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26 thoughts on “Sweden will join NATO”

    1. aldoushickman

      Indeed!

      Success of course has a thousand fathers, but in this case we should probably thank Vladi, too. If not for him this would have never happened! Sweden should send him a nice bottle of aquavit as a thank-you, perhaps with a reassuring note saying "does not contain polonium."

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  2. TheMelancholyDonkey

    My guess is that Biden quietly promised them the F-16s that Turkey wanted. The whole business about the PKK and Sweden not taking terrorism seriously was always a smokescreen. Turkey just wanted to be readmitted to the club of receiving U.S. military hardware.

    1. HokieAnnie

      It was likely a mixture of carrots and sticks by Biden along with a lack of support from other NATO allies for their concerns. I think your theory is as good as any.

      1. cld

        I think they suddenly realized they were showing the world they could have their chain yanked every time some dingbat anywhere on Earth burned a Koran and realized they need to walk it back.

  3. Austin

    Maybe somebody gently told them “hey you already have most of the Alliance hating you, some because of how you treat your people, others because they’re racist/islamophobic, but all which are increasingly annoyed by your resistance to Sweden - if that faction gets enough votes, they could expel you from NATO.” Even Turkey doesn’t want to lose NATO protection.

  5. Anandakos

    My nickel is on "Edogan is no fool and realized that the best way to get cozy with Europe again was not to be a jerk on Sweden in NATO."

  6. jamesepowell

    Contrary to what we may hear on the cable shows or read in the NYT or WaPo, President Biden is very effective at foreign policy. We still have our differences with our allies, but he has everyone focused on what is most important.

    1. D_Ohrk_E1

      He's been very effective at nearly everything, honestly.

      The only things he hasn't squared away: Middle East and Africa. Thankfully, the gradual failure of Russia is starting to weigh heavily on the Middle East and Africa.

      1. KJK

        If that orange moron was still in the Oval Office, Putin's handpicked puppet would already be the president in Kyiv, NATO would be in tatters, and Russia would be eyeing up their next target.

        1. D_Ohrk_E1

          I honestly don't know what the outcome would be. He may have pulled the US out of NATO and then Putin rolled into Kyiv, unopposed except in words.

          But yeah, Ukraine would not likely remain Ukraine and after watching US sit on the sidelines, China may have launched a war against Taiwan.

  7. Altoid

    Word I've seen tonight is yes, Erdogan's been given assurances by Biden and relevant congressional leadership that there is a path for us to sell them new F-16s and upgrade the ones they have. Plus there are supposed to be some moves by the EU toward more economic alignment, though they're still far from membership; this will help with the close-to-desperate economic situation. The Koran-burning angle was transparently always for consumption by his largely traditionalist support base.

    Biden is a canny fella, plays a long game at home as well as abroad-- long enough that some of his domestic allies can get worried.

  8. onemerlin

    I am hearing from folks in the Baltics that this is due to Turkey’s desire to join the EU. Erdogan is trying to play nice with EU members to get into the club.

    2. irtnogg

      Well, they have been trying to join the EU for more than 50 years -- since before it was even known as the EU!

  9. ruralhobo

    Erdogan is not known for sudden changes of heart or for giving in under oh so gentle pressure, so something happened. And we'll probably never know what. But since unexpected things tend to come from the Kremlin, my guess is that a phone call went wrong or something. I always had the feeling Turkey's holdout on Sweden was to make the country a credible broker in Russia v Ukraine. Which, when it comes to food, it did very well, saving countless lives. So here's my hope: that Erdogan, by allowing Sweden into NATO, isn't giving up hope on the grain deal.

  10. lancc

    However you slice it, we've gone from a US relationship with Ukraine that involved Trump trying to extort political favors out of them for the minimal amount of arms, and antagonizing most of our allies. Now we seem to be gaining the leadership over NATO that we used to have, and The Atlantic Alliance has taken on a new seriousness. Whether Biden set out. to take Russia down to vassal status, that is the endpoint that his leadership is pointing at, in the sense that Russian aggression against the countries on its western borders will be next to impossible in the post-Ukraine War era. With Sweden and Ukraine both coming into NATO in the foreseeable future, the length of the border between Russia and Europe will be almost entirely NATO countries.

    Russia could begin to think about NATO being essentially a defensive alliance, and negotiate with NATO as a whole over demonstrable force reductions along the borders.

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  13. Pittsburgh Mike

    My bet is that Erdogan wants to get closer to the EU, ad he realized pissing off NATO members in the EU by acting like a child wasn't likely in his best interests.

    Maybe at one time he thought it would be good to get some brownie points with Putin if he could do so without becoming the enemy of the EU. But it's increasingly clear that no matter what happens in Ukraine, Russia is in a steep decline, and won't be getting better any time soon.

    We're so used to Republicans doing self-destructive things that we forget that many successful politicians *don't* actually crap in their own nests.

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