TLDR: Sweden comes with a mature military industry, a well trained and kitted military, and an unsinkable aircraft carrier in the form of an island in the middle of the area.
No it's actually peoples homes. People live there. It has the Norths most preserved medieval town, I think. And alot of culture and history. Let the whole world call America an unsinkable aircraft carrier, and see what that does to your peoples spirit and paranoia... No wait, lets call America an unsinkable nuclear bomb test site. And let you be the tool for once. Oh the arrogance.
@@butterfliesandmothsits true that gotland is a home for thousands of civilians. At the same time its a military stronghold , thats had its influnce in the baltic sea for hundreds of years.
@butterfliesandmoths calm down, my family owns property on Gotland, and everyone there is well aware of the island's strategic value. It is a militarily important area both for launching aircraft, basing naval vessels and launching various missiles to controll the surrounding sea. It is thusly a prime target as in the event of war Russian would need to control it to blockade the baltic states. This is true regardless if Sweden was a NATO member or not. We do not want our island occupied by Russia
@@butterfliesandmoths as someone born and raised on gotland, i dont think he meant something bad about the comment, he just signified the strategic importance of the island as it has always been throughout history. In the middle ages it was one of the biggest trading hubs in scandinavia and continually fought over. Geographically it is a very good position to hold in the baltic sea. I love my beautiful island for a huge amount of other reasons but there is no denying the military perspective is an important one.
This title is complete clickbait and unrepresentative of the content of the video. Completely the opposite of what I'd expect from a channel name like "Context Matters". Apparently, it doesn't matter.
@@Intreductor yeah but NATO (Belgium, US, and others) refused to sell weapons to Portugal (like FN FAL and AR-10) because of the dictatorship. It seems conditions sometimes matter.
It was not a democracy? Well yes it wasnt, but not on paper, the President was elected through direct vote, and despite later issues in the late 50s, we have no reason to believe they were sham election in 1949. Salazar was a popular guy then, he had kept Portugal out of the war, the Church protected him and people were deeply religious, and the memory of what preceded him was still present. The Question of Portugal as a pluricontinental Country is what kept the regime going and if you asked most Portuguese in 1961, they would have supported it. I remember that the president was who really matter, he could have removed Salazar at any moment.
@@Intreductor so wait.. let's say France is selling 7.62x51mm NATO STANAG ammo. No relation at all with NATO right? Turkie did not have closed doors to buy any planes and spare parts from countries of NATO, including the most wanted F-35, because they bought S-300 SAM systems? And, I'm curious, ins not NATO made up by 32 sovereign countries bound by a all parts signed defense treaty? Sorry, I must really be a moron... Good that I never said NATO countries military production must be mandatory sold to only NATO members. I need my drugs, I'm quite confused... Does a EU member citizen be able to travel further than the EU countries Territories? An there's even that thing callled Schengen Space that allows me to travel with no restrictions, eg, to Switzerland? But Switzerland is neutral, it's not part of the EU... Where are my drugs???
Hungarys deal to buy the Swedish Gripens were a binding offer from 2019 that was made then. So no they didn't "get" any planes, they just fulfilled the deal they made then
@@davedeville6540Don't feed the troll. Anyone who actually knows anything about military technology would never make such a statement. He's just another Dunning Kruger Effect patient.
Sweden produces their own figher jets, submarines, marine ships, and artillery. And more. And it is top notch. What little country has this capability. And what would happen if all nordic countries has that ability....... Well, we, the scandinavian countries would have a central and close logistics for freedom. Peace out.
Except for 1 Small Correction (Detail) Fewer and Fewer get Recruited by/From Army. And only *More* Are leaving the Field of Service. It was a problem before *NATO* membership and even more so now.
@@Real-Name..Maqavoy not exactly the conscription system was abolished in 2010 but reinstated in 2017 and the Swedish Armed Forces are made up of 24,400 active personnel, 11,400 military reserves, 21,500 Home Guard and 5,200 additional conscripts yearly into the Reserves (set to increase to 8,000 conscripts yearly by 2024) as of 2022
I do hope Sweden's cottage defence industry won't just be choked out by multinational companies now thanks to economy of scale and dreaded "interoperability".
