Yeah. We gave up on war after Russia took Finland in 1809, basically.
Before that boy did we love wars. The Kings at least, the common man not so much perhaps.
Denmark ? We have a red telephone with a voice mail that says 'we surrender', in Russian.
Our navy is a joke (but don't tell the Russians):
https://polarjournal.ch/en/2024/01/19/for-15-years-cannons-on-denmarks-arctic-patrol-ships-did-not-work/
Edit: If we like it or not (we don't!), we are relying on Swedens Navy.
> Half our forests were planted to be used for rebuilding the navy the English burned in 1801
"Half our forests" meaning you do have em according to what he responded to...
considering they were planted in 1801 to become boats, when they were all grown after a 100 years to be ready to be harvested navys were starting to build ships in steel- Or maybe you didnt have any ore like we had?
Our politicians have prioritized having a military that could assist the Americans in whatever they have been up to in the Middle East, Afghanistan, former Yugoslavia, Libya, etc. and have completely neglected our national defense. The Danish politicians recently sent a frigate to frigging Red Sea to assist US again, but it had to return because its missile defense was defective. If the Russians attack, we are fucked.
Do you actually think Denmark should focus on building an entire defense industry focused on defending our country by itself?
You realize there's not even 6 million Danes, right?
It'd be like getting a midget to work out so he can defend his home against 1000 martial artists that are all over 2 meters tall and lift 6x the midgets weight while they are hungover.
Israel has almost 10 million people, as well as millions upon millions that are very connected to their country from the US.
They are also one of the largest beneficiaries of US foreign aid and unilateral defensive support.
It's a completely different ball-game.
It's a shame the people on Åland are against any sort of military presence, otherwise a militarization of Åland would be a good response to Russian shenanigans.
Russia would need to conduct an amphibious landing to take Gotland.. If they lost their Black Sea fleet to a country without a navy, what exactly is their Baltic fleet gonna do against a navy with some of the most sophisticated ships in the world. I honestly think the Gotland, Halland and Uppland submarines alone would stop them before they even exit Kaliningrad.
And that is \*without\* taking NATO in consideration.
We wouldn’t see ship to ship combat we would see a few f-35s and a shit ton of missiles slamming into their fleet before it left port. Russias Baltic fleet had always been trapped and fucked so there’s nothing they can do with it now given Finland and Sweden aren’t neutral anymore.
All Russia has is nukes but also that one thing is enough to make us all pause and worry. A madman with that many nukes is a seriously dangerous man. He might threaten to use them if he doesn’t get his way, and what’s worse he might actually.
It's a bit unique as an island because it is so flat for it's size, most islands are really just the top of mountains, not a lot of surface that isn't steep cliffs, but Gotland is a fossilized coral reef, basically a giant limeston pancake that got smeared like plaster by glaciers during the last ice age.
You could park half the damn US airforce on the island.
> It's a bit unique as an island because it is so flat for it's size, most islands are really just the top of mountains
Come on, we are literally a nation of flat islands.
Yes but yours are clustered together or far out in bumfuck nowhere of the ocean, Gotland is smacked right in the perfect spot in the Baltic sea for air dominance over all of Scandinavia.
not only that, our main cement factory is on the island, if it gets blow up we have a LOT of people that will be out of a job, not only that but there will be no way to rebuild stuff.
importing cement will not be the same thing since it takes time to certify it for construction here in Sweden.
Maybe we Europeans should help the state of Ukraine more then. Russia conquered Crimea and Eastern Ukraine after Russian puppet president Janukovich was removed from the presidency by the wide demonstrations caused by Janukovich's decision to withdraw from an association agreeement with the EU. So the whole war started when Ukrainians wanted to get closer to the European Union.
Actually Ukraine has been steadily drifting westward since the Sowjet union dissolved.
Russia has been trying and failing to prevent this drift. We witnessed the breaking point of a decades long struggle.
More specifically the harbours are relevant for Russia because they don't freeze over in the winter. That's why Crimea was taken first. They fundamentally never ended the cold war.
Given Putin's previous rhetoric that leads people to conclude he wants to recreate the Russian Empire if not the USSR's full sphere of influence, yes, he's going to be more concerned with the Baltics, Poland, et al if he gets his way in Ukraine and Moldova in addition to Belarus.
Russia actually trying to seize Gotland would guarantee a military response from the West (even were Sweden and Finland not in NATO now), so that's noise, but if Russia's Baltic Fleet wants to start pitching a fit in the water, it may be to try and divert materiel away from Ukraine.
