Trump is expected in Helsinki on Sunday for his summit meeting with Putin. They have met twice before, but this will be the first one-to-one, with the others having been a part of conferences.
The previous summit in Helsinki between a US President and Russian one, was Clinton and Yeltsin, in 1997, who met eighteen times in all:
It has one journalist writing in the GUARDIAN today, well-known novelist, Sofi Oksanen:
The writer goes on to complain that no-one was allowed to tell the truth about, say, Estonia. I am not sure if I agree. I think she exaggerates to make a point, having an Estonia mother, frustrated by the situation in USSR Estonia. She concludes:
Of course, Finland has had to be 'diplomatic', as it were. However, I guess that is one take on it. Maybe she has been more politisicised than the average Finn.
Throw in the Trump 'Russia-gate' accusations and we can see that the world will have its eyes on this summit.
The previous summit in Helsinki between a US President and Russian one, was Clinton and Yeltsin, in 1997, who met eighteen times in all:
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Saturday, March 22, 1997; Page A01 HELSINKI, March 21—President Clinton and Russian President Boris Yeltsin reached agreement today on a surprising array of security and economic issues, including further sharp reductions in the two nations’ nuclear arsenals, after Yeltsin protested NATO expansion but agreed to negotiate a pact with the alliance. In the most ambitious accord, the two countries agreed in principle to negotiate a new arms control treaty that over the next decade would reduce the number of deployed strategic warheads by about a third from the levels agreed to—but not yet implemented—by Yeltsin and President Bush four years ago. They also agreed to discuss "possible measures" to eliminate tactical or "battlefield" nuclear weapons. Yeltsin, in an unexpected move, agreed that all the anti-missile systems now under development by the U.S. military were admissible under the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. Clinton, for his part, agreed to support Russia’s integration into global economic institutions and to give it a more formal role in the Group of Seven leading industrialized nations. |
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When the news broke that a Putin-Trump summit would be held in Helsinki, some comments made my ears prick up. In the international media there was talk of Finland having been chosen as a venue because it is “neutral ground”, a country deemed to have a history of neutrality, and where east-west meetings had been held during the cold war. But Finland today is nothing of the sort. It is a member of the European Union. It is not somewhere in a grey zone between Europe and Russia. When I was born in Finland in 1977, the country was deep in the throes of Finlandisation. Even though Finland had retained its independence, the Soviet Union used its influence to interfere in its weaker neighbour’s affairs. This was Finlandisation. In addition to foreign policy, this practice also affected national defence, the economy, education, the press, publishing, and even which foreign artists visited Finland or which movies we were able to see. The peace settlement that followed the continuation war (in which Finland and Nazi Germany fought as co-belligerents against the Soviet Union from 1941 to 1944) gave free rein to communists in our country. In the arts, which drew me from a young age, communist paeans rang out loud and clear. Academic research wasn’t safe, either. Honest study of the Soviet Union’s catastrophic economy and its society was ill-advised if you valued your career. |
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Finland was a psychological laboratory for the reach of Soviet power, a place where Moscow could conveniently study the impact of one its favourite tools: reflexive control – in which a subject is led to take a certain decision (apparently independently) by controlling of the information they receive. Today’s Russia used this method in the US in its effort to help Donald Trump become president. Finland’s Finlandisation served Moscow’s agenda well during the cold war, because it looked like a Nordic democracy and it created the impression the Soviet Union was able to live peaceably with those on its borders. No wonder Putin’s regime seems tempted to duplicate that scenario today in parts of Europe – not least in Ukraine. As a Finn, I know how bad a solution that would be. |
Of course, Finland has had to be 'diplomatic', as it were. However, I guess that is one take on it. Maybe she has been more politisicised than the average Finn.
Throw in the Trump 'Russia-gate' accusations and we can see that the world will have its eyes on this summit.
via International Skeptics Forum https://ift.tt/2KN32YB
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