Yes, a Nordic military union would be good. When seen this, it might be good even if we finally got the first time in 500 years have a Nordic unified defense, in case of nato paralyzed, the Nordic union would save us. I’m also for a Nordic common krona, we have five different currency’s now.
YT creators love selling consensus building as a fatal flaw. But with what alternative? The most powerful state gets dictatorial rights over the Organisation (NATO, EU whatever we're talking about)? How is it surprising that the most powerful military alliance in the history of the planet has players within it that have diverging interests that need to be maneuvered. The very fact that this consensus building happens is what makes a NATO or an EU possible.
At least until Orban refuses to ratify execution of Article 5 when his good buddy Putin decides to do something. Consensus-building is great, but this wasn't consensus-building--it was two leaders holding proceedings hostage for personal political gain and transactional military gain.
The point the video is trying to make isn't that the process was made in due diligence with what comes with it being a democratic organ, but over how some members tried to use the democratic process in order to make individual selfish gain.
The problem with consensus building is that you need true democracies in an organisation like NATO for that to happen. Hungary is not a liberal democracy, the elections there are not free and fair (how can it be fair when the government controls the media). And Turkey is ... whatever Turkey is.
@@Blondul11 Funny how you've chosen to redefine 'true democracy' to mean 'liberal democracy'. Democracy simply means the govt. enjoy majority support, and most polls (besides their own elections) shows both those govts. do indeed have that, even foreign ones. Democracy does NOT have to be liberal to count, that's just liberals imposing their own ideology by stealth as somehow part and parcel of being a democracy. Your tribe is losing bub, learn to accept it.
Funny how you've chosen to redefine 'true democracy' to mean 'liberal democracy'. Democracy simply means the govt. enjoy majority support, and most polls (besides their own elections) shows both those govts. do indeed have that, even foreign ones. Democracy does NOT have to be liberal to count, that's just liberals imposing their own ideology by stealth
I'll be honest. There are a lot of details missing. Like how some of the demands Turkey made required a change of the Swedish constitution. And you need to votes in The Rikdag with one election between them to do a change like that. Or that in part Sweden stayed out of NATO because there was a fear that joining the alliance would result in Finlandization getting stepped up to Finland becoming a full on Russian puppet.
@@skp8748We don't. Sweden was the second country in the world to designate the PKK as a terrorist organization, second only after Turkey. We did so in 1984. We fight terrorism by convicting individuals after proving their crimes (actions) in a court of law. We do NOT convict people or - as Erdogan demanded (crazy) - seize and extradite individuals who have not committed a crime, just because they hold certain political views (kurds, not even in the PKK). We are a country who values freedom of opinion and free speach. Turkey and Erdogan on the other hand, puts their opposition in jail just because they are the opposition - very different, and not something we will ever do, or even could do based on our constitution. Kind of a piece of shit way of running a country, if you ask me. Anyway, this was hard for Erdogan to understand that we actually have rule of law, but it was even more important to him to be seen domeatically as if he was calling the shots, was bullying sweden and bending europe and the west to his will. Turks love that kind of boastful behavior, it covers up their insecurities. So Erdogan got himself some of that, we played along, and now everybody is happy, ok?
@tomasruzic6917 No, Sweden were never neutral even before the end of the Cold war. During WWII Sweden sent like one third its airforce to Finland, tons of ammunition and weapons to Finland, let german troops pass through Sweden etc etc. During the Cold War Swedish military cooperated deeply with Nato through mainly Norway and Denmark but also UK and US sharing intelligence, military personel exchange etc. The Swedish "neutrality" was basically a small passage in the yearly "government declaration" saying that Sweden "should be military non-aligned in peace, aiming for neutrality in war". You don't need much imagination to see it's very flexible. Nothing like Switzerland and Austria were the neutrality is written into law.
@@HenrikAndersson-c3nYou just described how neutrality works. NOT PICKING SIDE in a conflict. But still upholding relations to preserve the nation. It is a very difficult balancing act. If you look at a map to see where Sweden is located you should be able, if you are of avarage or higher intelligence, to understand that a complete passive stance is not feasible.
