Comments by "Nattygsbord" (@nattygsbord) on "How Sweden is Becoming Russia's Worst Nightmare" video.

  1. Sweden did suggest that Finland, Norway and Denmark would join them in a nordic military alliance. But Norway did shot down the idea and joined Nato instead. Finland was afraid to anger russia by breaking their peace-treaty with russia that said that Finland should never again join a military alliance. And little Denmark which is a continental power have always felt a bit closer to Nato and the EU than the other nordic countries, and for that reason have it also been less interested and loyal to the pan-scandinavian idea. Neutrality has been a great thing for Sweden. Joining the 2 world wars had almost no upsides for Sweden and many downsides. It had made no difference to the outcome of the war regardless which side Sweden would have joined, because Sweden was a poor country back then with a small population and a small economy and an outdated military. By staying neutral did we probably do out nordic neighbours a favor. Finlands war refugees could flee to Sweden, Denmarks jews fled to Sweden from a certain death in Hitlers death camps. And Norways political opponents of the nazi regime could save their own life by fleeing to Sweden. This is a history we should be proud of. We should be proud of not being a warmonger nation. And Swedens long tradition of neutrality did also exist back in the 1700s and 1600s. Our country became rich by foreign ships from France, England and the Netherlands came to Sweden and paid money to get the right to call themselves a Swedish ship and carry a Swedish flag. And since Sweden was the strongest super power of Northern Europe did no one dare to attack Swedish trading ships without provocation, as that would bring one of the most powerful navies in the world against them. Thanks to the many wars between England, Holland and France could the Swedish merchant navy expand from maybe 300 ships to long over a thousand, and become one of the largest in Europe. This helped Sweden get richer and more powerful. The age of liberty (1719-1721) is also known as a period of peace and neutrality. That claim is a bit unfair because it is not that true, as Sweden did start 2 wars during that time period against russia and prussia. And later on also under King Gustav III. However despite corruption and mismanagement of the country by greedy nobles, was this also a time period with some nice golden glimses. Sweden did create some fantastic art pieces, like the sculptures of Tobias Sergel. Sweden did also buy many famous art pieces from around Europe, before it was cool to do so. Which have led the situation we have today when many of the worlds most famous paintings can be found in Sweden like paintings from Rembrandt, Van Gogh, and portraits of Martin Luther. So have neutrality served Sweden well? - Absolutly. And we should be proud of our long history of peace. Other countries should learn from us, and not the other way around. Those who say that EU is a peace project, should just sit down and shut up and learn from Sweden instead as we got a hundred more years of experience with peace than what continental Europe do. And joining Nato is nothing that I got strong feelings about. I just wish it was done in a democratic way. But we must learn from our own history that we must never leave our military weak and think that we could get away with it because we join a military alliance, so we do not have to tax rich people. We tried that in the late 1600s and it failed, when our alliance with the no1 Super power in the world France dragged Sweden into pointless wars that France had started, and the Scanian war was a disaster for Swedens economy when half of our battle fleet was sunk in battle and the other half sailed home and was sunk in a storm. And then was Swedens reputation of invincibiliaty as Europes best army destroyed when Sweden lost the battle of Fehrbellin in 1675. So we must never repeat the same mistake again. We must never again make ourselves dependent on USA or any other country like we was to France back in the late 1600s. We must never let our military become weak and unprepared for war and hope someone will save us and do all the fighting for us. And we must never let tax cuts for the rich go before national defence and leave our military weak and our country dependent on military alliances with foreign powers.
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  2.  @TheKyosanim62  One dilemma for a Nordic alliance would the choice of focus. Denmark-Norway would rather send warships to protect the north sea, while Finland and Sweden would rather see a defence towards the east, as russia might wanna invade Finland with a land invasion (and then invade Sweden afterwards). Or just launch an airborne and amphibious invasion on Sweden. The last remains of the Danish empire that are Greenland and the Faroe islands are poor countries without large populations and economic resources. They wish they had economic resources so they could be independent - but since they don't, they have to live under Danish rule. Sometimes they wanna invite foreign investors from USA, China and elsewhere to have a card to play out against Denmark to show that they other options than Denmark. But Denmark wishes to keep those provinces even if it means an economic loss for the tax payers in Denmark. And the reason is that those areas are bargaining chips that makes little Denmark strategically interesting for world powers. For USA was it for example interesting to locate planes that could drop nuclear bombs on russia on Greenland as it is the shortest way towards russia. And under Greenland lay large deposits of natural resouces that are economically valuable. And with Greenland also comes a sea zone where there of course also lay economic resources at the bottom of the sea that many large companies wish to exploit. So for those reason do Denmark become valuable as a partner to USA, Nato and the EU in the geostrategic room.
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