651–660 of 1001 posts
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>However, adding new members requires unanimous consent from all existing members, so it's not guaranteed to be smooth sailing. I highly doubt that any of NATO's members will veto an application from Finland (or Sweden).
How about Hungary and it's seemingly pro-Russian leader, Orban? They could vote against.
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> Until recently Ukraine was only in media for their gov breaking human rights and stuff like this, and now it's suddenly the long lost brother we all love so much. Citation needed.
While it is not 1:1 with regards to human rights there was a pivot in the media away from Ukraine's "Problem with far right violence"[1] after the war started[2] into "Azov battalion is only 10% Nazi so there are no Nazis in Ukraine" [1]Here I am quoting one of the articles in the image [2] https://i.imgur.com/tfJ7PtX.jpg
seems like the absolute worst time to join NATO. Russia is as close to war with NATO as ever and now they decide it's a good time to join? they may find themselves at war the day after joining. Russia is way more closer to war with NATO than it was with Finland. on the other hand, they don't have much choice. Finland was not neutral, just not formally in NATO. they were anti-Russia independents. but now things got se…
Russia points guns at Ukraine and Finland and says, "Don't call for help or I will shoot you." Russia proceeds to shoot Ukraine anyways.
Perhaps this is an oversimplification, countries aren't people after all, but what is Finland to do in this situation? In my opinion, Russia has deteriorated trust so completely that folks assume that the punishment for a threat will happen _even if_ a line isn't crossed.
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Sources are inconsistent on this topic – some say Turkey has closed the Straits to all warships, others say it has only closed the ships to the official parties to the conflict, which is currently only Russia and Ukraine (arguably Belarus too, but that's irrelevant to this, since as a landlocked state they have no navy), and that other naval ships, including Bulgarian and Romanian, are still allowed through, so long…
Isn’t there a Danube Convention? Couldn’t Romania retaliate now that USSR is no longer party?
I'm Romanian, I live in Romania (Bucharest), so as I'm geographically close to this I've been following this particular Danube issue closer than the others, but the thing is that the situation on the ground is still pretty muddled. For example, just as the war started the Romanian authorities had suspended commercial navigation on the Chilia Danube Delta Branch, the one on which the Romanian-Ukrainian border is situated, for fear of Russian bombs. Presumably the navigation has been allowed to resume, but nothing official has been made public in the Romanian mainstream press, the only related news was something about the Ukrainian authorities being unhappy with us (Romanians) asking for navigation-related customs taxes that were seen as too high, so I assumed that commercial navigation had, in fact, resumed.
There was also our prime-minister meeting with the Bulgarian side (with which we share hundreds of kms of the Danube) and making a statement afterwards about how the Danube should be made easier to navigate (i.e. a strong hint made to the European Union to send us money to do that). If that indeed were to happen (i.e. if the Danube would be made easier to navigate) then the Ukrainians would be able to send a large part of their exports to Central and even Western Europe (via the Danube-Mainz-Rhine canal) via fluvial ships, at a fraction of the cost they now have to pay doing that using rail and road-transport. That's why (among other things) the Russians have set their eyes so strongly on the Budjak region (i.e. the Ukrainian region just North of the Danube's Delta) and that's why they have bombarded this bridge [2] that leads to that region at least three times in the last few weeks.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Commission_for_t...
[2] https://www.google.com/maps/place/Pidyomnyy+Mist/@46.0749075...
"When we look across the border now, we see a Finn on the other side. If Finland joins NATO, we will see an enemy." Putin to a Finnish journalist in 2016 according to Finnish President Sauli Niinistö in an interview with the German magazine 'Der Spiegel' https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/finnish-president... I guess, the russians are finnished.
Putin burned all bridges unfortunately, he can't seat at any table and be believable since he stomped on a bunch of international laws and treaties.
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That is a strange choice to spend 400% your annual overall defense budget on a new unproven system.
There was an open tender with all of the current/next gen western suppliers participating, with analysis comparing the capabilities of Eurofighter, Rafale, F-18 E/F, Jas Gripen, F-35 and their adjunct systems including weapon systems, tactical integration and their capability for several decades. Finnish air-force is quite professional and skilled in what it does. As a software geek I presume they spent the money wis…
https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2021/02/23/the-us-air-...
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Not quite. My understanding of WW1 is that the defense treaties were like multiple nets that all made enemies of each other come wartime. Today it seems that NATO is one big net and Russia is more or less an isolated node with no seriously powerful country to call to for help.
Wouldn't surprise me if Russia had a secret treaty with China.
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The ship has sailed for Russia already. USA will not tolerate obstruction by Germany, France or Hungary. Recent meeting about Ukraine support was hold in Ramstein and this place was chosen intentionally - to show who is the master of the show and who should sit and listen. By attacking Ukraine Russia wanted to "push" NATO away from its borders, but it all went backwards - now they will have a new, 1300 km long border…
USA is playing a dangerous game atm, they're not in Europe and don't depend on Russian energies. They just want Russia to sink and don't really care about the fate of Europe.
They should have a referendum and ask the Finish people if this is what they want. It makes the country a target in the event of a broad conflict.
No one wants conflict, no one wants war, but sometimes people can't grasp the consequences of some decisions.
Look at Brexit...
Didn't Russia (last month) threaten Finland/Sweden with 'consequences' should they decide joining NATO? Wondering what would those be. Putting both countries in a new list of 'very unfriendly countries'?
Russia has been threatening Finland/Sweden with consequences for years. As the Finnish PM mentioned in his speech with Boris Johnson a few days ago, Russia has shown with Ukraine that complying with Russia's threats is not a guarantee that the future will be consequence-free.
Exactly this. By attacking Ukraine, Russia proved to the world that there is no point complying with Russian geopolitical demands. If Ukraine somehow became a NATO member years ago (not saying that that would have happened, but talking hypothetically) Ukraine would never have been attacked. So, the only rational thing for Finland and Sweden to do is to ignore Russia and join NATO.