UK agrees mutual security deals with Finland and Sweden

[Yama]

Hope that's not the only ice cream truck there. 

[BansheeOne]

Quote

A Strategic Baltic Archipelago

What Happens If Russia Attacks Finland's Åland Islands?

Finland's Åland islands have been demilitarized for over a century as part of a peace treaty with Russia. Since Moscow invaded Ukraine, though, the agreement has come under intense scrutiny. Protests are held almost daily in front of the Russian Consulate in the capital city of the autonomous territory.

By Anna-Sophie Schneider in Mariehamn, Åland

06.07.2023, 17.44 Uhr

A peak into the windows of Mariehamn is a look into the past. The buildings in the capital of the Åland Islands are made of wood, the windows so old that the glass "has survived world wars," as Sia Spiliopoulou Åkermark says. The director of the Åland Peace Institute likes to talk about the decades-old windows – because they prove that the Ålands are islands of peace and remain so to this day.

The Åland archipelago belongs to Finland, but it is largely autonomous. During the Crimean War in the 19th century, Britain, France and Russia fought over the territory. In 1856, as a result of the peace negotiations, an international agreement stipulated the demilitarization of the islands for the first time and Russia committed to refrain from fortifying the islands. In World War I, Russia again stationed troops on Åland, with the agreement of its allies Britain and France. But in 1921, demilitarization was restored. From that point on, the archipelago was not to be attacked, and neither was it permitted to station military equipment there. All sides adhered to the agreement, which is the reason the windows in the wooden buildings are intact to this day, despite two world wars. "If Åland had ever been attacked and bombed, they would have been broken," says Åkermark.

The peace researcher is confident that Åland will remain an archipelago of peace in the future due to its special status. But people are less certain in the Finnish capital Helsinki.

Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Finns feel confirmed in their distrust of their neighbor Russia. And they have drawn consequences: Finland officially joined NATO in April 2023. However, the Åland Islands remain demilitarized. And that now leaves some Finns wondering: What happens if Russia attacks the islands?

The "Achilles Heel of the Finnish Defense"

Critics see the demilitarization of the archipelago as a weakness that the Russians could exploit. Former Finnish presidential adviser Alpo Rusi even called the Åland islands the "Achilles' heel of Finland’s defense." Several members of parliament are also openly questioning the territory's status. But experts warn that arming the archipelago could have unforeseen consequences. No one knows how Russia would react given that the demilitarization of the archipelago was once a condition for Moscow's recognition of Finland's borders.

The Åland archipelago in the Baltic Sea is located in a geographically important place. At the entrance to the Gulf of Bothnia, between Sweden and the Finnish mainland, there are over 6,700 islands and islets, of which only 65 are inhabited. Åland is as strategically important as the Swedish island of Gotland, which lies in the Baltic Sea between Sweden and Latvia. It was once said that whoever has power over Gotland and Åland has power over the entire sea.

For centuries, the great powers of the Baltic Sea fought for supremacy on Åland. Several compromises eventually led to the settling of the conflict. One was that, in 1940, Moscow was allowed to establish a consulate in Mariehamn. Russian diplomats monitor whether the demilitarization is being observed. And they are still doing so today, even though Russia is simultaneously waging a war against Ukraine that violates international law. Many Finns are now asking, critically, whether it is right for Russia to monitor compliance with an international agreement while breaking international law every day only a few thousand kilometers away.

[...]

https://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/a-strategic-baltic-archipelago-what-happens-if-russia-attacks-finland-s-aland-islands-a-87f17866-50bf-4b43-b021-23a80939aeeb

[Ssnake]

So, how would the Russian Navy keep those islands supplied after taking them?

They couldn't keep Ukrainian Snake Island supplied, under much more benign circumstances.

[Yama]

The archipelago has little strategic significance in modern war, and that has been the case ever since WW2. The idea of 'Achilles Heel' is nonsense: Even if Russians landed there, where would the Russians go?

[Sardaukar]

Things were obviously different when Soviet Union existed.

Now, invasion force would have to come either from Kaliningrad or from St. Petersburg. Not many other options, especially since trying to fly paratroopers into hostile airspace might not be a good idea especially nowadays.

The concern is that 90% of Finland's supply/trade is via sea (that's why we really need Sweden to get into NATO too). That is also the reason for new corvettes (which are actually more like frigates). There is also project to improve rail connection to Norway via Sweden.