10:25 - Wrong, Hungary did not "receive" fighter jets, Hungary wanted to buy 4 additional fighter jets which they did. 10:30 - Wrong, they extended the maintence contract. 10:39 - Wrong, the fighter jets shall be purchased after leasing not transferred.
wrong again. Hungary should not be European. They were on the wrong side both WW, the 3 baltic wars before that. Those cossacks came from RU in the first place. Luckely, there are few of them. If the EU was e democracy, orban would be a convicted villain. And yes, we remember your hungary/maygar opression.
@@thesaw9988I mean, you're free to think that Hungary shouldn't be a member of the EU. But not being European is a moot, if nothing else due to its location with in *Europe*. EU being democratic is probably one of the bigger reasons for why Orban hasn't been convicted of anything: as Hungary is an independent state, hopefully they're going to vote him out and start a criminal investigation on him, soon.
@@RannonSi Hungary was protected by Poland as they both shared some conflict with EU, but Poland doesn't share Hungary's friendliness with Russia making them no longer allied against EU.
In my opinion, NATO should work on having a democracy checking system. Country who are part of NATO and fail to fulfill basic democratic rights or have authoritarian leaders should be temporarily stripped of their veto right until their government meet the democratic level required by NATO. This is indeed hard to achieve, but a measurement is doable.
Now, how would you realias this. The US has by far the largest collective democracy. Nato is actually about European security. Sure in numbers we could "outvote you out." Russia tough, is just a poor losers' country ho happened to be a superpower, even if I as European payed for the lot. Now, if you like to live of the proffits of you ineffincent arms industries, be my guest. You pay a lot of money, true. It is all about local industry. IN the US I mean. Persnonallly, I don't give a shit abiout your politics.
@@thesaw9988 The signs of a slide into dictatorship are pretty common. Suppression of the press, the use and threat of violence, subverting the courts, etc. The big glowing red flag is changing the constitution to remove term limits.
Problem: Portugal, one of the founding members of NATO, was a dictatorship under the rule of António Salazar. How can we deny potential autocrats (because Orbán isn’t a true dictator yet) to remain in NATO when we allowed Portugal to help form NATO.
Let's not forget that being an ally with Russia during the Napoleonic war was just about "the enemy of my enemy" since Russia had just a few years earlier taken all of Finland from Sweden.
@@Tespri NAFO bot detected, Opinon rejected. At least feed this bot with somewhat historical information. Russia was facing biggest army at that time, and they were smarter then napoleon, baited him into Russia and burned Moscow and send all those shinny soldiers to the grave. sealing their fate. Before that they fought at Borodino. Regardless if this was their goal or not, this is what happened in the end. So Russia became that big by retreating and burning its villages? What mental gymnastics do you have to do and how much drugs do you need to take to write something like that IF you apply that to general Russian history. If you are talking about Napoleonic wars, Russia only burned Moscow.
"Now called Finland." Finnish people, speaking Finnish language has been here for a very long time. The word you are looking for is colonization. We were first colonized by Sweden, then by Russia. It was our homeland long before the swedish empire ever existed, even back in the Viking times. Now we've just driven the invaders out.
Small note to the history part, Sweden only really stopped fighitng Russia when it lost Finland in 1809 with the Finnish war, and prior to that the Swedes had continued to fight wars with Russia, with one war including the war in 1790 during which the Swedish ´fleet at the battle of Svenskund fighting an equally sized Russian fleet cost Russia 50-80 ships to Sweden's 6
@@ArawnOfAnnwnThe war was lost by Russia(Gustav III's Russian war), so you are incorrect here. However, the concessions were minor and non-territorial.
Title is confusing. It's not at all clear what 'Their' is susspoed to refer to. Both sweden and NATO shuld be referred to as 'its' so the only valid option is Both of them. Yet from the introduction it's made clear that you're talking about a weakness of NATO. Title thus should have been '...exposed its biggest weakness', or ven more preferably 'NATO's biggest weakness', since the former would still leave room for confusion.
