Nuclear expansion will inevitably make its way to the Baltics if Sweden and Finland join NATO, according to former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.
Medvedev, deputy chairman of Russia’s Security Council, made the bellicose declaration on his Telegram account as Russia’s war on Ukraine stretches into its seventh week.
“If Sweden and Finland join Nato, the length of the alliance’s land borders with Russia will more than double,” Medvedev wrote on the app, according to the Financial Times. “Naturally, these borders will have to be strengthened.”
“If this is done, no non-nuclear status of the Baltic will be possible,” Medvedev said. “The balance must be restored.” He added that the people of Sweden and Finland would have nuclear-armed Russian ships “at arm’s length” from their homes, per the report.
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The leaders of Sweden and Finland both said this week their countries are deciding whether to apply to join NATO, spurred by the conflict in Ukraine and seemingly undeterred by the Kremlin’s warnings.
“Everything changed when Russia invaded Ukraine,” Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin said Wednesday during a news conference in Stockholm alongside her Swedish counterpart, Magdalena Andersson. Sweden will decide on whether to apply “within weeks,” Marin added.
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NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said the two Nordic countries are welcome to apply to join.
If the two countries were to join the alliance, NATO would expand to 32 members. One of the demands made by Russian President Vladimir Putin when he began the war in Ukraine was for NATO to stop expanding and pull its forces back from Russia’s borders.
