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Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

presidentti.fi

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Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#711

Post by secondcoming »

rocqua wrote: post #194
2Gkashmiri wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i am not an american, nor russian. i come from a third world country far from this drama. to me, "russian propaganda" is the same as "american propaganda" which demonizes the other and calls their version as the "ultimate truth". don't americans/west see their media/actions as what it is, propaganda aganinst russia? blocking RT across america/EU is seen as protecting free speech but god forbid if russia reciprocates…

The blocking of RT across the EU was indeed a stupid move. Not just 'wrong' but also ineffective. It gives the impression that we are afraid of Russian news. Which I think generally we need not be. What seems scarier is Russian-influenced domestic news. Banning RT won't fix the scarier issue.

The RT website and live stream are sill available to at least me in the UK.

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#712

Post by ssl232 »

Kim_Bruning wrote: post #442
Kiro wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not here to change your mind. I'm here to show other people that I and many others disagree with your opinion. Downvoting for disagreement is fine, as stated by pg himself: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=117171

There are also people on that page who disagree with pg. Downmodding tends to make people disengage. That may be undesirable if you want a healthy debate.

Correct, I rarely bother to start debates on topics I know will be controversial here any more. This one being an exception I now slightly regret. HN used to be able to debate without emotion but in the past few years it's more or less disappeared.

I am still open to having my mind changed but we rarely get far enough before the downvote brigade find these threads.

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#713

Post by JumpCrisscross »

yakak wrote: post #706
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #688

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> plenty of countries are unhappy about banning Russian hydrocarbons But only one is blocking.

It only takes one party to block and there is shame in blocking, why would another country admit that they would have blocked if not for the vote of that shameless Hungarian?

> why would another country admit that they would have blocked if not for the vote of that shameless Hungarian?

This may be true or not. Doesn’t matter. Those others waited. Hungary didn’t.

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#714

Post by toxik »

wolverine876 wrote: post #583
tpmx wrote: post #82

Timeline (from Swedish press yesterday - Omni): Today, May 12: Finnish president Niinistö presents his view on the NATO issue. Friday, May 13: A new Swedish security policy analysis is presented in parliament. All 8 parties represented there have collaborated on this. Saturday, May 14: Heads of the Finnish Social Democratic Party meet and decide on the NATO issue. Swedish and Finnish FMs join a NATO meeting in Berlin…

> All 8 parties represented there have collaborated on this. Imagine a country where one major party doesn't sell itself by obstructing everything.

To be fair, there is no partisan issues in the US over helping Ukraine either. People unite against a common enemy -- it's like that old wisdom, the worst thing to happen to the US was winning the cold war.

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#715

Post by watwut »

suture wrote: post #329
klibertp wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know, I'm not American, and don't care that much. I was referring to this part: > I'm just tired of the USA paying for everything when we don't have the money. Which seems to be one of the things that made the previous President the President.

I’m an American. For many decades the idea that the U.S. props up the rest of world at the expense of focusing on our people has been a strong one. It was very strong going into the 80s but has becomes less so since then. It is still used from time to time galvanize right leaning people. There is a strong isolationist bent within the U.S. too. I do believe Trump was correct to criticize the lack of defense spending b…

Tho, some of that "defense" were invasions on false pretense. What americans do in Ukraine is great and they deserve all the credit. But, some of past wars were less great.

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#716

Post by dragonwriter »

yakubin wrote: post #166
ssl232 wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My take is that they should just have stayed out of the Russia US power game completely. I think so too. The West would tolerate invasion by Russia of Finland even less than it is doing for Ukraine, with or without NATO membership (notably, Ukraine is not part of NATO either). All this seems to be doing is escalating the situation with a man who is perhaps more interested in holding onto power and his own life than…

> The West would tolerate invasion by Russia of Finland even less than it is doing for Ukraine, with or without NATO membership (notably, Ukraine is not part of NATO either). That's not saying much. Ukraine isn't receiving military support from NATO countries. It only gets weapons, and western politicians (mostly US) keep making sure that they do not get the big guns (regarding e.g. airplanes). Initially Germany bloc…

> It only gets weapons, and western politicians (mostly US) keep making sure that they do not get the big guns (regarding e.g. airplanes).

US has directly supplied them with airplanes of the same type they use (not operational as is, but enabling them to return 20 of their existing aircraft to service through parts.)

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#717

Post by aiilns »

kibwen wrote: post #685
aiilns wrote: post #581

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then from whom is the alliance defending themselves, if not from those not into the alliance? For example, a defense alliance that included all nations, would defend against aliens. I repeat, a defense alliance must be, by definition, protecting the members from external threats. I don't think it's a very difficult concept to grasp.

It is possible to create an alliance against an external threat without defining the threat in advance, as you seem to assume. If Russia wanted to join NATO, they could, and this was an imaginable possibility in the 90s, and could be an imaginable possibility again in the future, in a post-Putin era. A defensive pact is just a pact against anyone who attacks; if the US attacked a NATO country, it would be a pact agai…

Obviously you are unaware of basic history of how NATO was created to halt the communist/Soviet "threat". Please, look up "History of NATO" on Wikipedia.

So, for NATO there _was_ a _defined threat_ it sought to protect against. In general, all alliances are made against perceived present or future threats, if you are _actually_ aware of an alliance being made with no external threat in mind, please let me know.

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#718

Post by bell-cot »

piokoch wrote: post #601
thematrixturtle wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This more or less seals Finland applying for NATO membership. However, adding new members requires unanimous consent from all existing members, so it's not guaranteed to be smooth sailing. Russia is also obviously deeply unhappy about this and will do its best to disrupt the process via direct and indirect pressure.

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…

> In fact in case of military conflict [St.] Petersburg is lost, can be attacked from the West and the North by land and covered by long range rocket artillery...

Ah...if I recall, the Germans - with a very large, experienced, and well-equipped army, at the time - assumed that St. Petersburg could be taken fairly easily back in 1941. That turned out not to be the case.

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#719

Post by denton-scratch »

yodelshady wrote: post #309
throwaway894345 wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In practical reality, if Russia were to attack Finland or Sweden now, the answer from NATO would be pretty much the same as if they were already members. Really? Why is this true of Finland but not Ukraine?

Ukraine hadn't applied, until recently arguably didn't meet the military requirements, and - even before this year - had a border dispute in Donbas. The latter is important, NATO is not a hired gun. Finland does have a stable border.

> had a border dispute in Donbas

Not to mention Crimea, whose annexation by Russia is accepted by nobody.

Re: Finland will seek NATO membership immediately

#720

Post by denton-scratch »

Wildgoose wrote: post #296
throwaway894345 wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In practical reality, if Russia were to attack Finland or Sweden now, the answer from NATO would be pretty much the same as if they were already members. Really? Why is this true of Finland but not Ukraine?

Because Ukraine was/is in a state of Civil War.

That's not a "civil war"; Ukraine has been invaded by a foreign army.
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