The victory of the center-right opposition in Finland’s election will mean that prime minister Sanna Marin of the center-left SDP has lost her job. Marin deserves credit for steering Finland into NATO, something that perhaps only someone on her side of the aisle could have managed. But, with Turkey finally having given its approval, Finland’s NATO membership is now imminent. The election won’t change that. That’s good news. Finland will likely prove a useful addition to the defense of the alliance’s northeastern flank. Moreover, with Finland as a member, and Sweden as something close to it, the Baltic states will look much less like the exposed NATO “peninsula” that they have been.
Noah Rothman gave some background to Finland’s joining NATO here. And lest anyone have any doubt, NATO’s agreement to accept Finland as a member is not an act of charity. The country has already passed the NATO target that defense spending should exceed 2 percent of GDP.
Meanwhile, via the Wall Street Journal:
We’ve likely seen no comparable boost to the strength of Western security since West Germany joined the alliance in 1955. For starters, Finnish membership in NATO represents a major political victory in the strategic competition with Moscow. It’ll be hard for even the Russian propaganda machine to twist this into a win.
From a more practical perspective, NATO hasn’t gained such a militarily capable member since Spain joined in 1982. Although Finland has a relatively small active-duty force of roughly 30,000 troops, it’s backed up by a large reserve of citizen-soldiers. Every young Finnish man is required to perform military service. When fully mobilized, Finland can field a force of 280,000 with some of the most advanced artillery and tanks in the world.
Finland is far more strategically important than Spain vis-à-vis the threat from Russia. The new NATO member shares an 830-mile border with Russia that complicates any potential Russian aggression elsewhere in northeastern Europe. NATO members Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania have long feared a swift Russian fait accompli attack. Before Finland joined, such an attack would have forced NATO to try to push military forces through the narrow Suwalki corridor separating Poland from the three Baltic states to eject Russian invaders. Now, Moscow must reckon with the prospect of NATO forces countering through Finland as well. In this way, Finland’s membership dramatically bolsters deterrence in Europe, making it clear to Moscow that any aggression directed against the Baltics is unlikely to succeed.
Admittedly, another implication of Finland’s lengthy border with Russia is that the alliance must now plan to defend it. But that effort is made easier by the Finns’ having already done so for decades.
Indeed they have. Years ago, I spoke to a senior politician on the Finnish populist right. When the conversation turned to NATO membership, one of the reasons he gave for not being convinced that this was a good idea was that it might discourage Finns from doing what it took to defend themselves. Given Finland’s experience between 1939-44, it’s not difficult to see where he was coming from. Anyone who thinks that those years have been forgotten should visit the national war museum in Helsinki.
At the time of this writing, the next prime minister seemed set to be Petteri Orpo, leader of the center-right (I’d emphasize the center in that definition) National Coalition Party (Kokoomus), the party that topped the polls. Kokoomus has edged out the national-populist Finns Party, which in turn edged out the SDP. The SDP saw its tally of seats increase, but others on the left, including the Greens and the (hard) Left Alliance (both of which had been in Marin’s coalition) lost ground, as did another Marin ally, the Center Party.
Much of the election was fought on economic issues. The Daily Telegraph has more:
Finland’s debt-to-GDP ratio has risen from 64 per cent in 2019 to 73 per cent, which [Orpo’s] National Coalition wants to address by cutting spending by six billion euros.
Finland is not the United States.
Meanwhile, amid cheers of “Finland! Finland!”, the 45-year-old head of the anti-immigration Finns Party, Riikka Purra, thanked her supporters for the party’s “best election result ever”.
The party, which first served in government in 2015, has seen its support surge since last summer with the cost of living crisis following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Purra even managed to secure the highest number of direct votes in the election, with her 38,000 beating out the 35,000 cast for Marin, whom polls have ranked as Finland’s most popular prime minister this century.
The eurosceptic Finns Party, which appeals overwhelmingly to male voters, wants a hard line on immigration.
Purra alleges that recent arrivals are behind a rise in street gangs and has pointed to neighbouring Sweden as a cautionary tale.
The Finns Party sees “Fixit” — an exit from the European Union – as a long-term goal and wants to postpone Finland’s target of carbon neutrality for 2035.
It should be said that Finnish voters are not the only voters in the region to see the disaster in Sweden as a warning.
So far as “Fixit” is concerned, Finland’s membership of NATO makes departing the Brussels imperium, however theoretically, a little more likely than in the past. One of the reasons that Finland joined the EU was to align itself more closely with the West. At a time when NATO membership was seen as unattainable, the EU was another way of achieving that end. That said, I wouldn’t expect Fixit now, or ever. However, it’s not entirely impossible that Finland might one day quit the euro (a currency that the Swedes were wise enough to reject in a referendum in 2003). If the euro-zone ever ran into serious enough trouble again, Finland would be an obvious candidate for a “Northern” Euro — but that’s a topic for another time.