[Text/Observer Network columnist Li Fan]
On May 28, Erdogan was confirmed to have won the second round of the Turkish presidential election and was successfully re-elected. On the 29th, Erdogan spoke with US President Biden and talked about F-16 fighters and Sweden's accession to NATO. Previously, due to Turkey's opposition, Sweden's accession process has been delayed, causing dissatisfaction in the United States.
Ahead of the start of the second round of voting, Erdogan said "strongly" in an interview on May 20 that Turkey would not actively welcome Sweden to NATO as long as it continued to tolerate terrorism. Not long ago, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg and US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin raised expectations that Sweden would formally join the NATO summit in Vilnius on July 11-12. Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson has also expressed hope that Turkey's position will turn around after his presidential election.
Although Turkey's opposition procedurally hinders Sweden's accession to NATO, public opinion is an important factor influencing its path to NATO. On April 22, NGOs such as the Swedish Peace and Arbitration Society (SPAS), No NATO and individual political parties staged protests in 17 Swedish cities against large-scale international military exercises in Sweden and NATO membership, advocating neutrality. Such protests are not the first of their kind, as some Swedes took to the streets to express opposition when former Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson first officially said Sweden would apply to join NATO.
From the data, Statista's latest announcement in March 2023 shows that after Russia's military action against Ukraine in early 2022, the number of people supporting Sweden's accession to NATO increased, but it is still a minority; After the Swedish government announced its intention to join NATO in May 2022, popular support soared to nearly 60% and continued to increase to more than two-thirds. The Novus survey also showed that 64 percent of Swedes said they would approve of Sweden joining the treaty if Finland joined the treaty.
Linda Akerström, chairman of SPAS Policy and Publicity, said in an interview that in the context of the tension of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, many people support joining NATO out of fear, and are not sure of the correctness of this choice. Former Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven also pointed out that the Swedish government's decision to join NATO was too hasty.
The attitude of the Swedish people towards Sweden's accession to NATO (Source: Statisita)
Who will guarantee the safety of a remote corner?
The security threat posed by the Russian-Ukrainian conflict is Sweden's main consideration for choosing to join NATO, and it is also the focus of debate among the Swedish people. Supporters believe that after joining NATO, Sweden can get NATO's military security guarantees, after all, "if Sweden becomes the only Nordic country not in NATO, refugee Russia may invade Sweden's largest island of Gotland", and even advocate that "Sweden should have joined NATO when Russia annexed Crimea in 2014."
However, not all Swedish citizens believe that NATO is a reliable military organization. The opposition believes that after joining NATO, Sweden will be forced to participate in the evolution of the European security pattern, which will undermine its security. Demonstrators said that "NATO is nothing more than a war machine for the United States", that "joining NATO could drag Sweden into a conflict they did not want to participate in", and that military imbalances in Europe could trigger a new arms race.
First, as far as Sweden's own security is concerned, NATO does have the ability to provide security for Sweden based on the existing actions of both sides. Although Sweden has a complete military-industrial system and a modern military with excellent capabilities, it is really small compared to Russia's military strength, and NATO's huge military strength can provide Sweden with necessary military support and effectively maintain the security and stability of the Baltic Sea.
On April 17, 2023, Sweden, Austria, Ukraine and 11 NATO members held the largest military exercise in 25 years, Aurora 23, in southern Sweden, Gotland and surrounding areas, involving more than 26,000 troops, including all branches of the military, land and sea, to improve Sweden's overall ability to respond to armed attacks, including the ability to receive foreign military assistance. Brigadier General Stefan Andersson said that "in this way, it can be determined whether Sweden has the necessary resources and conditions to obtain third-party support", which can effectively improve Sweden's military compatibility with NATO and show that NATO and Sweden are willing to provide each other with security guarantees. Lieutenant Colonel Henrik Larsson, the chief planner, also directly mentioned that "this exercise is Sweden's preparation for becoming a member of NATO."
Comparison of the standing military strength of NATO and Russia and some countries (Source: Washington Post)
Second, Sweden also chose to join NATO because it was difficult to receive a precise peace signal from the Russian side. Harvard professor Stephen M. Walt analyzed that Russia's "invasion" of Ukraine has changed the Swedish government's assessment of Russia, making it believe that Russia has the ability and willingness to take great risks to start a war. Tony Fang, a professor at Stockholm University's business school in Sweden, notes that the Swedish mentality may have been influenced by the haze of defeat in the Great Northern War from 1700 to 1721, which marked Sweden's decline. The negative impact of the superposition may make Sweden realize that even if it does not join NATO, it cannot completely exclude the possibility of future aggression by Russia in Sweden.