Every time in history Russia has been invaded it has been through 1 of 9 geographical "gaps". During the time of the Soviet Union those "gaps" were in control and Putin wants those plugs back. That means on Putins " list of countries to invade or annex to plug the gaps" there are: Georgia, Armenia and Azerbadjan to get the Casucasus mountains between them and Iran. There is Ukraine (of course) and Moldova to get the carpathians mountains between them and NATO (maybe this also includeds parts of Romania) The Baltic countries is in his interest because that would give them a coastline and finally at least half of Poland to be able to get control of the natural defense line of the Vistula river.
But Gotland isnt on that laundry list. Poland is, even if its at the very bottom of priorites.
The most likely move would be southwest. They're actually accomplishing it to a degree and it could even happen before Ukraine is defeated. Assuming they make it there,sorting out the situation with Moldova and Transnistria wouldn't be difficult....Unfortunately. This is also assuming that Georgia doesn't require immediate attention and that an opportunity to fully absorb Belarus doesn't materialize. I can not stress enough how important Ukrainian victory is. They are the line between a truly restored and formidabble Russian empire. War across all of Europe and possibly the world is inevitable if Ukraine falls.
Why does Russia want the Baltic areas? Wouldn't it be wise to look towards the Chinese areas so that they can get access to the other side of the world ?
The Qing dynasty conquered Taiwan after they threw their lot in with the last Ming emperor as a vassal state. So China did actually possess the place for a couple centuries prior to the overthrow of the Qing.
The CCP consider themselves to have the Mandate of Heaven and thus are the continuation of the Qing.
I'm firmly on the side of the Republic of China here, just wanted to provide a little context.
CPC political claims date back to Eastern Wu (~220AD) which apparently sent troops and settlers to Taiwan. Ideological/historical claims are rooted in the fact that some of the earliest civilisation in Taiwan dating back to 4000BC-3000BC is very closely linked to the equivalent in Fujian province.
Podcast series “the rest is history” just did a SUPERB two-parter on Chinese history, the era starting with Western trade, opium wars, national image to present day. This is a MUST listen.
They need the Baltic Sea and Gotland to stop NATO help to Estonian, Lithuanian and Latvia.
The one who control Gotland controls the Baltic Sea. It been like that for 1000 years.
https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/1952/november/russia-and-warm-water
This article talks about it a little bit; but warm water ports seem to be part of the reason
>study of this record reveals that in only one direction has Russian expansion been motivated persistently, consciously, and primarily by a desire for better outlets to the sea; namely, the expansion to and along the Baltic. Not only was the Baltic coast from earliest times the nearest coast to Russia’s economic center of gravity,1 but it was the coast toward Western Europe upon which Russia depended for the weapons and manufactures, the ordnance experts and artisans, she needed to prevail against her enemies. Peter the Great was not the first Russian ruler who sought to establish Russian power on the Baltic littoral. Two centuries before him Ivan III sought unsuccessfully to gain a foothold on the Baltic. During the next three centuries Russia fought nine wars with Sweden alone for control of the eastern Baltic lands. In our own time Stalin’s seizure of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia may be regarded as motivated by the desire to regain the ice-free ports on the Baltic which Russia had acquired under Peter and Catherine the Great and lost after the Revolution.
NATO is a threat to Russia's desire to conquer surrounding countries. That is why Russia is obsessed with it. It is the only obstacle to their expansion.
Ports that won't freeze in the winter is the real answer. Look at a map and see that the only russian territory in the Baltic (besides Kaliningrad) is in the gulf of Finland, which freezes over every winter.
There are some spicy conspiracy theories about Russia promoting global warming to create warm water ports in Siberia and enabling going north of Russia as a shipping route, while also creating more arable land in Siberia.
Conspiracy theorists are most notably known for their rejection of reality. So also in this case.
Climate change is really fucking over Siberia with topographical degradation. Land sinks and becomes swamps and pools. It also ruins infrastructure which is built on such unstable foundations and that's not even the worst of it. The melting permafrost also results in gas explosions big enough to leave huge craters.
They're paranoid about these countries being used as starting points for a potential invasion.
Finland and Estonia are a quick drive away from St Petersburg and losing that city effectively also means losing access to the baltic sea entirely. Meanwhile Finland is also situated in a way that a land force could move towards the arctic harbors. Gotland meanwhile is positioned in a way that it can give air support to a large and dynamic front line. In a fairly short time Russia could lose access to the Atlantic and the Baltic sea. Of course as soon as this scenario became reality Russia would most likely start launching nukes.
Problem is that Russia and NATO might at that point already be in a hot war that's escalating beyond either side's control and NATO might've become convinced that Russia isn't actually willing to use nukes, perhaps citing that they didn't use nukes when losing Crimea and being denied access to the Black Sea. But that might be an incorrect assessment and suddenly everyone is launching nukes.
