NATO Chief Says Turkey Will Back Sweden's Membership

Facts

• According to NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg, Turkish Pres. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has agreed to support Sweden's bid to join the Atlantic Alliance. This comes after Erdoğan previously accused Sweden of hosting Kurdish militants and saying Turkey would only back Sweden if the EU re-opened membership talks with Ankara.¹
• Following talks Monday in Lithuania with Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson, Erdoğan said his country will vote to make Sweden the bloc's 32nd member.²
• In his announcement, coming before the NATO summit was to begin in Vilnius, Lithuania Tuesday, Stoltenberg said that as part of the agreement, NATO will also increase its efforts in counterterrorism and trade with Turkey, adding that Sweden agreed to establish a new bilateral security accord.³
• Regarding EU membership, Erdoğan said, "Turkey has been waiting at the door of the European Union for over 50 years now, and almost all of the NATO member countries are now members of the European Union."⁴
• Hungary had also held out of voting to approve Sweden, but Stoltenberg said that Budapest "has made it clear that they will not be the last to ratify" and that "that problem will be solved."¹

Sources: ¹BBC News, ²Forbes, ³NBC, and ⁴Al Jazeera.

Narratives

• Pro-establishment narrative, as provided by Vox. Sweden has endured a lot of bullying from Turkey to get to this moment, but, thankfully, Erdoğan finally made the right decision. Sweden, as well as Finland, has a strong track record of not only upholding democratic institutions but cooperating with NATO despite not receiving membership. This is a great day for the West as Russia continues its aggressive tactics against Ukraine and threatens its EU neighbors.
• Establishment-critical narrative, as provided by The National Interest. Common sense would tell you that expanding a nuclear-capable military alliance on Russia's doorstep is a bad idea on its own, but history also shows us why this will only aggravate Moscow further and put these newest members at risk. Finland and Sweden did just fine as neutral parties for decades, with strong militaries and developed uncorrupt political systems. Turkey's sudden about-face in sync with a discussion about its own EU membership is suspect as well.