@MrErrolError and the controversal thing is that the democratic shoukd not sweden sell military equipment to dictatorships. At least the earn money on that. But giving away military equipment free to the dictature Ukraine Swedish taxpayers money. They make two fails at the same time
The context that these were the two quickest countries to be approved also matters here. The fact it was done so quickly happened mostly because Sweden and Finland were both already a kind of informal member of NATO. With both countries having tight strategic ties to NATO and a common supply chain. But even then, it happened really fast for what it is. Additionally the issue of Turkey and Hungary doesn't much affect reactions to a member invoking article 5. Since Article 5 allows each country to individually decide how it responds. Even if a few outliers don't follow the pack, as long as the US, Germany, France, UK, and other big players react, there won't be much of a difference in the net sum of the reaction.
The thing is NATO is also a physical organization that operates tah trains between countries. It does everything possible to secure exactly how each country will respond to article 5.
Kaliningrad would still be Russian for about 15 minutes in a Russian war with NATO. Poland is becoming one of the most armed countries in Europe. An article five for NATO isn't going to require everyone to vote on a response because it is urgent where having two countries use membership of a third country is not.
I'm at the 10th minute of the 13 min video and I still didn't get the info in the title, I hate it when someone has 1 line of info and wants to make a video out of it!
All of nato is struggling to supply the ukraine to hold off Russia who is pretty much alone in their fight, theres your answer, 30 countries cant hold off Russia
Well, NATO isn't a hegemony. The fact that the members bicker and squabble and are allowed to do so proves that it isn't a hegemony. Sure, NATO would be much stronger if it were centralized, authoritarian and imperialistic, but that's kindof the point. Basically, its simply an alliance of diverse small countries that wish to maintain peace in their borders and the borders of their neighbors by expanding the umbrella of nuclear deterrence over their own territories. In a grand geopolitical game of chess with winners and losers, NATOs strategy would indeed seem pretty crap, but this is the real world, and real nations are made of real people who, by and large, wish to be left alone to simply live their lives. This is what democracy looks like. Tit for tat cooperation on a civilization scale.
NATO is stronger than Russia even without Sweden. Even if their overseas forces were somehow inaccessible even "European" NATO presence alone could crush Russia.
you know that you can't block articile 5? even if Turkey or Hungary was against it and other countires decided to fight it would mean a fight without Turkey or Hugnary
Let's not forget that Napoleon forced Russia to a war against Sweden to force it into the blockade of Britain. That was also the war after which Finland got its first taste of independence as a Autonomic Grand Duchy of Russia. Very good time for Finland, much better than under the Swedish rule. Something that "the West" wants actively to forget or rather to lie about.
consensus can also be an agreement of and by fools, therefore it is not necessarily a strength, case in point illegal immigration being hailed as diversity when the word 'diversity' represents division, which is hardly a strength.
Problem is Hungary and Turkey are not truly democracies. Orban looks up to Putin, and would like to fully emulate what Putin did in Russia. NATO would not have this issues otherwise.
@@Blondul11 More of your nonsense. Funny how you've chosen to redefine 'true democracy' to mean 'liberal democracy'. Democracy simply means the govt. enjoy majority support, and most polls (besides their own elections) shows both those govts. do indeed have that, even foreign ones. Democracy does NOT have to be liberal to count, that's just liberals imposing their own ideology by stealth as somehow part and parcel of being a democracy.
@@Blondul11 More of your nonsense. Democracy simply means the govt. enjoy majority support, and most polls (besides their own elections) shows both those govts. do indeed have that, even foreign ones. Democracy does NOT have to be liberal to count, that's just liberals imposing their own ideology by stealth
@@Blondul11 More of your nonsense. Democracy simply means the govt. enjoys majority support, and most polls (besides their own elections) show both those govts. do indeed have that, even foreign ones. Democracy is not the same as liberalism, that's just liberals pushing their ideology by stealth
"This CHANGES EVERYTHING!" "That CHANGES EVERYTHING!" "This will leave you SPEECHLESS!" "That will leave you SPEECHLESS!" These mega-overused manipulative clickbait statements lead me to delete videos from my feed, sight-unseen, regardless of whatever merit they may actually have. What a waste.
a quick look in to this channel shows that many videos have a title like "why the west could not do this and that and why east is powerful" a good try. now gtfo.