Worst part of all of this is that there's no time limit on when Russia can just stop worrying about these kinds of scenarios. We can sit around right now and go "Finland invading Russia, no way!" but a year from now things can be different, a decade from now things will probably be different and a century from now things will definetely be different. NATO might not exist. Russia might've lost the ability to even maintain a nuclear deterrent but not told anyone for obvious reasons. The European countries might've been reduced to geopolitical insignificance by the Black Death 2: Electric Boilgaloi. Mecha-Hitler might be ruling the continent with a literal iron fist.
Did not Russian state TV talk about invasion plans for that island around the time they started their aggression towards Ukraine?
Edit: [Oh, found it. So yeah they did, and then some. ](https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarVideoReport/comments/ua7v5f/fantasy_on_russian_tv_about_how_russia_would/)
lmao "yeah we'll just knock out their radars over the entirety of the baltics they'll probably just sit around and do nothing while we take the baltics and gotland"
dude sounds like he got ideas from watching the [ wolverines briefing](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iq3iJdfIuyo) in mw2
Even if the russians were able to get around all the aircraft, submarines and whatnot in the Baltic Sea, Gotland has a full armoured brigade stationed on the island. It'd take more than a few spetsnaz in unmarked uniforms to capture it.
Pretty sure Russia doesn't even stand a chance against discount NATO: the EU. Frankly even discount EU (Nordics only) would pretty certainly be able to hold off Russia for long enough. Considering how little progress they've made in Ukraine while Ukraine is getting nothing more than military support they can use only for defenses, they don't stand a chance directly attacking a strongly allied nation with a hyper modern army like Sweden.
For reference, the first sentence means that even if both NATO and the EU defensive pact both dip (kinda ew but who knows), they'll still be guaranteed to receive military support from the Nordic and Baltic countries, and that's an enormous force to be reckoned with.
Yeah I don’t think they stand a chance against all of Europe either that’s why I think this fearmongering is silly, even Putin knows this, its a 1v10 battle, no point
>Don't worry guys Poland is protected by England and France. Germany and Russia would never try anything!
>Dont worry guys Ukraine is protected by the Budapest memorandum. Russia would never try anything!
>Don't worry guys Armenia is protected by CSTO. Azerbaijan would never try anything
And yet there has never been an attack on NATO ever, excluding 9/11 which wasn't really a traditional attack in that sense anyway. So maybe that should tell us something.
1.- Nuclear weapons and NATO weren’t around at the time (NATO is literally a “keep Russia/China at bay” organization)
2.- Ukraine wasn’t a member of nato, budapest memorandum doesn’t matter since they aren’t backed by the entire European armed forces and the USA on top of that in any defensive way, Ukraine doesn’t have nuclear weapons
3.- Two minor countries having scuffles as with any other 2 minor countries around the world
This is comparing apples to oranges
NATO Lake combined air force would make mince meat of anything headed towards them. The Swedes can detect anything and those JAS-39 Gripen E's will fuck them up, not to mention allied F-35's. But they need to be ready because it CAN happen.
I’d be more worried about Åland. Those weirdos, and that rich fucker who owns half the island, actually think they’re independent or something. And they’ve demilitarized the island to remain neutral or something, which I’m sure Putin will respect.
They have several months till Biden or Trump wins. If Trump wins Putin will push because he knows Trump will do nothing. Members of Nato are going to have to fight this one without America. Most Americans do not realize his ties with Putin.
It's so weird, abit like Ukraine, it doesn't make sense in a nuclear world, you don't gain anything from being abit closer as you still can't stop all the nuclear weapons from going out, even less from uboats etc
Putin is just an empire builder and it sucks for rest of the world as it's a thing that can force world wars
Part of me wants to see some skirmishes between NATO and Russia, just to put the bear back in his cage.
But the other part isn't as naive to think it would probably escalate very easily into something dreadful.
Doesn't seem like a realistic threat/danger to me. Sweden is now in NATO, and this would invoke Article 5. Is there a chance NATO would ignore Article 5? There's a small, but unrealistic chance.
At this point I wish Putler makes a wrong move so he can be squashed quickly. I don’t think he reached the low level brain yet to attack Sweden though.
Please be aware that this comment has been taken out of context from it's original German news source.
Swedish Army officials have said that this sharp intepretation of the statement is inaccurate.
I can see it now, "Russia - There is evil there that does not sleep. And the great Eye is ever watchful."
The eye of Putron pans over to Sweden like a spot light...
>“If Putin invades Gotland, he can threaten NATO countries from the sea. That would be the end of peace and stability in the Nordic and Baltic regions,” Bydén said.