 

[Sardaukar]

Finland is doing pretty well in this new NATO-published graph:

[Stuart Galbraith]

9 hours ago, Yama said:

The archipelago has little strategic significance in modern war, and that has been the case ever since WW2. The idea of 'Achilles Heel' is nonsense: Even if Russians landed there, where would the Russians go?

After what happened with Porkkala, I can entirely understand Finnish concerns, even if as you say, it doesnt look very practical for a country that isnt the USSR to pull off.

https://fennica.pohjoiseen.fi/en/2020/10/29/porkkala-parenthesis/

[Mistral]

The Sultan has spoken, for Sweden to get in, Turkey must be accepted to the EU before they can join Nato, US to sell the F16s at the price when requested (lira was 8-1 at the time now its 26 to the Dollar), and Turkey to always be in the world cup football finals.

That is his will and so it must be done

https://edition.cnn.com/2023/07/10/europe/erdogan-turkey-nato-eu-sweden-intl/index.html

 

[glenn239]

On 7/8/2023 at 3:02 AM, Stuart Galbraith said:

After what happened with Porkkala, I can entirely understand Finnish concerns, even if as you say, it doesnt look very practical for a country that isnt the USSR to pull off.

https://fennica.pohjoiseen.fi/en/2020/10/29/porkkala-parenthesis/

I had assumed from the sudden discovery of an invasion threat that somebody in NATO decided that ASW listening posts on these islands would be useful.   

[Josh]

47 minutes ago, Mistral said:

The Sultan has spoken, for Sweden to get in, Turkey must be accepted to the EU before they can join Nato, US to sell the F16s at the price when requested (lira was 8-1 at the time now its 26 to the Dollar), and Turkey to always be in the world cup football finals.

That is his will and so it must be done

https://edition.cnn.com/2023/07/10/europe/erdogan-turkey-nato-eu-sweden-intl/index.html

 

Holy crap their foreign debt must be impossible to maintain at that level. I should book a trip.

[Mistral]

11 minutes ago, Josh said:

Holy crap their foreign debt must be impossible to maintain at that level. I should book a trip.

Inflation, its the cancer of any economy.

[Sardaukar]

OK, things are moving.

Sweden and Turkey got into some sort of compromise, so Erdogan promised that Swedish NATO membership will be taken into Parliament of Turkey. Thus said Stoltenberg in press conference. 

Hungary also said that they'll not be last country to accept Sweden to NATO. 

[Yama]

3 hours ago, Mistral said:

The Sultan has spoken, for Sweden to get in, Turkey must be accepted to the EU before they can join Nato

That's hilarious, EU has nothing to do with that, and one of the countries which sabotaged Turkey's EU membership was Austria which is not in NATO.

[Roman Alymov]

2 minutes ago, Yama said:

That's hilarious, EU has nothing to do with that, and one of the countries which sabotaged Turkey's EU membership was Austria which is not in NATO.

Turkey is NATO member and without their voice new members could not be invited - so why not to ask for what they want, and it is up to other members to deliver (or not deliver).

[Sardaukar]

Sultan already agreed, so weep, vatniks!

Seems he is distancing himself from Russia quite a bit. Even selling quite a lot of military equipment to Ukraine.

 

[urbanoid]

Well, the Turks have said something about building a Bayraktar factory in Ukraine, not sure if it makes sense, but they did. He said that as far as Swedish membership goes, he'll take it to the parliament. 

[Roman Alymov]

14 minutes ago, Sardaukar said:

Sultan already agreed, so weep, vatniks!

Seems he is distancing himself from Russia quite a bit. Even selling quite a lot of military equipment to Ukraine.

You live too far away from Turkey, guys - while we got experience of numerous wars (and peace deals) with Ottomans, and Bysantine before them. He have agreed to pass request to Parliament and "work with it" - meaning he already got something in exchange for that. Now it will be debated in Parliament, somebody will conveniently burn Quran again, so Parliament will demonstrate anger, and Erdogan will communicate "You see, i am doing my best, but it is not so simple and you yourself is making it more complex, so i need additional ...... and .....  to push it through" and so on. At the same time he will be trying to get something from Russia and all others. May be it is good for Turkey, after all. Currently he is trying to "sell" to Putin his visit to Turkey, for example  (no idea in what way it is useful, bit our pro-Western party may want it as "first step to normalization of relations with West" etc).

