Sweden's foreign policy
- Washington Public Affairs Press 1957
- 99 p.
In a world of vast empires competing for position and prone to consider extension of territory as a policy conducive to world prestige and power, the position of the small nation is precarious. Through the nineteenth century the small nation could find security of a sort in neutrality. The German invasion of Belgium in the First World War showed how shaky a reed legal neutrality actually is. Neutrality might be effective in the case of Switzerland, where the principle was buttressed by mountains. But for nations in the path the armies of the great nations, or even within reach of the armies, not too much confidence could be reposed in neutrality.
Hence the latter doctrine that there can be no neutrals in the wars to come, if wars must come, and that the only safety of a small nation rests in collective security. If there must be opposing groups of nations under the dominance of competing great powers, the small nation must make its choice. Today that means to go with NATO or with Russia.
Sweden refuses to make this choice. She will not be a satellite of Russia, she will not be a member of NATO. She means to follow the policy of neutrality, which she has followed since the fall of Napoleon. We of the NATO camp don't like that, nor do the Russians. But it may be worth our while to dismiss large generalizations like "collec tive security," new "balance of power" and look at the problem from the point of view of a small nation.
Dr. Abrahamsen's book give us an opportunity to understand Swe den's neutrality policy. Perhaps it does not qualify us to judge that policy; but we may be familiar with the Biblical text, "Judgment is mine, saith the Lord."