Finland Sent Russia a NUCLEAR Message... With Love!

Name: Finland Sent Russia a NUCLEAR Message... With Love!
Uploaded: 2026-06-23T16:22:04+00:00
Duration: 17 min
Channel: The Military Show

00:00When Finland joined NATO, it shattered an illusion that Putin was trying to create.

00:05The Russian president's threats amounted to nothing. Finland thumbed its nose at Putin and

00:10did the one thing that he didn't want to see. But now things are getting so much worse for

00:15Russia's president. Finland just sent Russia a dangerous nuclear message. The NATO alliance has

00:22been further strengthened. As for Putin, he's just learned that the nuclear threats that he

00:27likes to throw around so readily can be matched by a power much greater than Russia's.

00:32Hold on a second, you might be saying, we're going to stop you right there. Finland doesn't

00:37have nuclear weapons, so how could it present a nuclear threat to Russia? Good question.

00:41And you are right, Finland doesn't have nukes. But what it does have is a 1,335 kilometre border

00:49with Russia and membership in a collective defence organisation that does bring plenty of nukes to

00:54a fight. And that's Putin's problem. Finland isn't saying that it will hit Russia with nuclear weapons.

01:00It's saying that for the first time, it's going to allow nukes to be stationed on its territory,

01:06ready to strike at a moment's notice if Putin's threats transform from bluster into reality.

01:12On June 17, Finnish lawmakers sat down to cast their votes on a new law that changes everything. And by

01:19a

01:19margin of 125 to 61, the vote passed. What this means is that Finland has just lifted a decades-long

01:27ban on nuclear weapons, which marks perhaps the largest shift in the country's military posture

01:32since World War II. The deepening integration with NATO is evident in this decision. But for Russia,

01:39the massive problem this decision poses is that it finally means that NATO has the opportunity to

01:45station nuclear weapons right on the border with Russia. This is Putin's worst nightmare.

01:51And it's not a decision that Finland has taken lightly. Taking to X in the wake of the vote,

01:56Finnish Defence Minister Antti Hakkinen said that this was a move that was a long time in the making.

02:01The overall nuclear weapons policy has been one of the most challenging issues in the Ministry of

02:06Defence during this parliamentary term. Years of study, discussions with nuclear weapons states and

02:11other allies and assessments of how Finland's security can be best strengthened in NATO, he declared,

02:16as he labelled the decision essential to Finland's security and the wider NATO posture against Russia.

02:22The Finnish nuclear ban has been torn up. This decision paves the way for Finland to receive,

02:28transport and facilitate the movement of nuclear weapons throughout its territory,

02:33which runs counter to the posture that it had held for years.

02:36Before the Ukraine war, Finland wanted to avoid antagonizing Russia. That's why it stayed out

02:42of NATO, and it's why nuclear weapons on Finnish territory weren't even being discussed.

02:46But everything changed after Putin launched his invasion. Now Russia is a threat, conventionally

02:52and on the nuclear front. With that change, Finland has to adapt, and the passing of this new law,

02:58or more accurately, the tearing to shreds of an old law, is Finland's way of accepting the reality it

03:03faces in the 2020s, while letting Putin know that he can't have everything his own way.

03:09Putin's goal, both with the Ukraine war and beyond, is to present Russia as a major threat to

03:13every country in Europe that doesn't ask, how high, when Putin says, jump. The Ukraine invasion was

03:19supposed to be over in a flash, reinforcing that threat. But years of brutal fighting and failure on

03:25Russia's part to do what Putin threatened have only led to a years-long transformation in Finnish

03:29defense policy that has culminated in this. Nuclear weapons can now be moved through Finland,

03:34and that means the nuclear path to Russia is shorter than ever before.

03:38This decision also signals a change in the Finnish attitude toward nuclear weapons.

03:43Few in Finland actually want nukes on their territory. As the New York Times points out,

03:48Finland avoided joining NATO for decades, and it has a deep-seated and justified fear of nuclear

03:53proliferation due to its border with Russia. But Putin's actions have forced Finland to make a

03:59decision that, in an ideal world, it would never have made. And that is another blow to Putin.

04:04Fear was supposed to stop Finland from doing anything like this. Instead, Putin's actions have

04:09led to Finland accepting the maximum role it could take in NATO, perhaps out of necessity rather than

04:14desire, and that has transformed everything about Putin's plans for taking on NATO in the future.