    Sooner or later Sweden will join, but not before Turks got maximum possible profit out of it.

Edited July 10, 2023 by Roman Alymov

[ZORK]

Roman Alymov.......your sobriety is excellent....you really understand how camel traders operate.......I sincerely wonder how you keep generating your seamless bias. Are you simply attempting to balance  the west fanboy syndrome......or something else?

Do you speak to yourself with the same understanding.....how useless and repetitive war is? 

[sunday]

7 minutes ago, ZORK said:

Roman Alymov.......your sobriety is excellent....you really understand how camel traders operate.......I sincerely wonder how you keep generating your seamless bias. Are you simply attempting to balance  the west fanboy syndrome......or something else?

Do you speak to yourself with the same understanding.....how useless and repetitive war is? 

Very esteemed @ZORK - Are you aware that about 20% of your posts, more or less, may be understood as containing unprovoked personal attacks?

Edited July 10, 2023 by sunday

[Sardaukar]

Well, it is quite a big defeat for Putin and his cronies. 

Very good for us and for NATO in general. 

 

[urbanoid]

I'd say it's a much bigger victory for the West than it's a loss for Russia. Finland and Sweden were largely integrated, NATO wouldn't tolerate aggression against them and Russia wasn't planning a war with NATO anyway, because it would only get rekt. Still, mentally (for us and for them) they were 'at the table', their opinions and 'warnings' were being taken into consideration instead of disregarded as they should be. 

[Stuart Galbraith]

The more Eastern Europeans that are brought in (well Sweden isnt exactly, though in perspective it certainly is), the much harder its going to be for NATO to backslide on defending Eastern Europe. All those aims to plans to tilt to Asia, the French plans to develop a European defence force, all look just a little more unlike I would argue.

[Roman Alymov]

1 hour ago, Sardaukar said:

Well, it is quite a big defeat for Putin and his cronies. 

Very good for us and for NATO in general. 

 

Let me remind you Puti himself  is pro-Western politician (as well as most of Russian elite), they do not care. It is not even PR problem for them, as Russian public opinion see little difference between Western NATO members and Western non-NATO members (It is interesting to see survey of what % of Russians are aware Sweden and Finland were not NATO members). So even in internal debate it will not be a big issue (plenty of other, more important facts for pro-Russian opposition to use against Putin&Co)

     By the way, not sure non-Russian speakers have noticed in Putin's speech on the meeting with war reporters

"We were believeng that we are yours, also bourgeois, we would like to be the members of civilized nations family, i was testing the ground for NATO membership" etc. -and describe humiliating denial of this attempts.

  I have not seen it mentioned by Western experts (probably they are not aware) but every post-Soviet Russian is aware where the words "I am yours, bourgeois" are comming from: it is quoute from Soviet child movie made in 1964 after Arkady Gaidar's book published in 1935 - and this words are said by triator (who have betrayed in exchange for "a barrel of jam and a basket of cookies")  to his masters who have left him behind when retreating

Every Soviet-born person knows what this quote means.

So actually this words (unlikely to be written by speechwriter - i can't imagine speechwriter who dare to write text like this for Putin) are opening for us rare insight of what Putin himself is thinking: "In 1990th, we were ready to surrender our country to you in exchange for some personal benefits , but West have turned us away".

Edited July 11, 2023 by Roman Alymov

[Yama]

AIUI, in NATO there were two competing views on whether try to bring Sweden & Finland in - East European view was that they are powerful European militaries (!) which have ability to reinforce defence of the Eastern Europe, most notably Baltic. That was one of the sticking points of former Estonian President Ilves, that Finland was 'freeriding' and not participating to defence of Baltic.

Another was Anglo-American view, which saw Finland and Sweden as insular and non-interventionistic nations which, as a part of NATO decisionmaking, would likely only hinder their own more global interests. However, the issue here was that if Finland and Sweden really wanted to join, it would be embarrassing to refuse them. Nordic countries are kind of 'Instagram Influencers' in global politics.

[Stuart Galbraith]

When you look at how reluctant and how obstructive Macron has been in this crisis, its the older members, not the younger ones, we need to worry about.