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0 pointsguappa1y ago0 comments

> impress upon your countrymen to stay away from NATO

Well well well… the request to join NATO was done just a few months BEFORE the election, after several changes of government since the previous elections.

People in power specifically didn't want the people's opinion about that one.

But just to be on the safe side, they also did a lot of mediatic fear mongering about russia invading sweden very soon™, which is ludicrous if you look at a map and see that there's a sea in between.

Anyway in sweden the ruling class had wanted to join NATO for at least 10 years, if not more. But the people would have not liked severe welfare cuts to buy expensive bombs. However the invasion of ukraine provided the perfect excuse.

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mopsi1y ago

> But just to be on the safe side, they also did a lot of mediatic fear mongering about russia invading sweden very soon™, which is ludicrous if you look at a map and see that there's a sea in between.

Perhaps you need a better map. Gotland is a prime target for Russians. Establishing air defense batteries on Gotland, along with capturing the Suwalki gap between Poland and Lithuania, are two key steps of invading the Baltics. Suwalki cuts the land supply route and Gotland the air and sea routes.

To prevent liberation of Gotland and keep Swedish armed forces busy, they would then terrorize the remaining parts of Sweden with drones and missile attacks on cities the same way they do in Ukraine. Even Sweden isn't rich enough to buy enough air defense systems for that, hence the need for NATO to get access to pooled resources.

It's a simple calculus.

guappaOP1y ago

> It's a simple calculus.

It's wrong. But it's certainly very simple :)

You forgot about how an invasion force is supposed to swim across the baltic.

After all, Russia can't move a huge fleet in there, because access is between sweden and denmark. So they'd have to use whatever they already have in there.

And sea invasions are more complicated than land invasions.

mopsi1y ago

Swim, sea invasion, huge fleet - why? It's the Swedes who would need to do swimming after Russians airdropped VDV onto Gotland in a surprise attack like they did in Hostomel, secured Visby airport, and started landing heavy equipment with Il-76 transports. Russian operation at securing Hostomel airport outside of Kyiv failed because the nearby Ukrainian forces immediately counterattacked. Until recently, Sweden had no military presence on Gotland and the island was entirely undefended.

The only wrong thing here is the idea that the invasion of Gotland would have to look like Normandy landings.

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mopsi1y ago

It's a simple calculus.

guappaOP1y ago

> It's a simple calculus.

It's wrong. But it's certainly very simple :)

You forgot about how an invasion force is supposed to swim across the baltic.

After all, Russia can't move a huge fleet in there, because access is between sweden and denmark. So they'd have to use whatever they already have in there.

And sea invasions are more complicated than land invasions.

mopsi1y ago

The only wrong thing here is the idea that the invasion of Gotland would have to look like Normandy landings.

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse