> Two long-time-EU, never-Soviet members joining NATO is as nothingburger as it gets Finland has been occupied multiple times by Russia and ceded 10% of its la

> Two long-time-EU, never-Soviet members joining NATO is as nothingburger as it gets Finland has been occupied multiple times by Russia and ceded 10% of its land to the USSR in an attempt to make peace. Heck, some even argue that Finland did a "redo" of one of their parliamentary elections because the USSR didn't like the results. Joining NATO is a major departure from their many decades of attempting appeasement - it's far from a nothingburger. It may be an even bigger deal inside Russia though: Putin directly triggered one of the very specific things Russia didn't want to have happen. This both arms his domestic critics and raises the pressure for him to deliver some sort of "win".