Two years in the past:
That’s a photograph from my lodge room, proper after Sweden requested to affix NATO. Just some months after the expanded Russian invasion of the Ukraine (reminder – the invasion started in 2014).
Now. From Politico:
The Russian protection ministry introduced a plan Tuesday to broaden the nation’s territorial waters within the Baltic Sea close to its maritime border with Lithuania and Finland, sparking worldwide concern.
“I’m sure that Putin even has both eyes on Gotland. Putin’s goal is to gain control of the Baltic Sea,” Bydén, Sweden’s supreme commander of the armed forces, instructed newspapers of the German editorial community RND.
Two Hundred Years in the past. Now, the Ministry of Protection has taken down the announcement of a unilateral change in borders, with out clarification. Any probability that Russia would ever attempt to seize the island? Properly, simply look again a pair hundred years in the past:
Supply: Encyclopedia Britannica, accessed 5/22/2024. Edited by creator: Gotland circled in orange.
On this map of the Russian, Gotland (circled) wasn’t included. That’s as a result of it solely extends as much as 1801. In 1808, Russia occupied Gotland, so the reply is “yes”.
Now, Russian forces are totally dedicated to the struggle in Ukraine. Again in 2021, CSIS evaluated a profitable seaborne invasion as unlikely. That was a pre-NATO Sweden, so it could appear even much less possible. Nevertheless, if Russia have been in a position to prevail within the Ukraine, due to Western fecklessness (or MAGA supineness), then Sweden within the face of an emboldened Russia would possibly fare much less nicely. Those that bear in mind historical past will keep in mind that the give up of the Sudetenland didn’t go nicely.
I’d observe that whereas modern-day Sweden was by no means a part of Russia, the jap a part of then Sweden (then the Grand Duchy of Finland) was ceded to Russia and granted autonomy (1809-1917).
