Finnish Ambassador Klaus Korhonen, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg and Swedish Ambassador Axel Wernhoff submitting their respective country's application to NATO (Finland at NATO). Source: https://twitter.com/FinMissionNATO/status/1526893945522950144
Finnish Ambassador Klaus Korhonen, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, and Swedish Ambassador Axel Wernhoff submitted their respective country’s application to NATO (Finland at NATO). Source: https://twitter.com/FinMissionNATO/status/1526893945522950144

Russia has self-alienated itself against the West through its actions and has become an increasingly paranoid nation under Vladimir Putin. Not only threatening Ukraine, but the country has also threatened Finland, Sweden, Georgia, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Moldova, and other non-NATO nations who are thinking about drifting toward the West.

Making an example of how they want to “protect their borders,” Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014 and conducted a full-scale invasion in 2022. This war has been an internal disaster for Moscow and a geopolitical catastrophe as nations saw their renewed imperial ambitions and sought their security interests—one of those countries is Finland.

Finland, which has had a dark and uneasy history with Russia as a neighbor, initially attempted to keep a neutral but aware stance on their eastern neighbor since World War Two. However, now that the Russian invasion has changed its perspective, Europe’s largest reserve and artillery army poses the ultimate nightmare to the Kremlin, more so than Ukraine could in the alliance.