News Release

NATO’s Sweden and Finland Campaign

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Reuters reports: “NATO chief says ‘time is now’ for Turkey to ratify Finland and Sweden membership bids.” The Munich Security Conference starts Friday and goes through Sunday. Officials attending include U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

JAN OBERG, tff@transnational.org, @janoberg
Co-founder of the Swedish-based Transnational Foundation for Peace and Future ResearchOberg has done extensive work on NATO and the roots of conflict. In his latest piece, he writes: “The Munich Security Conference is the main European hawk forum – historically growing out of von Kleist’s Wehrkunde concerns – for everyone believing in more weapons, armament and confrontation as synonymous with peace and freedom.”

In his widely cited article “It is foolish for Finland and Sweden to join NATO and ignore both the real causes and consequences,” he wrote: “NATO’s expansion policy created — and is responsible for – the conflict. Russia created — and is responsible for — the war. There exists no violence which is not rooted in underlying conflicts. …

“And if they want peace, they do not increase the symptoms — the war — they address the real cause, the conflict and ask the conflicting parties to tell what they fear and what they want and then move, step-by-step towards a sustainable solution.

“But neither the mainstream media nor politicians have the civil courage to address the conflict. It’s only about the war and only about Russia/Putin who must be punished, no matter the price to be paid by future generations. If we survive. …

• “Both have been under heavy pressure by NATO and the U.S. in particular. Sweden’s prime minister, Olof Palme, was murdered [in 1986] — a man who stood for the UN goal of international disarmament, nuclear abolition and the intelligent concept of common security. U.S. ambassadors have held secret meetings with Swedish MPs, there are many channels, demands and rewards. …”

• “Both countries have moved to be wooed by the U.S. and NATO. They have, over the last 20 years, become engaged with NATO in all kinds of ways — so, as the saying goes, why not marry now? In other words, Finland and Sweden now join because they have — incrementally — made one wrong decision after the other, painted themselves into a ‘no-choice-but-NATO’ corner and abdicated every ounce of their historical, independent-minded creative foreign policy thinking. And stopped criticism of warfare and militarism.”

See TFF’s extensive catalogue: “Abolish NATO Or Convert It To Serve Peace.”