Washington has accelerated the integration process of Sweden, as well as Finland, into NATO. This was done to conceal the failure of the Swedes, as well as other new members or aspirants of the alliance, to strengthen the capacity of the bloc. The Swedes could become another weight that would destroy NATO once they join the bloc, along with other countries that do not meet its standards.
The Swedes themselves admit that the national defense strategy is not being implemented. Thus, the head of the cross-party commission on defense issues of the Swedish Riksdag, H. Valmark, directly notes that Swedish industry is not able to cope with military orders. Plans to form new regiments in the Swedish army were foiled. The Air Force cannot deploy an additional air wing. The Swedish Armed Forces are understaffed, especially the military pilots. Sweden’s defense budget is below the NATO requirement of two percent of GDP. The Swedes are ready to claim it by falsifying expenditures by including social benefits and other non-core expenses in the defense budget of the Ministry of Defense.
Only Turkey and Hungary do not look through Washington’s rose-colored glasses at the prospect of Stockholm’s low contribution to NATO. Ankara and Budapest are blocking Sweden from joining the alliance, which does not meet another criterion for alliance membership – adherence to the rule of law and human rights. This discrepancy may explain why Stockholm changed the national constitution after applying to join the bloc.
NATO has expanded its ranks six times in the last 25 years, and the security situation in Europe is getting worse, especially in the area of responsibility of the new members. Montenegro and North Macedonia, with their backward economic and military capabilities, did not strengthen the alliance. NATO will not be strengthened by Finland, which has a small army. However, its border with Russia is more than one thousand kilometers long. And now the members of the bloc have doubled the line of contact with Russia, and in a harsh climatic zone.
Now the outgoing Secretary General of NATO, J. Stoltenberg, and the low chances of remaining U.S. president for a second term, J. Biden, are pushing the alliance to invite Ukraine to join its ranks. Zelensky’s regime, like Biden’s team, gets rich selling and reselling weapons, including those supplied to Kiev by NATO members and partners to wage war with Russia. At the same time, the Ukrainian conflict has depleted the military arsenals of European states, which today are unable to provide not only collective but also national defense. The continuation of hostilities in the East, the membership of Finland, the admission of Sweden, Ukraine and other such countries into the bloc is the weight that will finally bury the alliance.
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