04:20Let's look at the brass tacks of all of this. Now, Finland has no nuclear weapons program,

04:25which likely means that it also has no facilities in place for storing nukes.

04:29But that's not the point. What this decision has opened up is the possibility for nuclear weapons

04:34to be moved through, and potentially launched from, Finnish territory into Russia.

04:39And NATO's nukes are the great equalizer when it comes to dealing with Russia.

04:43According to Statista, NATO allies, which essentially amounts to the US, the UK,

04:48and France as nuclear-capable nations, combined to bring 4,215 nuclear warheads to bear against

04:55Russia in 2026. The number used to be much higher during the height of the Cold War,

04:59when the nuclear arms race was at its pinnacle. Back in 1966, NATO allies had access to 31,492 nukes,

05:08with Russia having a similar number, which goes a long way toward explaining why Finland wanted to

05:13stay out of NATO for so long. But with Russia actively invading Ukraine, and Russian threats

05:18spurring many, including Germany's Chief of Army Lieutenant General Christian Freuding,

05:23stating outright that NATO needs to be ready for war with Russia, the Cold War calculus no longer

05:28applies. Finland can't appease and avoid by staying out of Russia's crosshairs anymore. Instead,

05:34it has to point crosshairs of its own in Russia's direction, and this new decision is the perfect way

05:39to do it. For Russia, this doesn't just mean yet another European nation has approved stationing

05:44of nukes on its territory. This is the nation that is closer than any other to Russia, at least in

05:49regard to NATO's defense posture. The UK and France host nuclear weapons that they built themselves.

05:55Beyond that, five countries play host to US-made nuclear weapons, Germany, Belgium, Italy,

06:01Turkey, and the Netherlands. None of these weapons are armed or deployed on aircraft,

06:05the Arms Control Center points out. All are kept in WS-3 underground vaults at air bases,

06:10and none can be armed without the Permissive Action Link, or PAL, codes that the US controls.

06:16To be used, these nukes have to be loaded into dual-capable NATO fighter jets or bombers,

06:20and the US has to approve all of these and provide the PAL codes. On one hand, this does mean

06:26that

06:26Finland isn't an immediate nuclear threat to Russia. Plus, it has only just torn up its old laws. We don't

06:32yet know if the US is going to follow through by using Finnish air bases to store nukes.

06:36But on the other hand, the practicalities are all problems for the future. What's important right

06:41now is the message. NATO is getting stronger, and Finland lies at the heart of it all.

06:47Now, the nation that has the largest border with Russia out of all in the NATO alliance has said

06:51that it's ready to accept nuclear weapons. That alone is terrifying for Putin. Every threat that

06:57he has ever made to a NATO-aligned nation is coming back to haunt him, courtesy of the newest addition

07:02to the alliance. But to make matters even worse for Russia's president, Finland's nuclear decision

07:07isn't the only problem that he faces. Behind this major decision lies the bigger issue of NATO taking

07:12Russia more seriously as a conventional and nuclear threat than it has since the fall of the Soviet

07:18Union. That changes everything for Russia. But before we go deeper, this is a reminder that you are

07:23watching the military show. If this is the kind of insight that you want to see more of, make sure

07:28that you are subscribed to the channel. Finland's massive nuclear decision came on the back of

07:33another huge NATO move that has Putin sweating. On June 8, NATO announced that it has bolstered its

07:40posture in the High North and Arctic regions with the creation of the latest Multinational Forward

07:45Land Forces that the alliance has available. That FLF began operations on June 6 and is stationed in

07:52Finland and Sweden. Though led by Sweden as the framework nation, FLF Finland is the ninth of

07:58NATO's FLFs, the first of which was established in 2017 to run across the Collective Defense Alliance's

08:04eastern flank. The decision to create this FLF was actually made in 2024, not long after Sweden and

08:11Finland joined NATO, so Russia would have known that it was coming. Now don't get us wrong, this isn't a

08:16massive

08:17force. According to the Nordic Defense sector, FLF Finland will consist of a Swedish battalion containing

08:22600 soldiers, which is obviously not enough to stop Russia if it mounts a full invasion into the

08:27Nordic territories. But that isn't the point. For a start, FLF Finland can grow through contributions

08:33from other nations. In fact, the UK, Italy, France, Denmark, Iceland and Norway have already announced

08:39that they will work alongside Sweden and Finland to develop the force, so 600 soldiers are the starting

08:45point rather than the full might that FLF Finland will bring to bed. But more important than that is

08:50that FLF Finland means that NATO now has the ability to coordinate ground forces in a region that seems

08:55to be close to the top of the list for areas that Russia would choose to invade if Putin completely

09:00loses his mind and decides that failure in Ukraine means that Russia must escalate to all of Europe.