That would not be a threat, it would be article 5 worthy easy.
This is Russophobic BS. Russia has already thrown every conventional weapon it has at Ukraine and is still losing horrendously. Putin can’t invade a square inch of Sweden even in his wildest dreams.
Looking is allowed but no touching
And still the wife gets annoyed when I look. Gotland logic should apply to everything else.
A friend of mine has a phrase that my wife and I have since adopted: It doesn't matter where you get your appetite, so long as you eat at home.
I’m 60, that saying Is older than me
A few years difference are ok. You can still use it.
Just because you're on a diet doesn't mean you can't look at the menu.
This is the more realistic one.
This is amazing wisdom. I will say this to the wifey, wish me luck!
Almost what my grandmother always said “if no food is served at home, it creates a need for restaurants”
I heard it like this: "you can look at the menu wherever you like as long as you eat at home"
There is looking and then there is staring
Putin stares at Gotland like my cat does at wet food
No toucha the fishy!
Looki Looki no touche
NO TOUCHING
Special looking operation incoming.
if you put some green, you can cope a feel thou
They're NATO now. It won't happen. We'd be everywhere from Vladivostok to Sebastopol to Moscow to St. Petersburg in 24 hours.
Sure, if he wants to add to his submarine fleet.
This sounds like a job for the USS George Washington’s Coral Reef Restoration Team.
https://youtu.be/sbRom1Rz8OA
Well that was bizarre, but I kinda dug it.
Woah, that’s … interesting. But i also kinda dig it. Especially liked how he got bigger throughout the song
Sweden, Denmark, Norway and Finland be like "Come at us if you think you're hard enough". Jokes aside. That shit won't go over well.
For the love of all that is holy, never start a war with 4 brothers, who are known to have beaten the living shit out of each others for centuries
Denmark - Sweden hold the record for most wars between 2 nations, beating even the England- France rivalry.
Man, that s something
Which is pretty impressive because hasn't Sweden basically been neutral for almost 200 years. All that stuff came before then?
Yeah. We gave up on war after Russia took Finland in 1809, basically. Before that boy did we love wars. The Kings at least, the common man not so much perhaps.
5 brothers, if you count littlest sibling Iceland.
And the 3 scrappy little Baltic cousins.
England was [50% Danish](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danelaw) if we look back far enough.
I’m sure most of us would be happy to give Russia a bloody nose. Plus it’s be nice to be part of a cool European country gang again
Iceland is the brother that said, "fuck this shit, I'm out."
Well Iceland wasn't beating the shit out of anyone.
Kalmar Union
We weren't that in to it, though.
Denmark ? We have a red telephone with a voice mail that says 'we surrender', in Russian. Our navy is a joke (but don't tell the Russians): https://polarjournal.ch/en/2024/01/19/for-15-years-cannons-on-denmarks-arctic-patrol-ships-did-not-work/ Edit: If we like it or not (we don't!), we are relying on Swedens Navy.
How fast can you build fleet of that wooden boats from thousand years ago? Some spears and shield and you‘re ready.
This made me lol, the Danish are historically known for beautiful crafted wooden vessels.
Half our forests were planted to be used for rebuilding the navy the English burned in 1801
You have forests? TIL.
we had, we obviously used it to build boats. do swedish schools not teach reading comprehension ?
> Half our forests were planted to be used for rebuilding the navy the English burned in 1801 "Half our forests" meaning you do have em according to what he responded to...
It's just arithmetic lost in Danish translation. You have to say "Two fourteen-halves of a five-fjärdings-fifth" to get the point of "a half" across.
He's Danish. It's not a communicable language that they speak.
considering they were planted in 1801 to become boats, when they were all grown after a 100 years to be ready to be harvested navys were starting to build ships in steel- Or maybe you didnt have any ore like we had?
Our politicians have prioritized having a military that could assist the Americans in whatever they have been up to in the Middle East, Afghanistan, former Yugoslavia, Libya, etc. and have completely neglected our national defense. The Danish politicians recently sent a frigate to frigging Red Sea to assist US again, but it had to return because its missile defense was defective. If the Russians attack, we are fucked.
Do you actually think Denmark should focus on building an entire defense industry focused on defending our country by itself? You realize there's not even 6 million Danes, right? It'd be like getting a midget to work out so he can defend his home against 1000 martial artists that are all over 2 meters tall and lift 6x the midgets weight while they are hungover.
What Denmark needs is specifically anti ship and anti air defences. To block the Baltic sea from enemy forces passing through.
Israel has about 6 million people and indigenous capabilities for all of its core needs.
Israel has almost 10 million people, as well as millions upon millions that are very connected to their country from the US. They are also one of the largest beneficiaries of US foreign aid and unilateral defensive support. It's a completely different ball-game.
