https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/finland-set-join-nato-historic-shift-while-sweden-waits-2023-04-04/

Now that Finland has joined NATO, both side of the Gulf of Finland are NATO countries. Gulf is 20-30 miles across. Does this mean that St Petersburg can be cut off from the sea? I know Denmark and Turkey have declared some of their waters to be international to allow for shipping to pass through, but can't find anything similar for the Gulf of Finland.

Did Russia just lose it's biggest port, and now only has Crimea as its only warm-water port? Guessing not or the news would be making a much bigger deal about this story. Anyone familiar with international waters and navigation that can translate what effect this will have, specifically on St Petersburg?

Kaliningrad

ETA- I can't spell

None, the Gulf of Finland is mostly international waters but it could be easily corked in the event of war

If NATO was at war with Russia, then yes, most of its ports would be cut-off with the exception of Vladivostok.

But we aren't at war with Russia so the point is moot.

rgag12 said:

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If NATO was at war with Russia, then yes, most of its ports would be cut-off with the exception of Vladivostok.

But we aren't at war with Russia so the point is moot.

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The point is not moot.

The point is that NATO expansion is a very real threat to Russia's access to the seas. This threat is what caused the annexation of Crimea.

If we keep following ****ty foreign policy, Russia is going to continued to be backed into a corner. When that happens their response is always with a blundering hammer fisted attempt to "reclaim what is theirs".

While I can see the strategic advantages anyone that doesn't see how NATO is provoking the hell out of Russia is delusional. They can only ship through St Petersburg or the Black Sea (doesn't have to be through Crimea as they have other ports but it all has to go through the Bosporus. The Pacific ports are of little value because they are too far and have very limited access by train, rail, or pipeline and certainly not enough considering virtually all the population and value in Russia is on the European side.

It's literally why Peter the Great went to war to capture Azov on the Black Sea and later with Sweden to create St Petersburg, prior to that Russia was landlocked and cut off from the world for the most part. Catherine the Great took Crimea and built Sebastopol to protect that Black Sea shipping, anyone who thinks Crimea is more Ukrainian than Russian simply doesn't know history.

None of this means Putin is a good guy or that invading Ukraine was the right thing to do. It's just a reality that Russia cannot survive as a modern country without that sea access and threatening it is how wars get started. At a minimum it makes an already paranoid country with a ruthless dictator running it even more paranoid.

All of this is honestly hard for most Americans to even grasp because we have so many ports in so many directions and we haven't had a port in the Continental US even threatened since the War of 1812. People just look at Russia and see how big it is without realizing that the vast majority of it is about as valuable as the Badlands of Wyoming and they have a shockingly limited amount of sea access. When the USSR crumbled and they lost the Baltics and thus Riga as a Port to allow them to avoid the Gulf of Finland it was a massive blow strategically.

NATO can absolutely crush Russia's access to the world with little effort which is great and terrible at the same time. If Russia didn't have nukes it would be fantastic but they do.

Ags4DaWin said:

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rgag12 said:

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If NATO was at war with Russia, then yes, most of its ports would be cut-off with the exception of Vladivostok.

But we aren't at war with Russia so the point is moot.

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The point is not moot.

The point is that NATO expansion is a very real threat to Russia's access to the seas. This threat is what caused the annexation of Crimea.

If we keep following ****ty foreign policy, Russia is going to continued to be backed into a corner. When that happens their response is always with a blundering hammer fisted attempt to "reclaim what is theirs".

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NATO expansion poses no threat to Russia. NATO isn't the one going around and invading neighboring countries. Stop peddling this lie.

If the Baltic States and Poland weren't NATO members, Putin would have been putting the squeeze to them long ago.

This seems like a great time to let NATO be led by Europe and for us to see ourselves out. All of NATO is now easily a match for Russia, and should have no problem taking care of business without us.

P.H. Dexippus said:

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Kaliningrad

ETA- I can't spell

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Brings up another good question. That's also surrounded by NATO countries and doesn't even connect to Belarus. In a conflict, doesn't that port become mostly worthless too? Is Russia now at the mercy of Turkey? Pacific Coast is 3500 miles away and only connected by 1 rail line if I remember correctly. Murmansk is pretty dang cold most of the year. Is Russia's only option to deploy nukes if it gets in a tussle with NATO? Is cutting off energy supplies that big of a trump card? Maybe a much more in-depth discussion that what we can cover here.

