Finland–NATO relations
bilateral relations
Finland has been a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) since 4 April 2023. In the aftermath of World War II, following the formation of NATO in 1949 and throughout the Cold War, Finland maintained a position of neutrality, in what became known as Finlandization, in the face of its often complicated relations with the Soviet Union.
The possibility of membership became a topic of debate in the country after the end of the Cold War and following the country's accession to NATO's Partnership for Peace (PfP) programme and the European Union (EU) in the mid-1990s. In spite of these new bonds to Europe and the West, public support for NATO accession remained low.
The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine marked a turning point in the debate, and swung public opinion in favour of NATO membership. Along with neighboring Sweden, the country applied to join NATO on 18 May 2022. Following ratification, Finland became a member of NATO on 4 April 2023. Finland has a 1,340-kilometre (830 mi) border with Russia, which upon accession more than doubled NATO's pre-existing border with Russia.
History
Background: Finnish neutrality at the end of World War II
At the end of World War II, Finland had to cut its ties with Germany, with which it had allied against the Soviet Union in the Continuation War. Following the war, foreign policy was guided by the Paasikivi–Kekkonen doctrine, which aimed to ensure Finland's survival as an independent sovereign, democratic, and capitalist state next to the Communist Soviet Union.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Finland–NATO relations” is bilateral relations. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Finland, NATO and relations, not as a finished interpretation.
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This entry incorporates text from “Finland–NATO relations” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.