Finally, even if Russia joins NATO, it will not necessarily take the initiative to make an aggressive military response. According to the Guardian, the Russian side made it clear at the beginning of Sweden and Finland's announcement that they would apply to join NATO that although this action will inevitably affect relations between the two sides, Russia will only make a "reciprocal response" when NATO deploys troops and infrastructure in both countries. Sweden's application to NATO explicitly mentions its refusal to set up "nuclear weapons" or permanent NATO bases on Swedish territory.
In reality, in response to the "wall repair" operation launched immediately after Finland joined NATO, Russia only claimed that it would deploy military weapons on the territory of northwest Russia to counteract in due course. However, on March 24, 2023, the air forces leaders of Finland, Sweden, Norway and Denmark signed a letter of intent at the German air base, planning to establish a joint Nordic air force under the framework of NATO to jointly deal with military threats from Russia, and this more radical move is unlikely to stimulate Russia.
Neutral choice in path dependence
Since the beginning of the Napoleonic Wars, Sweden has adhered to a neutral position, and its more than 200 years of neutral history has been shaped and strengthened the unique neutral identity of the Swedish people. In the 19th century, the Swedish public had a more obvious preference for support, such as supporting Britain during the Crimean War; In the 20th century, during the Cold War, most of the Swedish population was opposed to joining any military alliance and strongly supported neutrality.
However, the beginning of the NATO accession process may mean the end of the era of Swedish neutrality and the collapse of the Swedish neutral identity. According to Ipsos 2019 survey data, only 38% of Swedes have a favorable opinion of NATO, but Pew's survey data in 2022 after the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict and before Sweden applied to join NATO showed that 79% of Swedes had begun to have a positive attitude towards NATO.
Changes in the attitude of the Swedish people towards NATO (2019 vs 2022) (Source: Ipsos)
This change may be an inevitability guided by the government. As a political tool, neutrality itself offers great flexibility. Although Sweden has been strongly building a neutral discourse order at the political level, and constantly emphasizing the pursuit of a military non-alignment policy in its foreign policy declaration, it has long deviated from its purely neutral position in defense and foreign strategy, not only joining NATO's "Partnership for Peace Program" and the European Union, deepening defense cooperation with Finland, but also gradually guiding the focus of the concept of neutrality from war neutrality to freedom of association to explain its accession to the EU. However, the rise of far-right parties at home also seems to indicate a comprehensive shift in Sweden in the future. Therefore, some argue that the end point of Sweden's neutrality policy is NATO membership.
Externally, while the sharpening confrontation between NATO and Russia has forced Sweden to make a choice, the changes in Finland are more noteworthy. During the Finnish Winter War, strong public opinion forced Sweden to provide war aid to Finland; Securing Finland from the Soviet Union after World War II was also an important reason for Sweden's choice of neutrality. The historical background with Finland's territory makes the Swedes have a strong sense of responsibility to the Finns, and after the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, Finland joined NATO more actively than Sweden, which to a certain extent also dissolved the Swedes' obsession with neutrality.
Statista's data shows that in the face of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, older people are more supportive of Sweden's entry into NATO than young people. Lisa Nabo, 27, president of the Swedish SPD Youth Union, said of Sweden's application for NATO membership, "Our generation, now in our 20s, has no memory of the war in Europe." The current situation is very alien to us, because we do not have the same war history as many of our neighbors in the Second World War or the Yugoslav War. ”
The attitude of Swedish people of different ages towards Sweden's accession to NATO (Source: Statista)
What is the future of the welfare state?
Swedes are also worried about whether joining NATO will lead to an increase in military spending, which in turn will have a negative impact on Swedish social welfare. "Becoming a member of NATO requires an increase in the defense budget, which leads to cuts in spending on social benefits such as education and health care," Krister Holm, a member of the Swedish Communist Party, said in an interview. However, Sweden's original intention in increasing military spending was not to join NATO, but to maintain national defense and security. According to the latest report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute in Sweden, global military spending has increased in 2022, with the top four countries increasing in Finland (36%), Lithuania (27%), Sweden (12%) and Poland (11%), all of which are closely related to the Russian-Ukrainian conflict in terms of geographical location and military security. The Russia-Ukraine conflict only reaffirms the core of Sweden's defense spending: ensuring that Sweden is ready to deal with growing regional power competition and rising geopolitical tensions.
