The Nordic–Baltic Area: Divisive Geopolitics at Work

Abstract

States in the Nordic–Baltic area reacted heterogeneously to the Iraq War operation: Denmark chose to participate; Iceland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania supported the operation diplomatically or materially; whereas Norway, Finland and Sweden were negative. The research tool used to explain this pattern is the parsimonious theory of ‘past and present geopolitics’, taking issue with systemic neorealism, primarily. In spite of official rhetoric emphasizing Baghdad or New York (the UN), states’ driving forces were mainly found in their different salient environments. The primary explanation, proximate power balancing, was at work regarding Denmark, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Iceland, with no big neighbour, could enjoy profit bandwagoning, while Sweden and Finland followed ‘standard operating procedures’. A minor aberration from expectations is noted regarding Finland: its EU balancing rather than US balancing of Russia. The Norwegian ‘no’ and Danish warfare were both an expression of geopolitical freedom of manoeuvre.

Notes

¹The author is grateful to several anonymous reviewers for valuable comments on a previous draft.

²The focus in this paper is on state positioning in relation to the Iraq War from 20 March 2003 with a dubious UN mandate (upon the May UN recognition of a stabilisation force in Iraq, additional states chose to contribute). For a brief survey of the crisis at the European level, see Mouritzen (2005, 212–214).

³‘Parallel action’ means synchronic behaviour driven by a mixture of cooperation and competition. The states involved are normally subject to roughly similar geopolitical conditions. See Mouritzen (1997a, 37–42) or Mouritzen and Wivel (2005, 190–193).

⁴See also Miles (2005, 98).

⁵‘United We Stand’, 30 January 2003.

⁶These figures and those below for other states are derived from a Gallup International survey, January 2003. People were asked, ‘If military action goes ahead against Iraq, do you think your country should or should not support this action?’

⁷‘Statement of the Vilnius Group Countries on Iraq’, 5 February 2003.

⁸In Torshälla, Sweden, on 5 March 2003. As formulated in the minutes of the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, ‘discussions concerning Iraq and the Middle East had the character of a general exchange of views’.

⁹On interdependence and its background factors as a set of catalysts for the grip of systemic structure on its units, see, for example, Christensen and Snyder (1990).

¹⁰Therefore, it is seen here as appropriate to operate with ‘power balancing’ rather than ‘threat balancing’ (Walt 1987) as the general category, and keep the latter as a subcategory. In other words, we are back to Waltz (1979) in emphasising power instead of threat, but it is proximate power (projection ability) that is at stake.

¹¹In Glenn Snyder's terms, abandonment is generally more feared than entrapment (Snyder 1984).

¹²For instance Belgium, Luxembourg and Austria by France and/or Germany. See van Staden (2005).

¹³Ideological identification was also crucial, of course.

¹⁴See the notion of ‘national strategic culture’ (Sedivy and Zaborowski 2004, 192–193).

¹⁵The book referred to builds on the sociological theory of Lewis Coser (1956). For a different application of Coser's theory, see Schweller (2004). On worst case scenarios, see Buzan (1991, 140–142).

¹⁶See the survey in Mouritzen and Wivel (2005).

¹⁷See Mastanduno and Kapstein (1999).

¹⁸In the American debate on systemic balancing against bandwagoning, the notion of ‘soft balancing’ has been introduced and discussed, primarily as an auxiliary concept to comprehend the European Iraq crisis: ‘Although soft balancing relies on non-military tools, such as international institutions, economic statecraft, and strict interpretations of neutrality, it aims to have a real, if indirect, effect on the military prospects of a superior state’ (Pape 2003, 6). The concept of soft balancing is redundant in the present context, since the political competition that seems to be the essence of the European Iraq conflict is conveniently captured by the concept of ‘proximate power balancing’.

¹⁹Author's interviews with high-level sources in the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs (10 November 2005 and 11 January 2006).

²⁰Speech at Vilnius University, 24 May 2004. Quoted from Ojanen and Raik (2005).

²¹None of the Baltic countries, though, felt particularly comfortable about being classified as US dependants (‘New Europe’). See Joenniemi (2005) or the speech by Latvian President Vike-Freiberga, ‘What is Old and What is New? Europe after the Enlargement of the EU’, 5th Annual Baltic Development Forum Summit, Riga, 6 October 2003, < www.am.gov.lv>.

²²See Bailes and Thorhallsson (2006).

²³Still, Finland wishes others to keep the US in. As pointed out by Ojanen (2005), Finland still perceives the role of the US to be pivotal in the north, and does not want EU defence plans to push the US out. At any rate, should Finland change its mind, unexpectedly, regarding its own NATO membership, it will have no problems getting a NATO entrance ticket; no doors have been shut in this regard.

²⁴See, for instance, Lodgaard (2002).

²⁵See Berthelsen (2005, 110–115).

²⁶Meaning that by safeguarding its reputation as an honest broker in international conflicts, Norway will be allowed to pursue its more specific self-interest in issue areas like fishing or oil. See Berthelsen (2005, 51–52).

²⁷See Rasmussen (2003a).

²⁸Rasmussen has never been an ideological European. ‘I belong to those who … do not believe in one common [EU] foreign policy—but one that is as common as possible’ (quoted in Larsen and Nielsen 2003).

²⁹Author's interviews with high-level sources in the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs (10 November 2005 and 11 January 2006).

³⁰See Rasmussen (2003a).

³¹See also Rasmussen (2003b).

³²The footnotes refer to reservations inserted by Denmark in NATO communiqués, stressing détente instead of the deployment of intermediate range nuclear forces (INF) missiles in Western Europe.

³³The Prime Minister has been criticised by historians for trying to win easy moral victories by playing the ‘hero’ in a later, much more favourable historical epoch. See ‘1940–45: Historikere vrede over Fogh’, Politiken, 3 May, 1st section, 2.

³⁴Note also Rasmussen's rather uncompromising handling of the Danish cartoon crisis, 2005–2006.

³⁵An alternative explanation for Danish warfare could be the rapid Danish adaptation to the military requirements of the post-Cold-War era (mobile ground forces for peace enforcement) compared with the other Nordic countries, where the Cold War environment had lasted longer (Jakobsen 2006). However, since the military contribution to the Iraq War was one corvette and one submarine, this explanation is hardly relevant in this situation (later, after the UN recognition of a stabilisation force, Denmark sent ground forces).

³⁶It might be replied, of course, that these perspectives do not pretend to deal with secondary powers. If this view (a little too convenient in the present author's view) is held, they are simply not relevant to the states treated in this article.

³⁷The conflictual relationship between Russia, on the one hand, and Estonia and Latvia, on the other, may be an exception to this.

³⁸See TV2 Nettavisen, 12 March 2003; Bergens Tidende, 13 March 2003.

³⁹See Berthelsen (2005, 107–108).

⁴⁰Author's interview, Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 10 November 2005.

⁴¹Denmark's participation in it now seems to lie in ruins, at least in its original version, for another reason—the Danish cartoon crisis, 2005–2006.

⁴²Whether this difference will last beyond the Bush administration is, of course, another matter.

⁴³The general level of support for US action, of course, will depend on many factors, including whether military action has UN backing or not.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Hans Mouritzen

1 1The author is grateful to several anonymous reviewers for valuable comments on a previous draft.