Monday, November 24, 2014

Well, if I were Finland,

I'd be worried about Russia too.  Though if they think most of Europe would do any more for them than  they did for Ukraine, they're fools.

The worries aren't helped by this more recent history, either:
One of Russian President Vladimir Putin's closest ex-advisers has claimed that the ex-KGB agent ultimately wants to reclaim Finland for Russia.

Andrej Illiaronov, Putin's economic adviser between 2000 and 2005 and now senior member of the Cato Institute think tank, said that "parts of Georgia, Ukraine, Belarus, the Baltic States and Finland are states where Putin claims to have ownership."
...Illiaronov admits that Finland is not Putin's primary concern at present but, if not stopped in other areas of Eastern Europe, the issue will one day arise. Russian troops are currently massing on the eastern border of Ukraine, following Russia's recent annexation of Crimea.
Marja, keep safe

1 comment:

Marja said...

Hopefully they are just flexing their muscles. And no, I do not have any faith in EU if Russia does something more than flex muscles. The worrisome part is that Estonia and co were smart enough to join NATO the minute they could, which leaves the only countries here which Russia might attack relatively safely Finland and Sweden (NATO may not guarantee perfect safety, if USA has something like the leadership it has had during the last six years they might be screwed anyway, but it is hell of a lot better option than EU which would probably resort to stern words and finger waving). They'd get a lot of sea shore with Finland, could control most of the Baltic Sea area if they got also Sweden... and with Sweden they'd also have unrestricted access to the Atlantic, without having to worry about the possible choke point of the straits between Denmark and Sweden.

Damn right I am worried. Not panicky, if that country acts smart a war here might not be in their best interests, not even a short and easy one (I doubt we could give them the kind of resistance our grandfathers did during the Winter War now), but then Russia doesn't necessarily always act smart as a country.

And yep, we were damn idiots not to join NATO when we might have done it easily, right when Soviet Union fell. But it would have been impossible then, the general opinion of voters was very much against that option. Opinion mostly due to decades of propaganda by our press and other media, by schools, by universities, of the benefits of neutrality, how we would always be safest if we were neutral, how we had such a good relationship with Soviet Union and then Russia that of course they would never ever again be a threat - as long as we stayed neutral...

Those opinions seem to be shifting now. May be too late. Seems that some high officials in Russia have said that if either Sweden or Finland, or worse, both, were to get serious about joining NATO now it might mean third world war.

Nice.