Ukraine Is The Key

Help Ukraine beat Putin

Which weakens Iran

Which weakens Hamas and the Houthis

Which removes a fair part of Netanyahu's rationale for holding power

Which eases tensions across the board in the middle east

All of which tells Xi he'd better watch his ass.

Can You Say "Containment"?

This past April, Finland was admitted to NATO. That in itself had to have been galling enough to Putin, but the deal to add Sweden is nearing a close as well.

Now Finland has agreed to put US forces on Finnish ground, and that has to be giving Putin nightmares.

The kicker there (for me) is that it's another Biden master stroke. Putin doesn't just have to worry about another 700 miles of border with a NATO member - now it's 700 miles of border with a NATO member that has large quantities of knock-your-dick-in-the-dirt courtesy of Uncle Sam (that whupass is about 100 miles from St Petersburg). And that means the Russians have to defend even more border areas, when they can't defend what they already had - which could mean a little less pressure on Ukraine.

Seems pretty smart to me.

Finland to sign defence pact with US

HELSINKI, Dec 14 (Reuters) - Finland will on Monday Dec. 18 sign a defence cooperation agreement with the United States, the Finnish government said on Thursday, to grant the U.S. military broad access across the Nordic country to the vicinity of its long border with Russia.

Russia's Nordic neighbour Finland became the NATO military alliance's newest member earlier this year in response to Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

"The fact that there will be no need to agree on everything separately, makes organising peace time operations easier, but above all it can be vital in a crisis," Finland's Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen told reporters.

The agreement with the United States is aimed at allowing swift military access and aid to Finland in case of conflict, officials said ahead of the announcement.

The agreement lists 15 facilities and areas in Finland to which the U.S. military will have unimpeded access and where it can also store military equipment and ammunition.

The areas will include four airbases, a military port and railway access to northern Finland, where the U.S. military will have a storage area alongside a railway that leads up to the Russian border, the agreement showed.

As Reuters reported in July, Finland is currently improving its railway infrastructure on its Swedish border, to make it easier for allies to send reinforcements and equipment from across the Atlantic to Kemijarvi, an hour's drive from the Russian border and seven hours from Russia's nuclear bastion and military bases near Murmansk in the Kola peninsula.

Neighbouring Sweden, which has also asked to join NATO but has been left waiting due to resistance from existing members Turkey and Hungary, signed a similar agreement with the U.S. last week, giving it access to 17 areas including four air bases, one harbour and five military camps.

Among other NATO members, the U.S. has signed similar agreements with Norway, Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Estonia, while the one with Denmark is pending approval.

Finland will not allow storage or transport of nuclear and biological weapons or anti-personnel mines on its territory, in line with international non-proliferation treaties it has committed to previously, officials said.

The U.S. military can have a permanent presence and regular exercises in Finland, but there are no plans for permanent bases, they said.

The agreement will be signed in Washington D.C. on Monday, before official ratification by legislators in both countries.