Linkkejä kirjan saamista kommenteista ja arvioista
1. Tohtori Teija Tiilikaisen arvio Europa-lehdessä 18.11.2009
http://www.digipaper.fi/europa/36048/
2. Toimittaja Hanna Kaarron uutisjuttu Helsingin Sanomien nettilehdessä 18.11.2009
http://www.hs.fi/politiikka/artikkeli/Unto Hämäläinen Nato-optiota ei ole enää olemassa/1135250854692
3. Professori Tuomas Forsbergin arvio Helsingin Sanomissa 21.11. 2009
http://www.hs.fi/kirjat/artikkeli/Juhlakirja tempaa mukaansa/HS20091121SI1KU04ty1
4. Ulkoministeri Alexander Stubbin blogikirjoitus 23.11.2009
http://www.alexstubb.com/fi/blog/1492/
5. Toimittaja Pentti Mannisen uutisjuttu Verkkoapilassa 18.11.2009
http://www.verkkoapila.fi/opencms/opencms/apila/news/articles/6537.html?view=newsday&d=20091118
6. Jussi Lähteen blogikirjoitus Aamulehdessä 18.11.2009
http://aamulehdenblogit.ning.com/profiles/blogs/jos-natooptio-on-valhetta
7. Päätoimittaja Matti Kalliokosken kolumni Ilkka-lehdessä 25.11. 2009
http://www.ilkka.fi/Article.jsp?article=463926
BBC Monitoring Europe – Political Supplied by BBC Worldwide Monitoring
November 20, 2009 Friday
Finnish analyst says NATO membership option no longer exists
LENGTH: 468 words
Text of report by Finish popular conservative newspaper Helsingin Sanomat website, on 18 November
[Report by Hanna Kaarto: ”Unto Hamalainen: NATO Option No Longer Exists”]
Finland”s ”NATO option” has run away far into the future, so that it is no longer even visible. In fact, it no longer exists, according to Helsingin Sanomat [Finnish daily] monthly supplement reporter Unto Hamalainen in his book Rupatellen Eurooppaan [Chatting Into Europe], to be published on Wednesday www.atoledo.com [ 18 November].
According to Hamalainen, the rapid rise in popularity of the True Finns and Timo Soini has driven ever farther Finland”s possibility of joining NATO, because the three biggest parties the Centre Party, Coalition Party and the Social Democrats must balance ever more carefully in their statements.
Out of the parties only the Coalition Party is openly advocating NATO membership, but even it has to tone down its talk of NATO in fear of Soini.
Hamalainen is also known for his blog Perassahiihtaja published in HS.fi [daily”s website]. Rupatellen Eurooppaan is a history of the Euroklubi [Euroclub] founded in 1989 and at the same time a review of Finland”s foreign and EU political debate in the past two decades.
”Of the Social Democrats and the Centre Party, Soini has already stolen all the possibilities concerning NATO membership,” Hamalainen analyses.
”Three equally strong parties are battling over the position of the biggest party and the prime minister”s seat, and in fear of losing their support they need to keep an eye on the True Finns.”
Hamalainen does not believe that Finland”s alliance policy will change at all after the 2011 parliamentary elections any more than after the 2012 presidential elections.
Finland”s ”westernization,” which has included joining the EU with all its preliminary stages and joining the euro, has now come to a halt. Even a couple of years ago both those supporting and those opposing NATO membership believed that Finland”s joining NATO was only a matter of some years, Hamalainen notes.
During the term of the next government, arms will get ever more expensive, the defence budget cannot be increased, no alliance options exist and still there is a need to maintain credible defence. In Hamalainen”s opinion, this narrows the next government”s room for manoeuvre.
According to him, the result will be that Finland remains an ”assisting member” of NATO, just as it is now, i.e. diligently participating in NATO cooperation but not seeking membership.
In the same way Finland used to an assisting member of EFTA, the Council of Europe and the EC, notes Hamalainen.
”In the long history of westernization we have already returned to the same pretentious model. We say one thing in public but do another in secret,” he says.
Source: Helsingin Sanomat website, Helsinki, in Finnish 18 Nov 09