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Comment by whimsicalism | Hacker News Reader

NATO is not just about Russia. To me, suggesting that Sweden is somehow more strategically important than Turkey is foreign policy illiterate.

Turkey brings a military ~30x the size of Sweden, they are actively involved in being a buffer for conflicts in the Middle East, and they have an advanced military manufacturing capability that they have used to supply Ukraine and others with military drones.

They also have substantial more recent conflict experience and partnerships with affiliates throughout MENA.

Even if NATO was about Russia, Turkey is a much more important buffer to Russian ambitions than Sweden is.

I'm not a particular fan of Turkey, but the only reason we would rather have Sweden over Turkey is due to "soft" cultural, christian, western centrism (calling things racism is taboo on HN so I will refrain).

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Yes but it's not just about military size, it's about cooperation. There's no point in having a military that's 30x the size of another one if they don't really cooperate with you.

> calling things racism is taboo on HN so I will refrain

In this case it's because it's just wrong. Sweden is by and large a peaceful, democratic, liberal democracy that has free markets and cooperates with NATO member states on a variety of areas. In other words, the interests and values are very closely aligned. The reason we would have Turkey "out" here is because of a misalignment of values - i.e. Turkey is (or would in this case) diverge from the shared interests of the majority of NATO members. I mean, to point this out from the start there's absolutely no reason for Turkey to object over Sweden joining NATO in the first place. The very act of that objection is a divergence from the rest of the group's shared values.

But this is also mostly a nothing-burger because Turkey's public messaging is different from its private messaging. Erdogan will get an internationally inconsequential bone for domestic audiences and will happily vote Sweden (and Finland) in to NATO.

NATO wouldn't do this without having all the members already in agreement with expansion. That's how things work at this level.

> there's absolutely no reason for Turkey to object over Sweden joining NATO in the first place

This is disingenuous. The YPG question is not "no reason" for Turkey. (I disagree about the reason, but it is still an actual concern for the Turkish government).

> if they don't really cooperate with you.

Turkey absolutely cooperated extensively with the US & NATO. Militarily, much more so than Sweden does.

> This is disingenuous. The YPG question is not "no reason" for Turkey. (I disagree about the reason, but it is still an actual concern for the Turkish government).

I don't view that as a valid reason to object to Sweden joining NATO. Maybe Turkey does, and maybe they won't be in NATO over it by the end of the year? There's 0 chance that Sweden and Finland don't join NATO, regardless of what Turkey publically claims.

> Turkey absolutely cooperated extensively with the US & NATO. Militarily, much more so than Sweden does.

Sure, and that cooperation is expected to continue. Ongoing partnerships have to like, keep going on right? Voting "no" to block Sweden and/or Finland from joining NATO would stop the ongoing partnership and end many elements of cooperation. Frankly, while Turkey is helpful militarily and strategically, the US can do anything in the world it needs to do with or without Turkey. But the one thing the US (and NATO) can't afford is serious dissension in the ranks, and that won't be tolerated regardless of the cost.

It's similar to me with the Taiwan thing. For some crazy reason people think that the US wouldn't go to war with China to defend Taiwan. For a while, people such as myself even were concerned about the Baltic states - then the US and UK moved thousands of troops there. These alliances and commitments are a big deal, especially when genuine strategic interests are at stake amongst nation states.

Of course Turkey cooperated more extensively with NATO, I mean it's part of NATO and Sweden is currently a neutral nation...

>Yes but it's not just about military size, it's about cooperation. There's no >point in having a military that's 30x the size of another one if they don't >really cooperate with you.

Well if it prevents them from cooperating with someone else it might still be worth it.

True - though I think I’m this case military power is less of an issue than diplomatic and political capital.

> NATO is not just about Russia.

Not only, but for the most part....It's about Russia.

> Turkey brings a military ~30x the size of Sweden

On the other hand Sweden and Finland at 2% GDP has a similar defense budget to Turkey. Money does not a military make, but "30x the size" is only counting manpower and not much else. Modern fighter aircraft is around a factor 2x rather than 30x, for example.

> a buffer for conflicts in the Middle East > advanced military manufacturing capability > partnerships with affiliates throughout MENA

These are all very important.

> "soft" cultural, christian, western centrism (calling things racism is taboo on HN so I will refrain).

It's perhaps easier to look at democracy and press-freedom indices then, to see why Turkey isn't like the others. Perhaps that's what you meant? The problem is that undemocratic/authoritarian states tend to be stable, until they suddenly aren't. NATO is supposed to be a partnership of democracies (It's a prerequisite for applying!) so it's safe to say that being not-a-democracy isn't popular once in the alliance either.

So sure, NATO is a defense mechanism for what some would call western (that is: secular, liberal, ...) democracy. That indeed does touch on culture and religion, but only superficially. Turkey has long been the champion of secularism in the area, and obviosuly everyone in NATO (and elsewhere) hopes that will remain the case, hence one is reluctant to push Turkey away too.

>Turkey has long been the champion of secularism in the area, and obviosuly everyone in NATO (and elsewhere) hopes that will remain the case, hence one is reluctant to push Turkey away too.

Exactly. With all the faults of current Turkish government, they are a mile ahead of everyone else in Middle East. The problem is the comparison: they were going forward with EU membership - their government just was way more sane in the past... And there's decent chance that Erdogan will be voted out in 2023.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_2023_T...

> there's decent chance that Erdogan will be voted out in 2023.

This isn’t irrelevant to what we are seeing now. He needs some good news/external foes/strongman aura these days.

They also occupy with 40000 soldiers one third of Cyprus, an EU country, thus essentially European territory.

And Greece stations troops in Cyprus as well after illegally invading them.

Enough of the lying propaganda. North Cyprus is by the accession treaties EU territory that the Republic of Cyprus cannot effectively control due to the illegally occupying Turkish troops. Much like the Russian controlled parts of Ukraine.

Numbers speak by themselves: 2000 troops in the South, 40000 troops in the occupied North.

Well isn't this comment completely disingenuous and devoid of context..

When they mutually recognize each others occupied lands as "sovereign states" the context would be pretty obvious. (Turkey to recognize the Russian backed separatists in Ukraine and Russia to recognize the Turkish backed separatists in North Cyprus).

Another point of context to you: Russia's narrative for the invasion of Ukraine is copied word by word from the Turkish invasion of Cyprus in 1974.

> Another point of context to you: Russia's narrative for the invasion of Ukraine is copied word by word from the Turkish invasion of Cyprus in 1974.

Super disingenuous considering that Greece was the initial country to invade and that multiple UN-brokered solutions to the problem have been supported by the Turkish side only to have been voted down by Greek cypriots. [0]

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annan_Plan

www.express.co.uk/news/politics/1617660/Boris-Johnson-Nato-expansion-Turkey-crisis-North-Cyprus-Sweden-update

Apparently, the Turks included the recognition of the occupied (by them) North Cyprus as one of the terms for agreeing to Sweden and Finland joining NATO.

Most people don't realize how important is the "size" of active military for any country.

Turkey is the 2nd most powerful military in NATO after USA. It has access to all modern weapons, manufacturing abilities and above all, centuries of experience in fighting, winning and losing WARS.

Turkey's location is very very important for all kind of military operations and trade via Black Sea.

They can also close the gates to the Mediterranean sea.

NATO is 95% about Russia. It actually probably wouldn't exist without Russia because it was starting to get a bit wobbly after the Trumpian regime attempted to dismantle it in the eyes of Americans. Now that we see it is 100% necessary given that Putin has gone of the rails I think it's stronger than it has been since the 70s

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