All this talk about the Suwalki gap being a weak spot for NATO, sure it's a narrow part for NATO. But it's even more a weak spot for Russia, it's not even on their territory.
@@3irikur The fact that it is NOT on russian territory, surrounded by NATO countries. They have to cross NATO countries to go from Kaliningrad to Belarus.
In a way yes. The biggest wekness is the extreme egoism and self-interest of certain nations. This is, however, nothing new. It has been there all the time - now it has just been exposed. Hungary really should move into the sphere where it belongs, i.e. Russia and all other pseudo-democracies. And at the moment, Turkey is just a lost case in all ways imaginable. You are also totally wrong about one thing: Nato doesn't have to take a unanimous decision in order for some or most member states to support one of its members - it is up to each and every MS to take that decision. It is not like there are any "Nato troops" anyway - the troops are all national.
More importantly - dictatorships should not have veto power. They really shouldn't be in NATO to begin with, being a democracy should be one of the criteria. But like exclude Turkey and they'll most likely align with Russia and China
@paulgibbon5991 Only US should have veto right since nato is protected by us nuclear deterrent. French & british nuclear war-heads is insufficient in numbers to deter russia.
I'm unsubscribing. the analysis here is pretty basic. Anyone that followed the news knew that when Russia invaded Ukraine, Sweden and Finland tried to join and were blocked by Hungary and Turkeye. The conclusion is that Sweden has a strong military, but needing even more people to be unanimous in their actions is a weakness. No s#$%. wasted 13 min.
Almost all of the video got things correct. But "might give them ideas to manipulate the leaders of nations within the alliance", isn't really true since it is already like that. That has always been the case with Hungary sharing the closest ties out of all of the nations in the alliance, with an Eastern superpower.
@@Something-tz2vw if you say so, you dont know history as well as international law. The crimea has been russian only since end of 18th century, and after 1950s it was given to ukraine. russia internationaly recognised the border of Ukraine, as it was in 1991, and in 2014 invaded the ukraine and is illegaly occupying it.
On your graphic, why are the British Crown Dependencies, Aland, Faroer Islands and Greenland not colored as being part of NATO territory? If these territories would be attacked, Article 5 would apply, right?
As far as I know that's not really the case. If push comes to shove it could be argued that these are not real territories and therefore don't trigger Article 5.
It's complicated. Greenland and the Faroe Islands are self governing countries with the Kingdom of Denmark, the Dependencies are ruled by the Crown but aren't legally part of the UK, and Aland is an autonomous region of Finland. They're legally distinct areas with their own identities separate from the parent countries. While parent countries would immediately come to the defense, I don't know if NATO's responsibility for them has been defined. An attack on those territories wouldn't be a direct attack on the homeland. Any NATO lawyers around to explain?
@@CortexNewsService You don't need a NATO lawyer to explain this. If Putin could steal ground in Europe in the midst of NATO facing no retaliations, those areas would already be Russian. They're not. Meaning that if Putin touches those areas it will not be solved in court by lawyers and politicans going blah blah blah but guns going blam blam blam.
@@CortexNewsServicethere’s no ambiguity in terms of NATO article 5 applying to invasion of any of the autonomous Nordic regions such as the Faroe Islands, Greenland,and Aland or for the British Crown dependencies around Europe. In other words, article 5 can/will be triggered for their defence.
Well I don't know about this "major strategic importance of Sweden" take. It seems pretty logical and definitely nice for NATO (even thou I think Baltic states could be well protected just by Finland (by air- and marine-forces) and Poland, like isn't 60 hours enough for NATO to maintain presence in Lithuania at least? The whole Kallingrad region has around 400-500k of population, there is just no way they can occupy the Suwalki corridor for long), but I don't think the same could be said about Sweden. Since Finland joined NATO, Sweden became protected by NATO from all sides and didn't have any possible threats from Russia - neither on the ground, nor in the sky or sea. But now in case of war Sweden will be one of the first ones to take hits from Russian nuclear weapon, basically for nothing.