09:05And who knows, maybe this FLF will end up playing a part in developing Finland's new nuclear posture.

09:11Returning to the subject of nukes, Finland isn't alone in letting Putin know that he's going to get

09:16burned if he keeps on playing with fire. On June 18th, just a few days after Finland passed its new

09:21law,

09:22the UK defence journal reported that NATO's nuclear planning group had issued a ministerial statement.

09:28That alone might not necessarily seem remarkable, but what's important about this statement

09:32is that it's the first that the NATO nuclear planning group has released since 2007 and it was all

09:37about modernizing NATO's nuclear capabilities and strengthening the alliance's nuclear planning capacity.

09:42The timing is too perfect to be a coincidence. This is NATO taking the knife that Finland just

09:48plunged into Putin's side and giving it a nice little twist. Now, the statement isn't anything

09:52too dramatic. It doesn't say that NATO is ready to launch nukes at Russia at a moment's notice.

09:57But what it does, said one unnamed NATO official, who the UK defence journal quotes,

10:02is show that NATO has shifted back from expeditionary warfare to an active policy of defence and deterrence

10:08in the Euro-Atlantic area. And that's not all. The same official says that the US is completely on

10:14board with this shift. Rubbishing claims that the US Secretary of War Pete Hegseth simply turned up to

10:19make opening remarks at the Brussels meeting where the statement was drafted, the official says that

10:23the US is fully leaning into NATO's nuclear sharing mission. It, along with France and the UK,

10:30is actively modernizing its nuclear forces, the official claims. They add that the US has repeatedly

10:35affirmed its nuclear guarantee to the rest of NATO, regardless of individual shifts. This statement

10:41was made despite reported adjustments to the B-52 bomber fleet and claims that the US is going to

10:46reduce the deep strike capabilities available to European NATO by withdrawing warships and cutting

10:51down on the number of F-16 and F-15E fighter jets available to NATO from the 150 it has

10:57now to 100.

10:59We mentioned timing a minute ago. And it's not just timing with Finland's decision that's notable here.

11:04NATO's new statement comes about a month after Russia held a three-day exercise

11:08that involved Belarus and included 64,000 troops, 200 missile launchers, over 140 aircraft,

11:1673 warships, 13 submarines and 8 intercontinental ballistic missiles armed with nuclear warheads,

11:22NBC News reports. Those exercises were clearly an attempt to threaten through nukes, as Russia has done

11:27so many times before. And there are suggestions that they focused on training troops on how to deploy the

11:33Oreshnik hypersonic missiles that are reportedly stationed in Belarus. Putin has been engaging in

11:38plenty of nuclear saber rattling. Both Finland and NATO have combined to show Russia's leader that he

11:43isn't the only one with a saber that can be rattled. Interestingly, what we've just seen from Finland

11:48and NATO may be precisely what the European Council on Foreign Relations, or ECFR, said was needed in a

11:55June 17 piece where it labelled Russia, the bear with the bomb. The ECFR's key argument was that

12:01European NATO needed to go into overtime to plug the gaps in its nuclear capabilities. However,

12:07the bulk of the article focused more on how European NATO needs to find a way to do this without

12:11US

12:12support, given the constant uncertainty about the US position on NATO under the Donald Trump administration.

12:18So perhaps we can see what Finland just did under a different light. If the US wants to station nukes

12:23in Finland, then great. The posture of the official, who spoke to the UK Defense Journal, is a reality

12:28and Russia faces a massive deterrent. But if for whatever reason the US withdraws nuclear weapons

12:33from Europe, Finland has still just made itself available to the UK and France as a potential site

12:38for their nukes. Which still means there is a clear and very present threat to Russia if Putin goes

12:43beyond the conventional and gets too happy with the atomic trigger. The US nuclear umbrella is

12:48irreplaceable for the foreseeable future. Europeans cannot abandon it, so they must build something

12:53that approximates its deterrent effects, lest Russia's leaders see America abandoning its defense

12:57of Europe as an opportunity to apply their theory of victory, concepts and capabilities, the ECFR declares.

