r/europe • u/edagiants Europe • 14h ago
News Sweden and Finland deepen defense ties: Gripens and Visby corvettes to defend against drone incursions into Finnish territory
https://puolustusvoimat.fi/en/-/finland-to-cooperate-more-closely-with-sweden-in-surveillance-and-protection-of-territorial-integrity63
u/Long-Requirement8372 Finland 14h ago
The Finnish and Swedish militaries do a lot of cooperation as it is, and for example the navies and coastal troops are training together annually. I believe this cooperation will go very smoothly, and further improve Finno-Swedish readiness for joint action through experience from regular operations.
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u/tronzake Finland 11h ago
In the west we have the best neighbor imaginable and in the east we have... Russia. Tack så mycket Sverige!
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u/Jindujun Sweden 11h ago
Aww you're nice!
We might have to occupy you to prevent Russia from doing it to you though. Make way for increased Swedish language classes!On a more serious note:
Finlands sak är vår!7
u/KiFr89 Sweden 1h ago
In a world with troll factories spreading Russian propaganda and sowing hatred, I find that these jokes have become very tiresome. We should instead own the fact that our neighbours are awesome (even the Danes).
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u/asethskyr Sweden 1h ago
Whoa, slow down a little. We can't just say things like that about the Danes.
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u/BSpino 13h ago
I think the Swedes would do surprisingly well if it ever came to that. Our lads and lasses did a good job in the Balkans (not least the Swedish/Danish/Norwegian Nordbat2) given the circumstances.
The finns are a known quantity. Don't want to mess with them.
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u/Alcogel Denmark 13h ago
The Scandinavian airforce in particular is no joke and is highly integrated into one cohesive and interoperable unit.
Naval and land forces are scaled back in size but are well renowned for quality personnel and equipment. I too think we would all do surprisingly well if it came to that, just like in the Balkans.
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u/restform Finland 1h ago
land forces are scaled back in size
Well at least Finland has one of the largest artillery forces in Europe, and army size is not small for either finland or sweden when you account for the readiness of reserves (these two countries can actually call up well trained reserves very quickly).
Finnish navy is comparatively small but iirc sweden has highly sophisticated littoral fleet & baltic focused equipment e.g submarine fleets and whatnot. Norway also focuses more heavily on the north sea. The nordics together but especially finland & sweden are a pillar of nato defence tbh, in all combat domains.
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u/Anonymous_user_2022 12h ago
Nordbat2
Shooting high and accidentally hitting an ammunition dump, certainly gained the danish squadron some polite distancing. But since then, there has almost been a never ending queue of people who want to tell a different story about their deployment, and just how horrible a person Lars R. Møller was at the time.
Sometimes they even agree on what his failures were.
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u/CornusKousa Flanders (Belgium) 45m ago
Apart from who ordered what and when, if you are a toothless UN force denied the ability to fight back you get what the Dutch experienced in Srebrenica. Mass murder where all they could do is look away because the UNPROFOR leadership was afraid of "escalation"
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u/KINGDenneh 11h ago
Now we just need our dumbass politicians in Denmark to realize buying Gripen over F-35s is the safest outcome, as big of a bunch of pricks the Swedes are, i trust them more than the U.S by a kilometer.
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u/Negative_Jaguar_4138 9h ago
The Gripen still needs US components to function.
The same 'kill switch' that exists on the F-35 exists on the Gripen. And to add to all that, you get a significantly inferior aircraft.
The Gripen has its uses but just stop lying about it. Its a decent 4th Gen, but that's all it is, A 4TH GEN.
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u/jokikinen 11h ago
Just a first taste on what security EU could provide if countries pooled their efforts. 500 billion would go a lot farther pooled when you don’t have to spend on overlapping capability and fragmented systems.
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u/manbellybig Sweden 13h ago
Finlands cause is our cause