Dies Irae said:

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This seems like a great time to let NATO be led by Europe and for us to see ourselves out. All of NATO is now easily a match for Russia, and should have no problem taking care of business without us.

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The Europeans certainly need to be goaded into doing more with regard to their own defense, but the US completely walking away would not help in that regard.

agnerd said:

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P.H. Dexippus said:

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Kaliningrad

ETA- I can't spell

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Brings up another good question. That's also surrounded by NATO countries and doesn't even connect to Belarus. In a conflict, doesn't that port become mostly worthless too? Is Russia now at the mercy of Turkey? Pacific Coast is 3500 miles away and only connected by 1 rail line if I remember correctly. Murmansk is pretty dang cold most of the year. Is Russia's only option to deploy nukes if it gets in a tussle with NATO? Is cutting off energy supplies that big of a trump card? Maybe a much more in-depth discussion that what we can cover here.

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Murmansk has become more viable as a year round port with the warming of the Arctic Ocean, but it's remoteness (connected to the rest of Russia by a single road which runs rather close to the Finnish border) puts it in the same boat as Kaliningrad and St. Petersburg as far as being vulnerable to being cutoff in a conflict with NATO. Frankly, the only smart move for the Russians is to avoid a conflict with NATO. But, short of open hostilities, NATO is not likely to blockade Russian these ports as that is considered an act of war. Transit through the Bosphorus is controlled by treaty, although the Turks do have some discretion on allowing naval vessels through the strait.

twk said:

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Ags4DaWin said:

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rgag12 said:

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If NATO was at war with Russia, then yes, most of its ports would be cut-off with the exception of Vladivostok.

But we aren't at war with Russia so the point is moot.

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The point is not moot.

The point is that NATO expansion is a very real threat to Russia's access to the seas. This threat is what caused the annexation of Crimea.

If we keep following ****ty foreign policy, Russia is going to continued to be backed into a corner. When that happens their response is always with a blundering hammer fisted attempt to "reclaim what is theirs".

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NATO expansion poses no threat to Russia. NATO isn't the one going around and invading neighboring countries. Stop peddling this lie.tt

If the Baltic States and Poland weren't NATO members, Putin would have been putting the squeeze to them long ago.

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That logic only works if you assume that NATO is only friendly and would never have hostile intentions toward Russia. Now you can make that argument but Russia has been invaded by NATO countries many, many times in their history so expecting them to just agree to it is naive if not delusional. Russia wants to protect their very fragile interests.

Another issue is Kaliningrad which now is going to be a real hot button. It's completely cut off from Russia proper and in order to access it from Russia ally Belarus you have to go across 60 miles of NATO territory on the Poland/Lithuania border With Finland joining NATO now the sea access from St Petersburg is also controlled by NATO. Russia has the bulk of their Baltic fleet there along with nukes. It is the only Russian port that does not freeze in the Baltics. It's not really about the trade value since most of that comes from St Petersburg but it has tremendous military value to Russia. It's also a highly contested area historically that was part of Germany and was given to the USSR at Postdam because FDR was a fool at death's door.

If we keep treating Russia in a way where NATO can do whatever they want and Russia has to accept it because Putin is bad it's going to continue to escalate the situation. I don't see how trying to push Russia into a war with NATO benefits us at all.

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Now you can make that argument but Russia has been invaded by NATO countries many, many times in their history so expecting them to just agree to it is naive if not delusional.

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The counter to that rather credulous claim (given that those invasions happened before NATO was created) is that Russia has invaded NATO members historically, too. It's not one way traffic even with that weak appeal to rather dated history. So, the Russians get to play the history card, but no one else does?

Ags4DaWin said:

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rgag12 said:

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If NATO was at war with Russia, then yes, most of its ports would be cut-off with the exception of Vladivostok.

But we aren't at war with Russia so the point is moot.

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The point is not moot.

The point is that NATO expansion is a very real threat to Russia's access to the seas. This threat is what caused the annexation of Crimea.

If we keep following ****ty foreign policy, Russia is going to continued to be backed into a corner. When that happens their response is always with a blundering hammer fisted attempt to "reclaim what is theirs".

