Of Andreas Kluth*

As US president, Joe Biden was constantly using a peculiar phrase that showed two of the many ways in which he was an awe -inspired rival for his successor, Donald Trump: The 46th president was a bad communicationist, but a good geopolitical strategy designer – The 47th president is the opposite.

Again and again, Biden boasted that the Russian president Vladimir Putin wanted ‘the Finnishization of NATO“But instead it got” the sorting of Finland “. Finnish and nodization are words with many syllables and mean little to ordinary Americans. You will not hear such rhetoric from Trump, who prefers the intense monosyllable Anglo -Saxon words. As a way of communicating the big strategy for voters, Biden’s phrase failed.

But the underlying great strategy that Biden was trying to advertise was a success – which Trump now negates.

The term “Finnish” was invented by West German scholars during the Cold War. He referred to the experience of Finland, which had twice repeated the Soviet Union’s invasion, once in the Winter War of 1939 and another as an ally of Nazi Germany between 1941 and 1944. In a bitter truce, it granted about 10% of its territory in Moscow and agreed. But it remained an independent nation.

The agreement later called Finnish began in 1948 with a treaty between Helsinki and Moscow. For the privilege of remaining otherwise dominant, Finland has agreed to comply with Soviet foreign policy and avoid closer links with NATO, USA and Western Europe.

Finnish in this narrow sense was gradually abolished only after the Cold War, with steps that the Ukrainians are dreaming of today. In 1995, Finland joined the European Union. And during Biden’s term in 2023, responding to Putin’s aggression, he finally entered NATO’s alliance. (Soon she was followed by another Scandinavian country that was proud of its neutrality, Sweden). Today, Finland is firmly ranked as the most “happy” country in the world.

For a long time, Finnish has gained its general importance. Although the phenomenon was possible only because Finland was very brave and strong to defeat it (but too weak to defeat), the word became derogatory and referred to any situation in which a weaker country resigns of part of its sovereignty to reassure a stronger force.

In this sense, Finnish usually takes the form of inadvertent neutrality or non -alliance with another and subordination to a dominant one. Mongolia, which both Moscow and Beijing consider a neutral state, has been described as Finnish- as well as some of the so-called “Stan” countries in Central Asia, such as Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, etc. Taiwan has discussed whether Finnish would be the right way to keep it.

Putin’s original plan for Ukraine was absolute conquest and submission. But when the brave Ukrainians, like the Finns in 1939, refused to Moscow this triumph, Putin was forced to do back. To tolerate the continuation of Ukraine, the country should be found forever except NATO, demilitarized and subordinate to the Kremlin. In short: Finnish. It has similar visions for example Moldova or Georgia (except NATO), even for Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania (located in NATO).

As the Biden government tried to explain, Putin’s threat is expanding even more. He wants to scare, and ideally to dismantle, not only Ukraine but the whole western alliance. With the invasion of Ukraine, it has also attacked the entire international class based on “rules”, which is based on the law and principle of national sovereignty, as guaranteed in the United Nations Charter.

Therefore, when Biden said that Putin finally managed to sail Finland, he was talking about something more than Finland’s accession to the Alliance. He meant that Russia had failed in a broader sense, because Ukraine – with American, European, and even Asian aid – defended itself and approached the West more and more. And the West, anything but terrified, was more united and determined to defend not only Ukraine but also the very idea of ​​national sovereignty.

Trump is heading to overturn these achievements. NATO has long despised, questioning the mutual defense clause at the heart of the Alliance and undermining the deterrent effect on Russia. Trump has despised individual allies – including Denmark, whose territory in Greenland is eyelash – and presents Putin as a fellow and powerful man. He has attacked the Ukrainian president at the Oval Office and, in the name of the trading of peace, seems to be satisfied with a possible truce that would be equivalent to capitulation of Ukraine.

Trump even seems willing to make some of his own finals. How else could one describe the kind of submission to the US that has in mind for Canada in the north or Panama to the south?

Biden understood the value of alliances and international order, while Trump did not. Biden was also bad for explaining foreign threats to Americans, while Trump knows how to frame voters.

*Andreas Kluth is a column of the Bloomberg Opinion column and deals with American diplomacy, national security and geopolitical.