13:04Perhaps we are seeing the first step toward building something that can mirror the current

13:08deterrent effects provided by the US. And if we are, Finland is right at the heart of it.

13:12Let's return to Finland as we round out the video. In recent months, Finland, along with other Nordic

13:17nations, has started to voice loud concerns over a Russian military buildup on their borders.

13:22Satellite photos show that this buildup, which includes the construction of new barracks and

13:26facilities, could be enough for Russia to station 115,000 troops on the borders of the Nordic and Baltic

13:33regions. All of this is happening as some within NATO suggest that a war with Russia could be coming

13:38in the next three to five years, GIS reports says. So it's not as though Finland has just made its

13:44massive nuclear decision unprompted. It's done it, at least in part, because Russia is making it very

13:50clear that Putin is planning something. If that something is an invasion of NATO, then tens of

13:55thousands of troops on the Nordic and Baltic borders seems like a natural starting point. Finland needs to

14:01deter Russia from moving forward with these plans in any way that it can. The country's nuclear

14:05decision is the culmination of a full-blown evolution in defense posture that Finland has

14:10been undertaking for years. Except Finland hasn't spent the last few decades treating Russia casually.

14:16Yes, it stayed out of NATO until Putin forced the Finnish hand, but it's not as though Finland

14:21was completely neutral towards Russia either. As GIS reports finds out, Finland was one of the few

14:26European countries that chose not to lower its guard once the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991,

14:32while others tried to welcome a new Russia, which has since developed into what we see today.

14:37Finland was quietly preparing for a fight that it always felt could be coming. We see hints of this

14:41in the Finnish military. Though Finland has just 24,000 active duty personnel in its army,

14:47it has reserves that number 870,000 and paramilitary forces of almost 54,000 in a country that has a

14:54population of a little more than 5.6 million people. Finland has never stopped training soldiers,

14:59and when Russia invaded Ukraine, pushing Finland into joining NATO in the process, we started to see

15:04why. Now that Finland is moving closer to battle mode, its preparation, which may have been seen

15:09as pointless in the 90s, is paying off. Along with Estonia, Finland controls access to the Gulf of

15:15Finland. That's leverage that can be used against Russia. The FLF we discussed earlier could balloon

15:20to 6,000 soldiers, GIS reports says. And it, combined with Nordic air power supported by NATO,

15:26NATO would enable the air superiority needed to prevent Russian access to the Gulf of Finland.

15:31And now, nuclear weapons are allowed to move through Finland. What all of this means is that

15:36Putin has a major Finland problem. And that problem is only going to get bigger from here. Now,

15:41its nukes along with all of the other preparations. Tomorrow, it will be an even stronger Finland.

15:46In early June, Finland's parliamentary defense committee proposed raising the country's defense

15:50expenditure from the $8.8 billion it is now to a little over $16 billion by 2029, and then

15:57maintaining spending at about $17.2 billion through to 2036. That proposal hasn't been accepted yet,

16:03but it perfectly showcases the mood that the Finns have toward Russia right now. Putin is a threat.

16:09Finland's response to that threat hasn't been to Cal. It's been to show Putin that Russia can't

16:14intimidate Finland into backing away. The posture will only get stronger. The military spending will

16:19only get more pronounced. And if NATO makes the most out of Finland's nuclear decision,

16:23the deterrent posed to Russia will be more lethal than it has been since the collapse of the Soviet

16:28Union. As Russia faces all of these problems in Finland, it also has to deal with NATO strengthening

16:33elsewhere. The Baltic defense line is being bolstered. New defenses and military command structures are

16:39being created. All to signal to Putin that NATO will be ready if Russia is dumb enough to invade

16:44European NATO. Find out what all of these changes mean for the Baltic and Russia in our video.

16:50And if you enjoyed this video, remember to subscribe to The Military Show to see more

16:54of our coverage about the evolution of NATO's posture against Russia. And thank you for watching.

Finland Sent Russia a NUCLEAR Message... With Love!

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