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It is moot, the threat of war with Russia is extremely small. The talking point about Russia having to go to war because it's getting squeezed out by NATO is laughable. That would only make sense if Russia wanted to A) get beaten so badly that it would risk getting broken up or B) End civilization (by exchanging nukes)

The NATO encroachment non-sense is only parroted out by Russia as an excuse for what clearly is regional expansionist aspirations. Putin and the old guard want to put back together the Russian Empire, that's what's driving their foreign policy. An expanding NATO does not interfere with Russian commerce. Again, the only reason why NATO encroachment worries Russia because it makes influencing/taking former empire territory tougher. And even though it makes it tougher, it's not something they'd go to war over the west over. They aren't idiots.

Ags4DaWin said:

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rgag12 said:

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If NATO was at war with Russia, then yes, most of its ports would be cut-off with the exception of Vladivostok.

But we aren't at war with Russia so the point is moot.

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The point is not moot.

The point is that NATO expansion is a very real threat to Russia's access to the seas. This threat is what caused the annexation of Crimea.

If we keep following ****ty foreign policy, Russia is going to continued to be backed into a corner. When that happens their response is always with a blundering hammer fisted attempt to "reclaim what is theirs".

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Finland had 0 intention of joining NATO until Russia's latest adventure. Neither did the Swedes. If Russia could stop ****ing around with their neighbors and either invading or trying to prop up/buy off their leadership, NATO expansion wouldn't happen.

Stop *****ing about "our" ****ty policy and excusing theirs. No one has backed Russia into a corner except Russia.

Ags4DaWin said:

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rgag12 said:

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If NATO was at war with Russia, then yes, most of its ports would be cut-off with the exception of Vladivostok.

But we aren't at war with Russia so the point is moot.

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The point is not moot.

The point is that NATO expansion is a very real threat to Russia's access to the seas. This threat is what caused the annexation of Crimea.

If we keep following ****ty foreign policy, Russia is going to continued to be backed into a corner. When that happens their response is always with a blundering hammer fisted attempt to "reclaim what is theirs".

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NATO is only a threat to you if you decide its a threat to you. NATO has never shown any interest in getting in an actual fight with Russia. They've gone out of their way to toe that line in Ukraine.

No one is trying to back Russia into a corner. Russia has backed themselves into a corner. NATO should have essentially lost its purpose after the fall of the Soviet Union. Indeed, NATO was headed towards a metaphorical rubbish bin but Russia has been determined over the last decade or so to make NATO very relevant. (Or maybe a little further back, to when Medvedev got suckered into getting involved in Georgia the first time.)

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dated history.

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In your mind but never to Arabs, Russians, Koreans, Chinese...

It doesn't matter how Russia gets in the corner, it bodes ill for the world, regardless.

PA24 said:

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I think a deal was made with Russia, me thinks the Ukraine war may be coming to an end.

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A deal with who? Considering the amount of heavy armor that was just pumped into Ukraine I am interested in hearing your thinking. I mean a country that has let their military turn to crap (Germany), just spent a boat load of money sending modern tanks to Ukraine.

twk said:

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Now you can make that argument but Russia has been invaded by NATO countries many, many times in their history so expecting them to just agree to it is naive if not delusional.

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The counter to that rather credulous claim (given that those invasions happened before NATO was created) is that Russia has invaded NATO members historically, too. It's not one way traffic even with that weak appeal to rather dated history. So, the Russians get to play the history card, but no one else does?

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You are making the moral argument. That's fine so long as you are ok with having a moral basis for going to war with Russia. I certainly am not arguing that Russia or Putin are moral or right or anything of the sort by Western logic. The problem is that Russia isn't Western and doesn't have Western values and they don't GAF about right and wrong.

From a "Russian" perspective they could say that allowing the Baltics into NATO was a de facto invasion since those countries were part of the USSR and have been Russian for much of their history. Of course no NATO country has militarily invaded Russia because NATO is a post nuclear Treaty and to do so would mean WWIII. It was NATO that decided to expand and not keep the countries that border Russia neutral or pro Russia. Now you can argue why that was a good thing and you have a strong moral argument to that effect but that doesn't make it any less of a provocation of Russia. Adding Finland (which Russia has also controlled large part of in fairly recent history) is also putting more fuel on the fire.

The Russians are a very proud people that have a very different view on human life and morality. They respect strength and still see themselves as great, that's why they support Putin and why so many Americans can't grasp how he is still popular in spite of all his terrible deeds. Russia isn't a place that has had many nice folks running it historically and when they did that nice person was usually killed or at least deposed. The people there are as harsh as the land is.