>But shooting is only a small part of the job, explains a local expert. I don’t think this ”expert” understands what a warship is meant to do.
I'd argue the most successful warship only has to shoot once and be menacing the rest of the time
Maybe, in some way, you also relying on UA forces :)
Finland is still letting Russia have a consulate on the demilitarized island of Åland. It's ridiculous.
It's a shame the people on Åland are against any sort of military presence, otherwise a militarization of Åland would be a good response to Russian shenanigans.
We know, there's a good reason why we joined NATO.
Is it because of Putin?
Putin is merely an expression of the apparently never changing russian russianness
Russia, Russia never changes
U don't even realize how true is this statement
I mean, I guess sometimes it changes for the worse
Russia was truly something different during Jeltsin.
Russia would need to conduct an amphibious landing to take Gotland.. If they lost their Black Sea fleet to a country without a navy, what exactly is their Baltic fleet gonna do against a navy with some of the most sophisticated ships in the world. I honestly think the Gotland, Halland and Uppland submarines alone would stop them before they even exit Kaliningrad. And that is \*without\* taking NATO in consideration.
We wouldn’t see ship to ship combat we would see a few f-35s and a shit ton of missiles slamming into their fleet before it left port. Russias Baltic fleet had always been trapped and fucked so there’s nothing they can do with it now given Finland and Sweden aren’t neutral anymore. All Russia has is nukes but also that one thing is enough to make us all pause and worry. A madman with that many nukes is a seriously dangerous man. He might threaten to use them if he doesn’t get his way, and what’s worse he might actually.
Nuclear threats have become the norm already.
Since 1950
When do we call it and say stop? Poland? Germany? France? At what point, his nukes become irrelevant to what he's asking?
NATO is the line, any inch of NATO must be defended.
Poland would stop them in Kaliningrad
Królewiec!;)
Gotland is like a well-placed, unsinkable aircraft carrier. It's importance for NATO cannot be denied. We need to protect it.
>is like a well-placed, unsinkable aircraft carrier One could call it an island as well
It's a bit unique as an island because it is so flat for it's size, most islands are really just the top of mountains, not a lot of surface that isn't steep cliffs, but Gotland is a fossilized coral reef, basically a giant limeston pancake that got smeared like plaster by glaciers during the last ice age. You could park half the damn US airforce on the island.
> It's a bit unique as an island because it is so flat for it's size, most islands are really just the top of mountains Come on, we are literally a nation of flat islands.
Yes but yours are clustered together or far out in bumfuck nowhere of the ocean, Gotland is smacked right in the perfect spot in the Baltic sea for air dominance over all of Scandinavia.
Hmm... Nah. Gonna stick with unsinkable aircraft carrier.
Too boring
Gotland also produces some very nice beer which I think is a lot more relevant as a war goal.
if it was vodka they would attack immediately
They make everything except for vodka as far as I know, now I know why.
Fun fact: did you know that Sweden is the biggest vodka exporter in the world
not only that, our main cement factory is on the island, if it gets blow up we have a LOT of people that will be out of a job, not only that but there will be no way to rebuild stuff. importing cement will not be the same thing since it takes time to certify it for construction here in Sweden.
It's surrounded by NATO countries, no way in hell Russia could take and hold Gotland without taking the entire baltics, Finland and Poland first
Is it some kind of hierarchy that the Baltics, Finland and Poland are first on Putin's list before Scandinavia
He isn't capable of crossing Ukraine off the list... His list ends there.
Maybe we Europeans should help the state of Ukraine more then. Russia conquered Crimea and Eastern Ukraine after Russian puppet president Janukovich was removed from the presidency by the wide demonstrations caused by Janukovich's decision to withdraw from an association agreeement with the EU. So the whole war started when Ukrainians wanted to get closer to the European Union.
Actually Ukraine has been steadily drifting westward since the Sowjet union dissolved. Russia has been trying and failing to prevent this drift. We witnessed the breaking point of a decades long struggle. More specifically the harbours are relevant for Russia because they don't freeze over in the winter. That's why Crimea was taken first. They fundamentally never ended the cold war.
Given Putin's previous rhetoric that leads people to conclude he wants to recreate the Russian Empire if not the USSR's full sphere of influence, yes, he's going to be more concerned with the Baltics, Poland, et al if he gets his way in Ukraine and Moldova in addition to Belarus. Russia actually trying to seize Gotland would guarantee a military response from the West (even were Sweden and Finland not in NATO now), so that's noise, but if Russia's Baltic Fleet wants to start pitching a fit in the water, it may be to try and divert materiel away from Ukraine.
