Why Sweden Is Immune To Wars

In Finland we have a joke about this: What is the Swedish official defense plan? -Finland

The Nordic Alliance would have been such a cool addition to European politics. And I'm probably one of the few in Scandinavia who would have liked Scandinavia to be united as one nation, though it would have had to happen much earlier (as a follow up on the Kalmar union probably) in order for everyone to actually feel like they are Scandinavian, rather than Norwegian, Danish, Swedish. If all the nations in the north united (Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Iceland and Finland) We would have close to 30 mil pop and probably one of the strongest economies in Europe. This would also include Greenland, Shetland and the Faeroe Islands giving us complete domination of the North Sea. Well shit Now I need to play EU4 again...

As a Swede it's really interesting to see Sweden portrayed from the outside. It's so common in pop culture that we are confused with Switzerland or sound German and är named something Norwegian. This was a breath of fresh air and I learn a lot about or more recent military history. Thanks!

Sweden wasn't immune to war during WW2, or rather: not immune to blackmail. As all international trade with countries other than Germany and Finland had to go through the Skagerrak (the wide strait between Norway and Denmark), anyone controlling those waters and/or the North Sea could cut off Sweden from imports vital to the rearmament and the overall supply of the population. There are people who think that Sweden should've joined the Allies in 1940 (the Allies who were quickly beaten by Germany), but they fail to recognize that Sweden was in a very weak position, with no offensive capacity (few tanks, obsolete aircraft, army in need of training, etc).

Sweden has individual security agreements with many countries during the application phase. Countries like Norway, Denmark, Finland, Germany, the UK, the Baltics, the US and Canada would all defend Sweden if needed

A big argument early on for the option of a northern defense alliance instead of nato was Finland, and how a nato membership could affect Finland during the "Finlandization"-era. Eventually the negotiations didn't work out, Norway and Denmark joined nato while Sweden stayed neutral with Finland and consequently I would argue few countries have a more interlinked national security strategy than Swe and Fi. When public opinion recently swung in Finland in favor of joining nato, this was the factor that tipped opinion in Sweden, even more than Russias invasion of Ukraine itself. Had Finland not wanted to join, Sweden would still have majority against joining nato.

I think it's funny that we always hear about the trade with Germany, but never the fact that Sweden kept the allied side in the war by selling them vital parts, like our full production of world class wheel bearings. Instead we hear some small thing about saving some Jews, which should be a given for any moral human. It's such a shallow reading of history that it almost becomes slander.

One of Sweden’s main strategy’s for avoiding conflict is that our military is heavily focused on being able to destroy incredibly expensive equipment with very cheap. There a small boat called “stridsbåt 20” that cost around 2 Million dollars that could quiet easily destroy much bigger ships worth anywhere from 10 million and up. There a somewhat famous atleast in Sweden story of a joint exercise between many countries were one Swedish submarine managed to sink a American hanger ship, those big ones with a lot of planes on top. If that had been for real the difference in money spent and enemy equipment destroyed would be astronomical.

It is slightly misleading to say Sweden controlled Finland. It is a bit like saying the US controlls California. And Finland was less of a State than California; it was simply the Eastern part of Sweden. The other areas pointed out on the map are regions in other countries that Sweden controlled for a while, but Finland had never been a separate country - it was practically a frontier ruled by nobody but every Finn for themselves, and then part of Sweden.

Thank you for giving a informative, historical and geopolitical video of my homeland Sweden. I always love when these sort of videos comes through, because I am always eager to hear what others have for information on Sweden.

1:36 The Swedish embassy is within the former embassy for the German Democratic Republic (better known as East Germany in the West). Today it is not just the Swedish embassy, but also the British and German embassies as well as a French Cooperation office. It serves as consular representation for Finland, Iceland, Italy, Canada, Australia, and protective force for the US too. We bought exactly a thousand Volvo 144s from Sweden in the 70s. Twice a year Sweden sends out new invoices that we still ignore. Why? Because they shared their Volvos with us, thus they're OUR Volvos.

The draft was actually reinstated a few years ago and is now slowly growing each year, once again giving us a good number of people capable of picking up weapons in defence of the country, as well as expanding our military. Also, we didn't just control Finland, Finland was a part of Sweden as much as Normandie is a part of France, to give an example. From the mid 13th century up until 1809 what is todays Finland was "just" the eastern part of Sweden, a fully integrated part of the country, not just controled by it. Except from that, great video :)

A bit of context should be given to Germany gaining access to Sweden to get to Finland. Germany and Finland was working with each other to stop the USSR from taking control of Finland. And Swede did not want Finland to fall to USSR. No, the more controversial bit is that Sweden also allowed German troops to pass though Sweden to get to Norway after Germany had invaded and taken control of Norway. That and the trade with Germany are the main points why many saw Sweden more as a puppet of the Nazi regime. Though in reality is more correct to say that Sweden made deals with both sides to try to stay out of the war. Since Sweden also provided a lot of information to the allies, which amongst other things help the allies sink Bismark. Switzerland also played this neutrality game not totally isolating themselves, but also not to try to favour one side too much. And that is the price of neutrality. You can not pick sides. You have to try to balance things so not to be drawn in to conflicts.

I would really like to see this series keep going, it's super interesting and informative to watch. Keep up the excellent work!

Very informative video. Thanks!

Off-topic a bit, but I am swedish and just wanna tell yall a fun fact. When my uncle was training in the military, they used water guns on each other to train. If I remember right, according to my uncle memories, he said every month a certain group of people in a certain age was forced to pick up water guns and fight other cities. That was all.

Dude I’m a Swede living in LA and you using stock footage form my hometown that’s taped during the summer made me cry. Damn that was an emotional rollercoaster lmao. Just random flashbacks.

Always a pleasure to wake up to an informative video on historical and modern geopolitics! Thanks for the great content!

8:53 Fun fact, on the yellow house on the far left, about one meter above the red canopy you can see a dark spot on the corner. That is actually a canon ball lodged into the wall. It was once said it was a stray cannon ball aimed at he Danish king Christian II (or "Christian the Tyrant") from 1520 during Gustav Vasa's siege of Stockholm (following the "The Stockholm Bloodbath"). Truth is however that when the house was rebuilt in 1795 the owner had the canon ball fitted into the wall in Memoriam of the siege, which had led to Christians retreat.

i actually am from sweden and i am very interested in history of the eu and scandinavia but i learned lot of new stuff watching this video keep up the good work and best of luck to you