Sweden officially joins NATO

- I blame the fact they built all these institutions with no clause to expel members, or which require total unanimity to do so. They really bought in to the whole "end of history" thing, I guess.
  
  Yeah, this is an interesting element. Historically, allowing all members a veto, while also having no way to expel a member, means that any such institution is liable to outside meddling. The classic example is the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberum_veto -- in the Polish Lithuanian Commonwealth, any noble could veto anything. So all it took was buying a few nobles and it shattered.
- We (the western world) really needs to deal with Orban eventually.
  Incredible display of chauvinism. Cause it's worked out so well every other time you westoids have stepped in to decide another countries leadership for them. Stfu and stay home before you collapse yet another nation and start the slave trade there.
- That is an L take. Having a term limit helps increase the difficulty of making political dynasties. It doesn't make it impossible, but it sure is gonna make it harder for a certain person or group to solidify their power base.
  
  Not really, the difference between two people of the same ideology to fulfill your democratic needs whom one can find in a population of a few million can be very small.

Rad
- Russia uses RadAway
  
  It fails.

the little "world tension" meter in HOI4 just went up by like 3%
- I think Sweden just lost a bunch of tension

Do you know why NATO annexed Sweden?
- startrek website continuing to be the highest quality instance
  
  Everyone's doing a big ehhhhh on that.

NATO still trying to finish what the nazis started.

It was a de facto member as long as NATO existed. Now it also is a de jure member too, a big nothing-burger.
- NATO membership comes with guarantees and responsibilities.
  The guarantee is that if Sweden would be attacked, other members will support with their troops. The responsibility is that Sweden must expand their military.
  
  The former won't happen. Sweden is sorrounded by friendly countries. The second is a downside for Sweden.
  So globally it is a nothing burger and locally it is a negative development for Sweden.
  
  The guarantee is that if Sweden would be attacked, other members will support with their troops.
  Allied guarantees are not something to rely on really. The de-facto participation was something more honest for expectations IMHO.
  The responsibility is that Sweden must expand their military.
  I don't think that's a problem for them, they never turned it into some bureaucratized rudimentary institution in the first place and they had a nice military during the Cold War.

Thanks ~~Obama~~ Putin!
- Reignited the West's arms industry as well! We had gotten complacent until Putin started the largest war in Europe since WWII.

Guys will see this and say "hell yea"
- hell yea

I don't like the expansion of NATO, but due to Russia's recent imperialism, Sweden's and Finland's reactions are completely reasonable. A much healthier alternative would have been actually advancing towards an integrated European defense system involving EU members, with a door open to certain neighbours such as Norway, but it's pretty hard to do that when the political groups that could actually promote that alternative are schizophrenically tolerating positions such as "I'm a pacifist, so I'm advocating for my own country's disarmament despite my neighbours starting wars very recently" and "if Ukraine didn't want to get invaded, they shouldn't have sought guarantees against Russian aggression from third countries".
- I think Europeans in general psychologically still feel themselves weak without NATO, unable to fill the needs of their own defense.
  I've been reading about 1st Indochina war yesterday, so - emotionally biased.
  
  EU's population: 448 million
  EU GDP: 19 trillion dollars
  Russia's population: 143 million
  Russia's GDP: 1,78 trillion dollars
  Simplifying a bit here (I'm obviously taking Morocco and Belarus for granted, assuming that Turkey wouldn't attack Greece, and so on), but it's pretty much a "gotta get our shit together" situation, because there's no reason why we should depend on the US for defense, or anything else.
- but due to Russia’s recent imperialism, Sweden’s and Finland’s reactions are completely reasonable.
  that is, it was not NATO that staged two coups in Ukraine, put its puppet government there and began to push the country into NATO, build bases and create threats to Russia's security, but this Russia, for no reason, attacked poor Ukraine, which did not exist at all not so long ago, and it was part of Russia
  
  Lol

Fuck the tankies in here and praise UN and Sweden.

Russia locked out of the Balkan Sea now?
- They have Kaliningrad.
  
  Kaliningrad's fairly strategically useless to them now that every surrounding country's NATO though. The Suwałki Gap between Kaliningrad and Belarus used to be pivotal in potentially re-taking control of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. It would have been very difficult for NATO defend them if Russia took the gap. But now those countries are protected by NATO countries all around so Kaliningrad's a lot less useful strategically. Not to mention that there's a strong Kaliningrad independence movement so they're struggling to control it internally as well.
  More here.
- The Balkan wars were tough on Sweden, being so geographically close to the conflict.
  
  NATO coming for the Baltic peninsula next
- Close enough man, close enough

Huzzah! Welcome to the team, Sweden. We can all be self defense buddies together! =D

What a lousy website they have...
- It's the primary source, but I do agree...

depositing its instrument of accession
Sounds like a sov.cit.

Irasshaimase~ er, welcome! This isn't really that big of news imo, they were pretty much already a member kinda.

Its so funny to me that it takes Sweden like a week to become an official NATO member but Ukraine is still getting lead on.
- Countries in active conflicts cannot join NATO
- it takes Sweden like a week
  They are member in all but a name for 30 years.

Took long enough. Glad to have them finally.

I hate China

You used to be cool, Sweden
- When was that exactly?
  
  Back in the day, there used to be Swedish politicians worth assassinating. That's gotta count for something
- Yeah, during the 30 years war. After Gustavus Adolphus went the way of the Dodo, Sweden sucked.
- Now they're really fucking cool!

A new member of the US foreign policy enforcement gang. Who's next?
- Ah yes the US foreign policy of "not being invaded by Russia"
  
  Dunno, is it really US foreign policy if it's not bipartisan
  
  Russia can't even conquer a quarter of Ukraine. No chance they're going to invade Sweden, a country they don't even share a border with. Is Canada afraid of being invaded by Russia? Is France? Is the UK?