What the nato alliance needs to do is put all military facilities and factories on full scale production and build air defence and artillery fast as possible. Non of this we need to spend 3 years talking and 5 more years producing 5 a year more systems in 2050. We need to to keep military factories open 24/7 producing as much as possible ASAP. Putin is telling the world his plans yet our government just wants to chat about it but no action. If we dont act now and America pulls out of nato like trump wants too we'll be on our own to face a mass invasion
Context matters: Finland. Also, I'm not sure we should be worried about Turkish obstructionism unless they were to become friends of Russia. Even if they left NATO, they would still be at cross purposes with Russia.
Swedish person here. I don't know why I keep hearing this - that we have a strong miliatry and such. Our military was almost completly dismantled after the cold war! It was up until very recently only focused for to be able to assist during small international missions like that against the somali pirates. It wasn't even supposed to be able to defend the country as the chance of war was so distant. Its very small, and desperately under-equipped when it comes to essential stuff like boots and uniforms. The military might be high tech and good quality stuff, but under staffed and under equipped. It just started to be built up again after the new defense plan of 2015. But before that, there's this famous quote of a officer, a general I think, that said outright in TV that sweden only had the capability to defend one area of the nation for about 2 weeks. And regarding the cyber defense, OMG that HAS to be a joke! We're constantly under probing cyber attacks and it recently was published an article that said that 9 out of 10 governmental and munincipal authorities lacked even the basic cyber security knowledge. I hope that it's different in the actual defense sector but there are very often reports that make me doubt that. There's been a lot of ransom ware trouble that's crippled hospitals, grocery stores, banks, and even the Financial department recently.
That is why the countries are joined together. Of course it's a small army because of our small population but these men and women have powerful toys. Airplanes, tanks, submarines and weapons that have all been very succesful in wars and tests such as CV90, Archer, Carl Gustav, Submarines and 39 Gripen You can ask the ukrainians, americans, brazilians.. They all know that we have some of the best detection systems, software and hardware all over the world. Other countries have also lessen their military like UK. Make some more research in RU-vid videos. I also talked to one that worked in a secret army group in Sweden. He said that our army is very strong.
I don’t think individual members would be allowed to hamper NATO in action in a truly critical situation. It is clear that Russia is weak, far weaker than NATO, and would face quick, sure defeat in a war.
Fact check history. The Baltic states, regained their independence when the USSR broke up. They did not become new states, they became free. Like most of occupied eastern europe. Think of it like France which did not become a new country when Germany left France in WW2 or when Poland also regained their independence when the USSR broke up. The Baltic states were independent countries before USSR occupied them during WW2. Estonia, Latvia & Lithuania were in the League of Nations in 1921. Finland became an indepedent country in 1917, Germany only became a state in 1871. So around this time many European nations were founded. The Baltic nations were founded over 100yrs ago. So please recognise this. Context is important.
While Sweden is older than recorded history. What we celebrate as national day is just another king taking over as happened several times before and after that. But that king solidified our own letters åäö so there is something to celebrate. ;) You could argue Sweden in today’s shape has never been invaded. With exception for the “unsinkable aircraft carrier” Gotland and Skåne. But we have been controlled from Denmark during the days of the undemocratic Nordic union. :)
You forgot to mention what happened in 1808-1809, which is why this was the last time Sweden was at war. That was when Russia invaded Sweden and we lost our entire eastern half of our nation, i.e. Finland.
if saint petersburg which is very close to finland, and moscow falls, could russia really be a strong power anymore? if russias gets warsaw ,berlin ,helsinki and stockholm, nato would stilll be a strong power. and why ppl are getting concern about the suwalki galp? cant nato also retake it? russia needs to surround and capture 3 countries, while nato only have to surround and take kaliningrad
The thumbnail map is wrong. The bottom island called Bornholm is a part of Denmark and the top island called Åland is an autonomous part of Finland. Edit: However the center island called Gotland is a part of Sweden and is important in the defense against Russia.
