A long thread about Russification of brains and what to do about it 🧶

In a 1990 article in Svensk Tidskrift entitled ‘Why Wasn’t the Cause of the Balts Ours?’, (1/30)

Swedish journalist Janerik Larsson (@janeriklarsson) listed several factors that had contributed to Swedish ‘conspiracy of silence’ about the Baltic states in the Cold War period. (2/30)

These included deep lack of knowledge about their history and feelings of shame about Sweden’s past behaviour, which made it a difficult subject to discuss. But also, as he points out, (3/30)

there were two broader reasons: the Swedish inability to accept that nationalism can be a progressive force in international politics, and a fundamental acceptance of the principle of ‘might makes right’ in relation to the USSR. (4/30)

Regardless of whether the Soviet Union was still a world superpower in 1990, its historical stature had according to Larsson created a kind of ‘finlandisation of our brains’: a mixture of fear and fascination that had a paralysing effect. (5/30)

Sweden was of course far from unique in its mental finlandisation. At the time, there were few Western observers, including in the top echelons of politics and intelligence community, (6/30)

who were able to predict or even wish for the collapse of the Soviet Union in near future. Instead of being some nefarious plot to bring down the USSR (as often claimed by Russian propagandists obsessed with their Dolchstoßlegende), (7/30)

Western policy in these years was befuddled, reactive, and characterised by a deep streak of appeasement due to fears that Gorbachev might fall if not supported enough by the West.

In the end, of course, Gorbachev fell anyway, (8/30)

which contrary to all fears wasn’t a bad thing. Baltic liberation activists, long in disagreement with the morally dubious and irrationally pro-Soviet aspects of Western policy were vindicated, even if this did not earn them much praise or recognition. After all, (9/30)

nobody likes a Besserwisser, especially if it's your supposedly less civilised cousin.

But having failed to learn the lesson of the fall of the USSR, today’s Western assessments of Russia still repeat many of the same mistakes. (10/30)