At the start of our conversation, Finland’s ambassador to Ireland Raili Lahnalampi offers some background to the long journey towards her country deciding to apply for NATO membership. “History matters,” she says. “Geography matters,” she adds, although she will later explain why it may matter less than it once did When the historian and geographer Jared Diamond wrote about Finland in his 2019 book, Upheaval, he used the country to demonstrate how nations could navigate crises. Finland’s crisis was for a long time a crisis of geography and he described the country’s relationship with the USSR as “Byzantinely complex”. Finland,…

Want to continue reading?

Introductory offer: Sign up today and pay €200 for an annual membership, a saving of €50.

Subscribe

Cancel at any time.

Are you already a member? .