I mean, equality is good, but I’d much rather not have people forced into bearing arms against their will.
We are a small country next to a big and historically pretty hostile one. We need conscription. Sweden did away with it, and their military hollowed out; they’ve restored it again.
Of course, it helps that the last time Finland engaged in military aggression was during the Continuation War, 1941-44, and there were, shall we say, mitigating circumstances. Serving as a conscript, you know you’re not going to be thrown into some imperialistic invasion halfway across the world, but rather if you ever are called up, it’s to defend your homes from said imperialistic invasion.
(There are also options for non-military service, “siviilipalvelus” or literally “civilian service”, and military service without bearing a weapon, for those who are ethically opposed to bearing a weapon.)
Sounds like the sort of situation where you’d get plenty of volunteers, then.
If there’s still not the numbers, then it’s like all other situations we’re seeing lately. There’s not a labour shortage, there’s a pay shortage.
That will end soon.
Nah. Finland isn’t going to send Finnish conscripts to NATO operations overseas, and NATO isn’t going to request them.
What will happen is that NATO will ask for, and get, volunteers who will join various ops in different positions. Mostly career military, who are going to be fully aware they’re risking their lives, because that’s their profession. In other words, exactly what happened with our participation in ISAF in Afghanistan, or any number of UN peacekeeping missions over the decades.
Nah. These volunteers are going be part of Nato forces committing war crimes just like any other Nato coutries volunteers.
That may happen, sure. I was talking about the selection process.
The operations where NATO acts under a mandate from the UN (e.g. Kosovo, Afghanistan, Libya) don’t fall under the collective defence clauses, so it is up to each member state to decide whether or how to participate without any obligations. In the case of Libya, the NATO-led military intervention involved only half (14 out of 28 at the time) of NATO member states. And Finland already volunteered to send troops to NATO-led operations in Kosovo and Afghanistan, as well as to the coalition in Iraq, so I don’t think Finland’s NATO membership will change much in that regard.
Yes we have already aided in war crimes but that last bit of joining still makes me sick. I have no doubt that we will commit war crimes with Nato troops.
And of course Nato has been operating in Finland for for decades.
Saner then building a wall.
Bolsonaro and Lula said no to the request for ammunition for Ukraine made by the German government. Now, according to a Brazilian weekly magazine, the Germans decided to retaliate and embargoed the sale of Guarani armored vehicles, which are produced by the Italian company IVECO with German parts.