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Batic countries declared independence in 1918. They where occupied countries after WW2, not just Soviet states. And in 1991 they restored full independence, not declared new.
Estonia and Latvia are facing a demographic time bomb and have a significant ethnic Russian population that need to be protected. They would be an ideal strategic fit for Russia.
Russia already started manipulating, there was a map where western Ukranie was given to Poland and Hungary would be getting some parts. Its probably tempting for Orban that dreams of maing hungary great again..
The Baltic Sea is NATO’s lake now and its an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that is enclosed by Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden, and the North and Central European Plain.
Two things. 1. I have never understood the talk about the Suwalki gap in an allout war scenario. If there is an allout war between NATO and russia, Kaliningrad will be the first thing to be flattened, why would NATO leave that russian military outpost with major area denial capabilities untouched, if there is already allout war? Flattening Kaliningrad would delay reinforcements, certainly, but after that, the Suwalki gap ceases to be an issue. 2. Article 5 of the NATO treaty (the one, that means that if one is attacked, all others must help) has nothing to do with consensus building. If it is invoked, then all NATO members decide themselves the extent of the military assistance. So russian lapdogs in Hungary may deny assistance, but they can't stop others from doing so.
The issue with Kaliningrad is that it is extremely likely Russia would be the aggressor in any war between NATO and Russia, so they get to choose when the fighting starts whilst NATO has to react and hope their precautions were enough. Something made dangerous because Russia is just as aware of how vulnerable and how useful Kaliningrad's position is so they have done the best they can to make it a modern day fortress. In simple terms? Russia will be the one that decides when tanks roll over borders, and the aggressor has a massive advantage in the opening hours of a war which is when Kaliningrad is both most vulnerable and more dangerous to it's neighbours. Sure, Kaliningrad's going to be under siege the moment NATO responds, but how possible is it that Russia has severely damaged or taken out the nearest garrisons in Poland and the Baltic States before a coordinated response happens? How likely is it that Russia has captured the Suwalki Gap and thus isolated the Baltic States on land from NATO and also secured a land corridor to their own (aligned) territory? Those are the questions that keep up war planners all night. Because if Russia can make either or *both* answers 'Yes', then NATO faces a much more painful time crushing Kaliningrad and rescuing the Baltic States. Of course, recent events have shown that Russia making either answer a 'Yes' is probably a lot less likely than it was before, but that's still only a 'probably not achievable'. Not a No.
@@SkyHawk2137 Whatever the confrontation will be, NATO will have air superiority in the area, especially now that both Sweden and Finland are in NATO. russia would have had a hard time even before losing a big part of their air defence capabilities in Ukraine, after that it's a foregone conclusion. And once air dominance has been established it will be quite difficult to defend Kaliningrad and the Suwalki gap. Those same Finnish and Swedish forces also make any naval operation impossible for russia in the Baltic Sea and will allow for air cover for the Baltic forces that will make things harder on land also. So as you see, things are quite a bit different than before the Ukraine invasion.
@@carthagonova4132 Some of the west may be hesitant, but I am absolutely certain that Finland will help us (I'm from Estonia and we have history of helping each other against the russians) and Sweden also. And that will put pressure on the hesitant ones to also help out.
Good to be in a defensive alliance who saved Europe from being attacked by former Yugoslavia and Libya, and helped the US to defend themselves in Iraq and Afghanistan. Strange though that Nato only do what the US tells them to do?🤣
I'd like to add my opinion on that "NATO's biggest weakness" as it's an unspoken rule that the USA runs the show, and there really isn't any unity in NATO, so when a state joins the alliance it expects to have a say, but the USA bullies them into submission which is not what a partner would do. On the other side, everyone expect the US to help them when a conflict happens..but the question in, would Sweden or Portugal or Montenegro send their troops to fight China if that conflict erupts, i'm not sure member states would have US's back.
Good objective video, but at 11:11 the map had a detail that you should maybe consider addressing, that is...kosovo is not in nato, yes but it is houses the biggest nato base "Camp Bondsteel" and is in fact a nato claimed territory. So you might mark it with blue diagonal lines.
