What does Sweden’s NATO entry mean?
STOCKHOLM: Sweden’s NATO membership bid, submitted in the wake of Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine, cleared its final hurdle as Hungary’s parliament voted to ratify it on Monday. Accession to the US-led alliance means stark changes for both Sweden’s defense and the geopolitical balance in the region.
Why did Sweden decide to join NATO?
At the end of the Napoleonic wars of the early 19th century, Sweden adopted an official policy of neutrality. Following the end of the Cold War, the
neutrality policy was amended to one of military non-alignment. While Sweden has sent forces to international peacekeeping missions, it has not gone to war for more than 200 years.
The last conflict it fought was the Swedish-Norwegian War of 1814. Despite its neutrality it pursued an active foreign policy, championing human rights and being a top aid donor per capita, sometimes being a labeled a “humanitarian superpower”. But while remaining outside NATO, Sweden has formed ever-closer ties to the alliance, joining the Partnership for Peace program in 1994 and then the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council in 1997.
However, a majority of Swedes were long opposed to full membership and it was considered a taboo among the Social Democrats - Sweden’s largest political party. Former Social Democrat defense minister Peter Hultqvist even declared in the fall of
2021 that he could “guarantee” that he would never participate in a process to join NATO. Only months later, Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine led to a dramatic shift in both public opinion and among political parties. A broad majority of the Swedish parliament voted to apply for membership, which the country did - along with Finland - in May 2022.
What does Sweden bring to NATO?
For a long time, Swedish policy dictated that the country needed a strong military to protect its neutrality. But after the end of the Cold War, it drastically slashed its defense spending, turning its military focus toward peacekeeping operations around the world. In 1990, defense spending accounted for 2.6 percent of gross domestic product, shrinking to 1.2 percent by 2020, according to the government.