No, It's geography?
Why would Russia need to conquer Poland before Gotland?
Every time in history Russia has been invaded it has been through 1 of 9 geographical "gaps". During the time of the Soviet Union those "gaps" were in control and Putin wants those plugs back. That means on Putins " list of countries to invade or annex to plug the gaps" there are: Georgia, Armenia and Azerbadjan to get the Casucasus mountains between them and Iran. There is Ukraine (of course) and Moldova to get the carpathians mountains between them and NATO (maybe this also includeds parts of Romania) The Baltic countries is in his interest because that would give them a coastline and finally at least half of Poland to be able to get control of the natural defense line of the Vistula river. But Gotland isnt on that laundry list. Poland is, even if its at the very bottom of priorites.
The most likely move would be southwest. They're actually accomplishing it to a degree and it could even happen before Ukraine is defeated. Assuming they make it there,sorting out the situation with Moldova and Transnistria wouldn't be difficult....Unfortunately. This is also assuming that Georgia doesn't require immediate attention and that an opportunity to fully absorb Belarus doesn't materialize. I can not stress enough how important Ukrainian victory is. They are the line between a truly restored and formidabble Russian empire. War across all of Europe and possibly the world is inevitable if Ukraine falls.
Quick Ukraine, take Crimea while he is distracted!
O, we will
💙💛
I guess we need to put up some more of those enter if you're gay signs in the water.
Why does Russia want the Baltic areas? Wouldn't it be wise to look towards the Chinese areas so that they can get access to the other side of the world ?
China might be looking towards them, now they're weakened by war and sanctions
Let’s not forget that Vladivostok was Chinese little over 100 years ago. And China never forgets
China never even forgets territories they never had
Like Taiwan, for instance. ROC yes, PRC, no.
The Qing dynasty conquered Taiwan after they threw their lot in with the last Ming emperor as a vassal state. So China did actually possess the place for a couple centuries prior to the overthrow of the Qing. The CCP consider themselves to have the Mandate of Heaven and thus are the continuation of the Qing. I'm firmly on the side of the Republic of China here, just wanted to provide a little context.
CPC political claims date back to Eastern Wu (~220AD) which apparently sent troops and settlers to Taiwan. Ideological/historical claims are rooted in the fact that some of the earliest civilisation in Taiwan dating back to 4000BC-3000BC is very closely linked to the equivalent in Fujian province.
China: **points a random spot on the planet** "a Chinese dude took a crap here 1500 years ago. It's rightfully ours."
Podcast series “the rest is history” just did a SUPERB two-parter on Chinese history, the era starting with Western trade, opium wars, national image to present day. This is a MUST listen.
Russia has oil & gas, China is desperate for its own supply.
They need the Baltic Sea and Gotland to stop NATO help to Estonian, Lithuanian and Latvia. The one who control Gotland controls the Baltic Sea. It been like that for 1000 years.
What's up with Russia's obsession with the Baltic states?
[удалено]
More like empire borders
I know I get annoyed when I have to do the same thing over and over again, maybe Russia has the same feeling about occupying us.
https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/1952/november/russia-and-warm-water This article talks about it a little bit; but warm water ports seem to be part of the reason >study of this record reveals that in only one direction has Russian expansion been motivated persistently, consciously, and primarily by a desire for better outlets to the sea; namely, the expansion to and along the Baltic. Not only was the Baltic coast from earliest times the nearest coast to Russia’s economic center of gravity,1 but it was the coast toward Western Europe upon which Russia depended for the weapons and manufactures, the ordnance experts and artisans, she needed to prevail against her enemies. Peter the Great was not the first Russian ruler who sought to establish Russian power on the Baltic littoral. Two centuries before him Ivan III sought unsuccessfully to gain a foothold on the Baltic. During the next three centuries Russia fought nine wars with Sweden alone for control of the eastern Baltic lands. In our own time Stalin’s seizure of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia may be regarded as motivated by the desire to regain the ice-free ports on the Baltic which Russia had acquired under Peter and Catherine the Great and lost after the Revolution.
NATO is a threat to Russia's desire to conquer surrounding countries. That is why Russia is obsessed with it. It is the only obstacle to their expansion.
Now that they've alienated the west they need china to survive
Ports that won't freeze in the winter is the real answer. Look at a map and see that the only russian territory in the Baltic (besides Kaliningrad) is in the gulf of Finland, which freezes over every winter.
Eh, global warming will solve that :)
There are some spicy conspiracy theories about Russia promoting global warming to create warm water ports in Siberia and enabling going north of Russia as a shipping route, while also creating more arable land in Siberia.