Finland has a huge border with russia but also massive defence preparation. NATO gains airspace and base access to directly attack Russian strategic war production. Sweden helps close the Baltic which would happen anyway but Sweden also has a great near shore Anti Sub capability blocking easy access to Atlantic from Barents Sea. Turkey still gets attacked by Russia to secure the Mediterranean sea access but also to disrupt the Suez. Small but fast Russian ships and commandos attack Mediterranean ports to sap southern Europe political support for NATO while capital ships try to push US and French capital ships West of Italy or even out of the Med. NATO (US) aircraft redirected from Turkey defence to Sweden offence leaves Turkey feeling exposed. I suspect as well as the F16s the US got Greece to agree to never use F35s in Cyprus etc and maybe even to guarantee the greek F35s help defend Turkey. Probably threw in a US carrier fleet and Marine landing fleet to protect Dardenelles and bottle up Russia in the East of the black sea. Hungary just being trying to play both sides as they also jump to claim a chunk of Ukraine (Zakarpattia /Transcarpathia) if the Ukrainian government had failed.
it do worries me, then the video say that we in Sweden have a strong CyberForce compatibility,, well, we do not suck, but few years ago we had non in the military. and if we already are one of the best in Europe.. oh lord...
I'd call this analysis over complicated. If NATO gets into it with Russia....what is to prevent Finland from mining the Gulf of Finland? That would bottle up and end any naval operations by Russia instantly. And this upload completely ignores the fact that NATO would have complete and total aerial domination.
I would put my money on NATO. The United States has shown it can project power anywhere in the world. Russia and China has trouble projecting power outside their own borders
Crimea is incorrectly shown as part of Russia. At most, 5 countries (one being Russia) recognize this annexation. If you believe Russia will ultimately retain Crimea, why not include the other parts of Ukraine it wants to illegally annex? Either include all of what Russia illegally wants, or none of it.
It goes both ways. You reap what you've sown. If Hungary or Turkey ever got invaded by Russia or someone else and asked for help, the rest of the alliance might then have second thoughts. Should we help those who caused obstructions that helped the enemy? Should we send our people to perish for them? I think not.
I love the content, but I just have to give some critique: The narrator has a great voice but he speaks in a very blocky way and has a strong rising inflection that I find a little annoying. Everything he says sounds like a question to me?
I think this content is too alarmist. EU has significant issues with unanimity - but not NATO. Getting new members requires everyone to agree, because by agreeing they accept responsibility to defend them. But the actual response to an attack has no such limitations. Article 5 affects every country separately - one or two countries dragging their feet is these one or two countries dragging their feet. Certainly not ideal, but not something that would force the others to hold their response and convince the laggards. Things might get a bit trickier if, Idk, Latvia went mad and decided to not just withhold support for Estonia but prohibited NATO troops moving to help the latter on its land - that would be a problem for geographical reasons. But even then, it's a case of "Latvia suddenly turns out to not really be part of the alliance and NATO needs to go around it to get to Estonia", not "the alliance is paralysed until they convince Latvia to greenlight deploying NATO troops to Estonia".
I wonder is romania next to prop up their economy and thus military as they are decently sized country almost next to russia. Poland has done this process and seems well in process. The more the better we have in europe so there wont be weak link anywhere and manufacturing can support needs of NATO.
The problem isn't that it's grown too large and too diverse, it's simply that the concept of unanimity was always naive and silly. It's definitely a problem that needs to be fixed, so that bad faith autocrats serving as trojan horses can't undermine the alliance like they did here, for so long. Operate by majority, yes, unanimity, no.
You know, I'm glad the person who lives at the end of my street with "strategic control" of the corner store and the main road doesn't try to take over my neighborhood. Aren't people funny?
The Gripen deal was already agreed on though, but Hungary might have used that "deal" for domestic propaganda purposes when accepting Sweden into NATO.
Russia attacked Sweden during the Napoleon war while Sweden was at war with France But Russia was allied with France. They annexed Finland because the main Swedish armed forces was down in the south of Sweden