So fundamentally it comes down to this. If you want a NATO war with Russia and to feel you have a moral basis for that war you are absolutely correct. If you want to avoid a war with Russia then continuing to provoke them is a very bad idea. As I mentioned if Russia didn't have nukes I wouldn't much care. Hell if there were no nukes we could just roll into Moscow in short order because we have a massive conventional military advantage over Russia. They do have nukes though so that's all moot. Above all of that as well is what possible US interest is there in pissing off Russia and potentially going to war with them?

We have so many larger problems and the fact that Russia is a dying country demographically with a GDP smaller than Florida that would actually be even worse if it became a Failed State because we were able to remove Putin makes this even more foolish. Our strategy is based on a world that doesn't exist anymore.

Crimea is not Russia's only warm water port. That was always a lie. They have other ports and shoreline in the Black Sea.

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From a "Russian" perspective they could say that allowing the Baltics into NATO was a de facto invasion since those countries were part of the USSR and have been Russian for much of their history.

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The propagation of this "they're Russian because Russia invaded and ruled them for XX years" line really needs to end.

But it's propagation is always enlightening as to Russia's real motivations. They're still 1800s style imperialistic.

BQ78 said:

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It doesn't matter how Russia gets in the corner, it bodes ill for the world, regardless.

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It certainly does matter. We can't control what Russia does. We, and NATO, can only control our response. The best response to their continued aggression is a very strong defensive posture and continued positive relations with other countries in the region. If that ultimately means NATO expansion, then that is a function of Russia's ****ty decision making. The absolute worst way to respond is to do nothing at all and simply accept it lying down. That simply encourages more of the same in the same way that just watching a mugging or rape happen in broad daylight just encourages more of the same.

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So fundamentally it comes down to this. If you want a NATO war with Russia and to feel you have a moral basis for that war you are absolutely correct. If you want to avoid a war with Russia then continuing to provoke them is a very bad idea. As I mentioned if Russia didn't have nukes I wouldn't much care. Hell if there were no nukes we could just roll into Moscow in short order because we have a massive conventional military advantage over Russia. They do have nukes though so that's all moot. Above all of that as well is what possible US interest is there in pissing off Russia and potentially going to war with them?

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How about this: If we want to avoid war with Russia, we create a purely defensive alliance of nations, many of whom have been invaded by the Russians in living memory, and demonstrate our peaceful intentions by not invading for almost 80 years, while at the same time, preparing ourselves to propel aggressive action so as not to invite same.

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Russia is going to continued to be backed into a corner. When that happens their response is always with a blundering hammer fisted attempt to "reclaim what is theirs".

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Russia can't do **** without assuring their own destruction.

I seen ZERO percent chance there would ever be a conventional war between NATO and Russia

NATO would literally annihilate most of the Russian military in a week

which then means... limited nuclear weapons exchange.

St Petersburg is now very easy to blockade and it makes invading the Baltic states much harder

Once Sweden joins and Gotland becomes available to NATO expect it to become an unsinkable aircraft carrier/middle batteries able to instantly attack Kaliningrad

The downside is that now Russia has even more need to keep Ukraine to keep its access to the Black seas warm water ports open

It's not like St. Petersburg is a useful military port. The Russians can't get to the Atlantic in a time of war even without Finland as a part of NATO. It pinches down between Denmark & Norway.

Even before Finland joined NATO, they worked closely with the West, it's not like they would be neutral in a conflict and Russia has known that for years.

PA24 said:

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TacosaurusRex said:

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PA24 said:

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I think a deal was made with Russia, me thinks the Ukraine war may be coming to an end.

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A deal with who? Considering the amount of heavy armor that was just pumped into Ukraine I am interested in hearing your thinking. I mean a country that has let their military turn to crap (Germany), just spent a boat load of money sending modern tanks to Ukraine.

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The weapons could be moved to the west part of Ukraine. Eastern Ukraine goes to the bad guys with the fall of Bakhmut. Crimea stays as is.

IMO

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Yea I am not following your line of thinking at all. I haven't seen that idea floated anywhere, especially over something like Bakhmut. Long term deals have been made recently for ammunition, and more MiG transfers. Who would have made this deal with Russia? Ukraine would throw several million more men at this before they agreed to give up a portion of their country that has such a large affect on their long term GDP.

