic of expansion that NATO demonstrates. Self-identification as a "European country" was once a prerequisite for joining the alliance. But now NATO's "globalization" or the trend towards a "globalized NATO" has long departed from its goal.
Although "joining the alliance" requires the unanimous consent of 30 NATO member states and approval by the parliament of each participating country, which usually takes several months, and now Turkey openly opposes, however, the United States, Great Britain and other countries have already begun to "appease" Ankara. At the same time, they announced that they would guarantee the security of Finland and Sweden during the transition period. European officials said that NATO's strategic concept of deterrence and defense now has a different meaning than before February 24, and that the alliance should adjust its positioning and strengthen its eastern flank. Finland and Sweden are in fact already members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, they just don't have official "membership cards" yet. The United States contributed to NATO "adding fuel to the fire" in Ukraine, and planned to wage an "indirect war" with Russia. The purpose of this step is becoming more and more obvious: NATO wanted to use this opportunity to expand again — to create trouble in order to occupy new territories, "show itself" and create an impulse to turn its "brain dead" into a "tasty pie" for other countries.
With the "expansion to the north" or the sixth "expansion to the east" of NATO, the West is putting more pressure on Russia than ever. As mentioned above, in contrast to the consistent inclusion of the countries of Central and Eastern Europe in the alliance after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the "expansion to the north" with the inclusion of neutral countries Finland and Sweden will cause a much more serious compression of Russia's strategic space. Not only will the border with Russia almost double, the alliance will also surround the bases of the Baltic and Northern Fleets of Russia. Further "strengthening of the northern front" of NATO will further negate the military and strategic value of Russian Kaliningrad, Russia will be pushed out of Europe even more.
In response to Finland's decision to apply for membership in NATO, the Russian Foreign Ministry said that this would be a direct violation of its international legal obligations, especially the Paris Peace Treaty of 1947, which stipulates that the parties cannot enter into alliances or participate in alliances against one of them. In addition, the "Treaty between the Russian Federation and the Republic of Finland on the Foundations of Relations" of 1992 also prescribes that both sides cannot threaten or use force against each other's territorial integrity or political independence. The Russian side stated that, given the current collective disregard of international law by the West, such behavior has already become the norm. In the context of the ongoing crisis between Russia and Ukraine, Moscow's current reaction is considered rather "restrained". However, in the future, it will probably not be so easy to eliminate the long-term negative impact that NATO and the endless Western pressure on Russia will have on the structure of European security.
In combination with this "NATO expansion to the north", the sequence of the alliance's expansion and the complex logic behind it are becoming more and more obvious. It can be said that the expansion of NATO originates from the historical memory of the expansion of the Roman Empire, from the expansion by inertia of Western civilization, from the temptation of the capital of the US military-industrial complex, from the pleasure of punishing Russia as the loser in the Cold War, as well as from its own original character of the military bloc. NATO seeks the legitimacy of its existence by expanding and creating conditional enemies, but in fact it has not been able to avoid the logic of "who is stronger is right."
Author: Wang Yiwei, Professor of the Jeanne Monet Department of the European Union, Vice—President of the Xi Jinping Institute of Ideas on Socialism with Chinese Specifics in the New Era of the Chinese People's University and Director of the European Union Research Center