Global military spending in 2022 will break a record high (Source: SIPRI)
Even without NATO membership, improving its defense capabilities is part of Sweden's long-term plans. Since the resumption of forced recruitment in 2017, Sweden's military spending as a share of GDP has gradually increased, and defense spending is expected to increase to 1.4% in 2023, and the target of 2% of defense spending will not be achieved until 2028. Although NATO requires its members to spend 2% of GDP on military expenditure, less than half of NATO members meet this criterion. In reality, Sweden has only paid lip service to achieving the 2% target "as soon as possible".
However, General Micael Byden, the supreme commander of the Swedish armed forces, said at a press conference in late 2022 that current inflation trends could push Sweden to reach its target of 2% of GDP for defense spending by 2026, two years ahead of schedule. Inflation may be the real "killer" of the Swedish welfare system. The Swedish government's draft 2023 spring budget lowered its domestic economic growth forecast to -1.0% from -0.7% at the end of last year, and the European Commission even predicted that Sweden would become the only EU country to enter a recession in 2023. Swedish Finance Minister Elisabeth Svantesson said Sweden was facing its worst inflation in more than 30 years. The Swedish government expects domestic inflation to rise to 8.8 percent for the whole of this year from 8.4 percent last year and fall back to 3.6 percent next year. The unemployment rate will rise from 7.5 percent last year to 7.9 percent this year and continue to rise to 8.3 percent next year.
Swedish inflation rate curve (2002-2022) (Source: World Bank)
In the long term, migrants and refugees are also important factors influencing the perception of social welfare in Sweden. Sweden's high personal income tax has made people pay great attention to the quality of health care and education benefits, but since the 2015 refugee crisis, the imperfect immigration integration system has made Swedes dissatisfied with immigrants, gradually developing welfare chauvinism (a right-wing claim that welfare should be given priority to natives rather than unemployed immigrants). Taking the immigration issue as an opportunity, the far-right Sweden Democratic Party began to rise and gain support by intensifying and consolidating the antagonistic sentiment of the Swedish people against immigration. In the 2022 parliamentary elections, the Sweden Democratic Party has become the second largest political party in Sweden.
In recent years, Sweden's immigration policy has begun to tighten: in terms of the number of recipients, Sweden was the EU country that received the most refugees in 2015, receiving at least 5,000 refugees per year since 2018, while the Swedish government plans to accept only 900 refugees in 2023, even in the face of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, it only accepted 53,957 refugees, and the number of shelters was not even in the top ten; In terms of reception policy, Sweden also provides refugees with daily allowances and nursing care measures far less than other Nordic countries. Despite this, however, the long-worn sense of social security of the Swedish people will not be immediately restored. It can even be said that as long as the immigration problem continues, it will always be a political weapon for the far-right to manipulate the people, and the stigmatization of immigration will never end there.
Changes in Swedish people's attitudes towards immigration (Source: ODI)
Although the just-concluded Turkish election results indicate that Erdogan is about to enter a third term, in my opinion, this will not really hinder Sweden's path to NATO.
On the one hand, the extradition of Kurds in Sweden is both central to Erdogan's opposition to Sweden's entry into NATO and an important means for Erdogan to attract nationalist voters at home and mitigate the negative effects of high inflation and the earthquake, but it is not a long-term solution to the Islamic problem. With the end of the election, the Kurdish issue, which has been removed from the electoral factor, will once again be on the agenda; Moreover, as NATO's reality with Sweden unfolds, there is no guarantee that Turkey will not face pressure from NATO in the future.
On the other hand, a pro-Western diplomatic stance has led Kemal Kilicdaroglu to show a positive attitude towards Sweden's accession to the treaty, and may also continue to pressure Erdogan on this issue afterwards. In addition, although the Swedish public does not support some of the extreme actions of the Swiss Kurds, polls show that most of the Swedes believe that Sweden has made great concessions to Turkey on the issue of accession, which may further strengthen Sweden's public opinion base, coupled with the stalemate of the Ukraine crisis, the overall public opinion will only be more inclined to support NATO membership. While some in Sweden are justified, there is little time left for minorities to accept reality.
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