EMY92 said:

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It's not like St. Petersburg is a useful military port. The Russians can't get to the Atlantic in a time of war even without Finland as a part of NATO. It pinches down between Denmark & Norway.

Even before Finland joined NATO, they worked closely with the West, it's not like they would be neutral in a conflict and Russia has known that for years.

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St Petersburg is Russia's largest commercial port by far. It's absolutely vital to their economy. Everyone talks about Stalingrad but the Russians were just as fierce protecting Petrograd (St Petersburg) because without it they were doomed.

The Baltic fleet is primarily in Kaliningrad to keep it from being boxed in as easily by NATO and able to avoid the Gulf of Finland. That's the military concern.

aggie93 said:

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EMY92 said:

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It's not like St. Petersburg is a useful military port. The Russians can't get to the Atlantic in a time of war even without Finland as a part of NATO. It pinches down between Denmark & Norway.

Even before Finland joined NATO, they worked closely with the West, it's not like they would be neutral in a conflict and Russia has known that for years.

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St Petersburg is Russia's largest commercial port by far. It's absolutely vital to their economy. Everyone talks about Stalingrad but the Russians were just as fierce protecting Petrograd (St Petersburg) because without it they were doomed.

The Baltic fleet is primarily in Kaliningrad to keep it from being boxed in as easily by NATO and able to avoid the Gulf of Finland. That's the military concern.

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It's vital without question to their economy, but trade/oil/gas from there is also vital to Central Europe. (The battle of Jutland is one of the most remarkable naval engagements of the 20th century, imho).

Securing the Baltic past the Brits/Scandinavians/nato/US etc. long term is practically impossible from a Russian perspective I'd guess, but this just escalates things a bit further.

twk said:

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So fundamentally it comes down to this. If you want a NATO war with Russia and to feel you have a moral basis for that war you are absolutely correct. If you want to avoid a war with Russia then continuing to provoke them is a very bad idea. As I mentioned if Russia didn't have nukes I wouldn't much care. Hell if there were no nukes we could just roll into Moscow in short order because we have a massive conventional military advantage over Russia. They do have nukes though so that's all moot. Above all of that as well is what possible US interest is there in pissing off Russia and potentially going to war with them?

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How about this: If we want to avoid war with Russia, we create a purely defensive alliance of nations, many of whom have been invaded by the Russians in living memory, and demonstrate our peaceful intentions by not invading for almost 80 years, while at the same time, preparing ourselves to propel aggressive action so as not to invite same.

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Sure, from a NATO perspective that makes sense because we consider it "Defensive" even though it keeps expanding on the Russian border and multiple NATO countries are openly offering aid and support to Ukraine which is not a NATO country.

Like I said, from a moral perspective, especially a Western moral perspective, we have the high ground and justification to continue to isolate Russia and grow NATO. From a Russian perspective they see it very differently. So as long as you are ok with WWIII I suppose that's fine. It won't be conventional because NATO will obliterate Russia conventionally in short order.

So you are betting that Putin will back down and admit defeat rather than use limited nuclear strikes betting that NATO doesn't have the guts to actually respond with nukes in turn. BTW, he will start in Ukraine because it isn't in NATO and test to see what we do (I would really, really like to be wrong on this btw). There still is no clear expectation of what NATO will do if Putin nukes Kiev for instance. If you don't think Putin is willing to sacrifice millions of Russians in a limited nuclear exchange if he has to then you don't know much about Putin, he sees this as a fight for survival for Russia (for right or wrong). Is Ukraine a fight for survival for NATO?

If we aren't then we better be looking for an off ramp and a peace deal. We already won the big prize, we exposed the Russian military to be Saddam's Iraq in terms of a threat and have taken years off the clock of the limited amount of time Russia had left to be relevant. They are a desperate country and we are pushing them into potentially becoming a vassal of China potentially as well. All of this for Eastern Ukraine which has no value from a US perspective?

I'm fine with standing up to bullies and protecting our interests but if we are risking WWIII and a country with thousands of nuclear weapons capable of making our entire country glow in the dark it better be for a lot better reasons than we think it's morally wrong that Russia is trying to take over Eastern Ukraine.

BTW, we opened the door with the Afghan withdrawal and not making a clear statement of what would happen with a Russian invasion of Ukraine. Russia doesn't know when we are serious and when we aren't because we have incompetent leadership so they are going to test our limits until they find them. That's how this works.