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Comment by ricardobayes | Hacker News Reader

Next up is Finland. Also not a NATO member.

I believe Finland has a compulsory conscription system for all males over 18:

https://puolustusvoimat.fi/en/finnish-conscription-system

Therefore I do not think Finland would be a walk-over for the Russians...not to mention what happened last time Russia fought Finland:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_War

You can't really compare skis and rifles to modern military.

Yes I can. A "modern military" isn't a guaranteed victory if your enemy is fighting in it's own turf in difficult terrain. The best armies in the world have failed to do this in Afghanistan (several times now).

Stalin also gutted the Soviet Army and Navy via The Purges before the Winter War, and the Army had attempted to impliment a lot of "New Soviet Man" style of changes that were detrimental.

The modern Russian army has experience in several different theaters, has experienced and professional leadership, and rocks a small but highly modernized kit backed by copious amounts of older Soviet-era gear.

The Ukranians just got slammed with huge cruse missile attacks -- how will the Fins neutralize that with conscripts carrying skis and rifles?

I respect their bravery, but boldness doesn't stop JDAMs -- they need NATO.

But also a country with a history of coming to terms with the USSR, and notably one that didn't receive a NATO membership invitation guarantee (working of Wikipedia). Ukraine and Georgia did, both also want to join NATO. Finland has no such plans (again, working of Wikipedia).

Having just watched the Finnish president and prime minister address the situation, the press' pressing questions about joining NATO were continually downplayed, as is customary.

Finland is almost militantly neutral, since that was the original condition to independence in the first place. On the other hand, Russia just voided the Minsk agreement with Ukraine to attack, so...

Imagine being Russia's border neighbor, man. It's seriously stressful.

But if any country is prepared for russian invasion, it's Finland.

Being a border nation with Russia now, without a staunch pro-Russian government, is pretty scary right now. Even if you are a NATO member, because I don't trust NATO to go to war with Russia.

Why do you think Russia would attack NATO member? War has its own costs, Russia probably has some calculation. I don't think we will see any combat from Russian sides, at least on NATO member.

At least Finland doesn't, to my knowledge, have a meaningful amount of Russian population to "liberate". Compared to countries that used to be soviet republics, I'd say they are relatively safe.

> Finland is almost militantly neutral, since that was the original condition to independence in the first place.

Finland a long time ago voided/broke the Paris peace treaty on their own. Basically once the Germany unified in 1990 Finland went "nope we don't like this peace treaty anymore".

If Finland was still following the treaty we would not be allowed to have aircraft that can deploy bombs, mere than 60 planes (including civilian airfact registered to Finland), more than 34k total infantry+border guard, 10k tons total displacement of navy, no sea mines or torpedoes. Finland has gone way past these since.

The only part of the Paris peace treaty we still follow is the no nukes part and that due to signing a separate treaty about not getting nukes in the 70s.

Why would Finland be the next? Because someone wants to scare them to join NATO?

Finland was already able to resist Russian aggression once not so long ago (by European standards), and Russia paid a dire price for attacking in man life. Later, Finland also paid its toll, but in territory.

Both sides learned their lesson. Finland is not going to provoke Russia, and Russia is not going to attach again without reason.

Finland is in the EU - a much stronger alliance than NATO

I disagree, the EU doesn't have an army. So if Finland is invaded they can send their "thoughts and prayers in these difficult times".

Also agree. It's also an alliance mostly built on trade and laws, with some intelligence thrown in if the parties feel like it. The EU has stayed away from military allegiance.

Germany and France have much better reason to actually defend Finland. The Euro.

Basically if a Euro country gets invaded and the other countries do nothing that crashes the value of the Euro which would destroy the economies of the other Euro countries. And the non-Euro EU countries have a good reason to follow the same logic as Euro crashing would also destroy their economies.

I wonder if as a side-effect this current situation will make the EU federalization process faster.

Doesn't the EU have a mutual defense treaty as strong as NATO? That was my understanding. They'd be obligated to help militarily.

TIL, Apparently yes: Article 42.7 of the Lisbon Treaty. Obvious in retrospect.

but so far with no military. That might change in the future though, after brexit and this.

The EU itself has no military but its member states do and are obligated to help if a member is invaded

"If a Member State is the victim of armed aggression on its territory, the other Member States shall have towards it an obligation of aid and assistance by all the means in their power"

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