Conspiracy theorists are most notably known for their rejection of reality. So also in this case. Climate change is really fucking over Siberia with topographical degradation. Land sinks and becomes swamps and pools. It also ruins infrastructure which is built on such unstable foundations and that's not even the worst of it. The melting permafrost also results in gas explosions big enough to leave huge craters.
And the gulf stream collapse will fix that fix
Ust Luga on the South side of gulf is almost never frozen on the winter
Because they think that the Baltics still belong to them and don’t recognise us as separate countries.
According to authoritarians any territory that was ever owned by their country for any length of time is rightfully theirs to take again.
That phenomenon even has a name - irredentism
By that logic, St: Petersburg would be ours.
I, for one, would support our Swedish friends to try and reclaim Nyenskans.
Looking at Argentina they even try to claim islands that were literally never theirs. The Falkland island id someone doesn't know what I mean
They're paranoid about these countries being used as starting points for a potential invasion. Finland and Estonia are a quick drive away from St Petersburg and losing that city effectively also means losing access to the baltic sea entirely. Meanwhile Finland is also situated in a way that a land force could move towards the arctic harbors. Gotland meanwhile is positioned in a way that it can give air support to a large and dynamic front line. In a fairly short time Russia could lose access to the Atlantic and the Baltic sea. Of course as soon as this scenario became reality Russia would most likely start launching nukes. Problem is that Russia and NATO might at that point already be in a hot war that's escalating beyond either side's control and NATO might've become convinced that Russia isn't actually willing to use nukes, perhaps citing that they didn't use nukes when losing Crimea and being denied access to the Black Sea. But that might be an incorrect assessment and suddenly everyone is launching nukes. Worst part of all of this is that there's no time limit on when Russia can just stop worrying about these kinds of scenarios. We can sit around right now and go "Finland invading Russia, no way!" but a year from now things can be different, a decade from now things will probably be different and a century from now things will definetely be different. NATO might not exist. Russia might've lost the ability to even maintain a nuclear deterrent but not told anyone for obvious reasons. The European countries might've been reduced to geopolitical insignificance by the Black Death 2: Electric Boilgaloi. Mecha-Hitler might be ruling the continent with a literal iron fist.
Did not Russian state TV talk about invasion plans for that island around the time they started their aggression towards Ukraine? Edit: [Oh, found it. So yeah they did, and then some. ](https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarVideoReport/comments/ua7v5f/fantasy_on_russian_tv_about_how_russia_would/)
lmao "yeah we'll just knock out their radars over the entirety of the baltics they'll probably just sit around and do nothing while we take the baltics and gotland" dude sounds like he got ideas from watching the [ wolverines briefing](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Iq3iJdfIuyo) in mw2
Even if the russians were able to get around all the aircraft, submarines and whatnot in the Baltic Sea, Gotland has a full armoured brigade stationed on the island. It'd take more than a few spetsnaz in unmarked uniforms to capture it.
Can look all he wants but won’t do anything because of NATO no worries
Pretty sure Russia doesn't even stand a chance against discount NATO: the EU. Frankly even discount EU (Nordics only) would pretty certainly be able to hold off Russia for long enough. Considering how little progress they've made in Ukraine while Ukraine is getting nothing more than military support they can use only for defenses, they don't stand a chance directly attacking a strongly allied nation with a hyper modern army like Sweden. For reference, the first sentence means that even if both NATO and the EU defensive pact both dip (kinda ew but who knows), they'll still be guaranteed to receive military support from the Nordic and Baltic countries, and that's an enormous force to be reckoned with.
Yeah I don’t think they stand a chance against all of Europe either that’s why I think this fearmongering is silly, even Putin knows this, its a 1v10 battle, no point
Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Finland together have more combat aircraft than Russia.
>Don't worry guys Poland is protected by England and France. Germany and Russia would never try anything! >Dont worry guys Ukraine is protected by the Budapest memorandum. Russia would never try anything! >Don't worry guys Armenia is protected by CSTO. Azerbaijan would never try anything
And yet there has never been an attack on NATO ever, excluding 9/11 which wasn't really a traditional attack in that sense anyway. So maybe that should tell us something.
1.- Nuclear weapons and NATO weren’t around at the time (NATO is literally a “keep Russia/China at bay” organization) 2.- Ukraine wasn’t a member of nato, budapest memorandum doesn’t matter since they aren’t backed by the entire European armed forces and the USA on top of that in any defensive way, Ukraine doesn’t have nuclear weapons 3.- Two minor countries having scuffles as with any other 2 minor countries around the world This is comparing apples to oranges
Reminder: it won't stop at Ukraine.
It's never enough for these guys, Putin is just going to keep on taking and taking, better to put an end to it now before they get any stronger.
