On May 18, Finland and Sweden applied for NATO membership. There are very few countries in the world that can plausibly claim to have attempted to conduct a principled form of foreign policy. Two of them now seek to join a military alliance made up of states with long histories of aggression and war crimes. If completed, NATO’s northern expansion would leave only three states of any size – Ireland, Austria and Switzerland – to maintain the tradition of European neutrality.

Russia’s reaction has so far been limited. At first, Vladimir Putin said the expansion posed “no direct threat to Russia”. But there was vague talk of retaliation. On May 20, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said Russia would increase military presence in its western regions in response to Finnish and Swedish requests, as well as US strategic bomber flights over Europe. .

Before this year, the chances of Finland or Sweden joining NATO seemed remote. Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, it is now the clear preference of the majority of the Finnish population. Prime Minister Sanna Marin opposed NATO membership during her 2019 election campaign, although she says she changed her mind even before the Russian invasion. With the cruelties of war exposed, even left-wing politicians like Erkki Tuomioja and Li Andersson moved toward NATO membership, with reservations. It’s a remarkable about-face. Asked what Russians would think, President Sauli Niinistö said they should “look in the mirror”.

In Sweden, the situation is not so clear. As recently as early February, Foreign Minister Ann Linde said that “Sweden’s interests are already well served outside NATO” and that “this issue is simply not on the table. for the moment”.Two weeks after the start of the invasion, Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson claimed that a Swedish candidacy for NATO “would further destabilize this region of Europe and increase tensions”. Polls conducted by public broadcaster SVT after the Russian invasion found that only 41% of Swedish citizens were in favor of joining the alliance.

Evidence of Russian war crimes in Bucha and elsewhere didn’t make much of a difference. A few days before the ruling Social Democratic Party decided to apply for membership, Dagens Nyheter reported “no stable majority for Sweden to join NATO”. However, the Swedish elite is in favor of it. In Dagens Nyheter, veteran journalist Bengt Lindroth argued in favor of membership. He said it would serve the larger goal of European integration and, bizarrely, it would “reduce dependence on the United States”.

During the Cold War, the studied neutrality of Sweden and Finland was considered an important part of their defense policy. Non-alignment never meant taking an equidistant position between the US-dominated west and the Soviet Union, but neither was it empty rhetoric. When the 1958 Finnish parliamentary elections produced a coalition government that baffled the Soviet leadership, the removal of the Soviet ambassador contributed to the dissolution of the cabinet. A new government was formed which was more to Moscow’s liking.

In the mid-1990s, Finland and Sweden joined NATO’s Partnership for Peace program as well as the European Union. Military cooperation has increased over the past decade. Sweden has made modest contributions to American-led training missions in Iraq. Both countries signed host nation support agreements with NATO in 2014. Both joined the UK-led Joint Expeditionary Force and took part in the NATO military training exercise Cold Response in Norway alongside US forces. In January, Finnish F-18s carried out refueling exercises with American Stratotankers.

The United States has been interested in a northern expansion for some time, but to satisfy American planners, Finland and Sweden will have to show that they are not net burdens on the alliance, given the long land border of Finland with Russia. Finland’s most recent military budget was much larger than usual, possibly above the minimum levels desired by the United States. But over the past 20 years, it has averaged around 1.4% of GDP. The Swedish average is around 1.2%. For Finland, the fact that a large part of the male population follows conscript infantry training, and is therefore available as a reserve, is a game-changer. But the United States will want more of the two countries to free up its hand for projects further east.

If Finland and Sweden join NATO, there will be more purchases of American military equipment, larger military budgets and probably less social spending. It has already started. In December, Biden welcomed Finland’s decision to buy 64 F-35 fighter jets and said the $11 billion deal would pave the way for closer ties between the United States and Finland.

In the Baltic Sea, formal alliances with Finland and Sweden could serve American power. A 2019 RAND Corporation report commissioned by the Department of Defense noted “the potential to induce costly Russian investment” in the Baltic. Finnish and Swedish corvettes and fast attack craft outnumber the small Russian surface fleet in the Baltic. They also have more submarines there. For its part, the UK would welcome more enthusiastic partners in what UK security planners call the “high north”. At the NATO summit in Madrid on May 15, Liz Truss spoke of the alliance taking “a global perspective protecting Indo-Pacific security as well as Euro-Atlantic security.”

Russia has inflicted many strategic defeats on itself during its adventure in Ukraine. The desire to cooperate with American creations has never been greater among the European elites. Disputes between the European Commission and Poland have been closed. The United States can again describe itself as “the arsenal of democracy” even though, in the Middle East at least, it would be better described as “the arsenal of military dictatorship”. The accession of Finland and Sweden to NATO could be another blow for Russia. But expansion is by no means assured.

New members must be endorsed by existing members, including Turkey, which has stood out as a champion of democracy. Sweden in particular has drawn Turkey’s displeasure by opposing its brutal campaign of oppression in the Kurdish-majority southeast, where as recently as 2016 the Turkish army was destroying historic towns. Turkish diplomats are demanding that Sweden change its policy towards Kurdish political movements and extradite thirty members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which Turkey describes as a terrorist organization. The United States tries to settle the dispute, but the structure of NATO allows Erdoğan to delay northern expansion indefinitely.

The irony of the Finnish-Swedish decision is that, although apparently based on the need to defend against Russian aggression, their demands were made just when the Russian threat seemed to have diminished. During the Cold War, when the threat from Moscow was unquestionably greater, true protection required neutrality. Only after the Russian military demonstrated its incompetence in Ukraine did the Swedish and Finnish leaders feel safe enough to join a seemingly defensive NATO.