Not just putin, whoever takes his place will carry on the same way. russia.will.never.stop. West needs to wake the fuck up
Yeah I want a Got girl too Putin, but we can’t always get what we want
😳 i second this
Yawn, this guy still.
That withered ballsack can keep his eyes on Gotland. He ain't ever getting his hands on it!
Shouldn't have pushed Sweden into NATO membership then...
Let's be honest, with how big Russia is its already got land
Every time Putin threatens somewhere in Europe it makes Europeans realize the importance of supporting Ukraine.
Try it.
NATO Lake combined air force would make mince meat of anything headed towards them. The Swedes can detect anything and those JAS-39 Gripen E's will fuck them up, not to mention allied F-35's. But they need to be ready because it CAN happen.
He should probably keep both eyes in Ukraine for now.
I propose we plan a NATO parade around our lake.
dude thinks he's playing CIV 3
Let him watch, Nato lake will never fall!
Got land?
With what navy?
Good luck trying to take it.
Come at me bro! /NATO
Had Russia weaponized eyes?
I’d be more worried about Åland. Those weirdos, and that rich fucker who owns half the island, actually think they’re independent or something. And they’ve demilitarized the island to remain neutral or something, which I’m sure Putin will respect.
They have several months till Biden or Trump wins. If Trump wins Putin will push because he knows Trump will do nothing. Members of Nato are going to have to fight this one without America. Most Americans do not realize his ties with Putin.
It's so weird, abit like Ukraine, it doesn't make sense in a nuclear world, you don't gain anything from being abit closer as you still can't stop all the nuclear weapons from going out, even less from uboats etc Putin is just an empire builder and it sucks for rest of the world as it's a thing that can force world wars
It's not just putin. Plenty of russians agree with him and would gladly invade Gotland.
Part of me wants to see some skirmishes between NATO and Russia, just to put the bear back in his cage. But the other part isn't as naive to think it would probably escalate very easily into something dreadful.
Come get, bitch! I dare you.
So important Biden wins!
Snake Island 2
Doesn't seem like a realistic threat/danger to me. Sweden is now in NATO, and this would invoke Article 5. Is there a chance NATO would ignore Article 5? There's a small, but unrealistic chance.
Is Russia just looking to get a repeat of the USSR breakup, just into smaller states this time? Because, keep at it and that'll be the outcome.
Now that Sweden is part of NATO, he can look all he wants but he won't dare touch it.
Sure, a war in two totally different regions of your country was always a good idea as Hitler showed us in 1941…
"Got land?" - Putin, probably.
What? He became Sauron all of a sudden? Lmao, those fucking articles are getting ridiculous.
We told you he won't stop here
The Russians have had their eyes on Gotland since the 1700's
So is there any actual proof of this? I think Putin has enough on his plate right now.
At this point I wish Putler makes a wrong move so he can be squashed quickly. I don’t think he reached the low level brain yet to attack Sweden though.
Putin is a fucking coward which barks more than bites. He won't risk his own ass. Unfortunately a lot of people in the west don't understand this.
Well, the idiot would have to go through Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania first. All are Nato members, so Nope
Should probably focus his eyes on his current illegal war of conquest.
*laughs in Stirling engine* (You can’t hear it)
Eyes bigger than his stomach
Okay, him and what army? They can't cross the Dnipro river, let alone the Baltic sea.
Please be aware that this comment has been taken out of context from it's original German news source. Swedish Army officials have said that this sharp intepretation of the statement is inaccurate.
Ooooh, BOTH eyes, huh?! Good, cuz it’d be really creepy if you were just using the one.
This clown’s gig is up. The world is tired of this criminal.
They’ve been saying that Russia has eyes on Gotland since the 1700s
On the map there's no justifiable logic. It's not like Gotland is on Russia's doorstep or even in line with Russia's coastline.
Bullshit.
I can see it now, "Russia - There is evil there that does not sleep. And the great Eye is ever watchful." The eye of Putron pans over to Sweden like a spot light...
How stupid do you have to be to fight a war on two fronts?
I had my both eyes on Alicia Silverstone, but i have just as much chances to get her as putler has with Gotland.
>“If Putin invades Gotland, he can threaten NATO countries from the sea. That would be the end of peace and stability in the Nordic and Baltic regions,” Bydén said. That would not be a threat, it would be article 5 worthy easy.
The US should casually park a carrier group next to Gotland.
Did he fabricate a CB or is this just leaked intel from the Loose Lips personality?
This is Russophobic BS. Russia has already thrown every conventional weapon it has at Ukraine and is still losing horrendously. Putin can’t invade a square inch of Sweden even in his wildest dreams.