Top Swedish General: NATO 'heeding the call' on its new reality

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I think that that Europe has finally understood.

It's relevant that the US demands a shift of burden in terms of financial commitments,

and that we have sort of heated the call.

Here in the US, we hear a lot about President Trump's open disdain for NATO

and how his actions are reshaping the post-war global order.

What does that all look like from Europe?

Today, Sweden's top general tells us that whatever the political tensions,

military cooperation across the Atlantic runs deep and strong.

I'm Mary Louise Kelly. This is Sources and Methods from NPR.

General Michael Klossen is Sweden's Chief of Defense and Supreme Commander of Sweden's

Armed Forces, and he's our guest for today's special episode.

He is here in Washington this week for meetings, so we wandered over to the embassy of Sweden for chat.

As always, we'll be back here again Thursday with our regular episode

to talk through the week's biggest national security news.

General, welcome. Thank you so much for having me.

So let's get to it. Sweden joined NATO two years ago.

Right.

Not a boring moment for the Alliance.

No, not at all.

Not a boring moment for Sweden, either.

Well, I was going to say Sweden had maintained an official policy of neutrality for more than two centuries

since the days of Napoleon.

So let me start by asking how has joining NATO changed Sweden?

I think I would like to start with the fact that we entered into the partnership with NATO

after the end of the Cold War, and that of course changed a lot already at that time.

So we have effectively been present with troops in all NATO-led out-of-area operations,

from Western Balkans to Afghanistan.

So getting used to work together with NATO forces and NATO allies in operations has been

a feature for more than 25 years.

You were not strangers to Germany?

No, no, not at all.

For Sweden's military, what has it meant?

You're spending more in defence, expanding ranks?

Oh, yeah, yeah, it means that we have a clear political commitment to the

Hague Defense Investment Target of 5%, and 3.5% hard-coded for military spending.

And this is something that the government has really bought into, and they have a higher

ambition than was actually set out in the Hague that we should meet 3.5% at 2030, not

2035.

So it's a steep curve.

We, as many other European countries, downsized and decommissioned a lot of our military forces

after the end of the Cold War.

And I sometimes sarcastically refer to this as the eternal era of peace, which proved

not to be...

Not so peaceful.

Not so peaceful and more of a fair tale and a hope for something than reality.

So now obviously we are expanding.

We are filling up our storages.

We are also trying to innovate our way into the future.

And just so that I understand, can you be specific about what it means to expand, like how

many more troops, how many more boats, how many, how are you thinking about it?

Yeah, we are expanding from approximately a small armed force of like 75,000 personnel

to 140,000, till 2030, which is quite a high ambition.

We have reinstated conscription, that's quite a few years ago in 2017, but the numbers

increase, recruiting is high, but of course it's not that many years ago that we actually

paid people to leave the armed forces.

And that's the same segment of officers that I would now need to send to staff positions

in the NATO command structure, so it's not without challenges.

But I would say that it's going well.

So within a year of NATO membership, we provided forces to the Baltic states, land forces,

we provided air policing and air defense forces to support NATO's work in support of Ukraine.

And we've been involved in NATO's standing naval forces as well over the years.

So I think we have set the tone, and we have also made it clear that Sweden is a security

provider.

We're small, but we're effective and have an effective force, a modern force, and we

want to be seen as a security provider and not as a consumer.

So let's go to some of the challenges facing the alliance today.

I saw a comment you made back in January, so two months ago, where you said that you

were not concerned about NATO's future.

Has your optimism survived the intervening two months?

Yes, it has basically survived, and I think it's important to zoom out a little bit and

to look at NATO's history, where immense problems in the 1960s, all the way up till the end

of the 90s, with France leaving the military cooperation.

We have in the alliance had bilateral challenges between Turkey and Greece since 1952, but

the alliance still works regardless of that.

It's very impactful when there are transatlantic tensions, but basically I think that Europe

has finally understood that it's relevant that the US demands a shift of burden in terms

of financial commitments at the end of the day, transatlantic, but also European security

needs to be outbalanced by much more commitment from the European side, and that we have sort

of heated the call.

You're sitting here in Washington, so I need to ask you about some of the recent comments

about NATO from Washington, and specifically from the White House.

Last week, President Trump described the NATO alliance as a one-way street, who said

the US spends billions to protect countries that will do nothing for America in a time

of need.

How do you react to that?

Well, of course, it feels somewhat unfair because back in 2001, the 9-11 situation, and

I, together with many of my countrymen, we have served in Afghanistan during tough times,

and basically shouldering sort of the security challenges that were global, but also in one

way or another also were directed against the US.

So in that regard, I think that we are better than that, and I think that the alliance is

still a valid role-payer in the transatlantic security and is a major best buddy also to

the US.

President Trump has been demanding that US allies join the war in Iran and help secure

the straight-of-formers.

He called NATO countries cowards for refusing to pitch in his word.

Will you pitch in?

Will Sweden send warships to help the United States and Israel?

At the end of the day, this is a political question.

Do we have capabilities?

Yes, yes.

Many of the allies do have capabilities, but it needs to be addressed.

Also through the NATO channels, to be dealt with politically, what kind of forces for how

long, how do we balance that together with other NATO commitments that all the 32 allies

have concluded that these are priorities for the alliance right now.

So if the current situation in the Middle East is brought into the framework of the alliance,

I'm sure that the alliance will also be able to deal with it in one way or another.

Also including to consider whether forces could be provided.

After a quick break, more of my conversation with the Supreme Commander of Sweden's armed

forces.

Stay with us for sources and methods.

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Let me turn us to Ukraine specifically, and how you see the future of the alliance there,

and how you see the future of US cooperation, because that has come into question with President

Trump back in his second term.

Yeah, right.

I think that Ukraine is obviously a clear European concern.

It's an integral part of European security.

I think it's important to conclude that Russia's strategic objectives are not limited

to parts of a couple of provinces, about erasing Ukraine from the map as a nation state,

and to introduce a buffer zone that in some ways also resembles the old Russian Empire.

It's not about launching massive Soviet style offensives into Western Europe, but it's

about to establish this type of security buffer zone that they can influence, and again,

to impact the cohesion of the West in so many ways.

How's the work going in your estimation?

I was there a couple of weeks ago, and it was not a broken country.

It's not a broken country.

What makes you say that?

Interaction with a lot of military commanders of different ranks and in different locations

and different roles, but also traveling those 3,000 kilometers through the country and meeting

people.

They have suffered through a very tough winter, with Russia particularly focusing on damaging

the energy sector in a way that had made people literally freeze, and in some cases

also freeze to death.

This country is remarkably strong and resilient for many reasons that we don't have time

to dwell on right now, but I think it's important not to make Russia a 10 feet tall, and it's

important not to diminish Ukraine, because it's a strong country with a strong military,

a very innovative military, and from a Swedish point of view, we feel that it is important

to continue to support in all the ways we can.

One more on Ukraine.

You will be familiar, General, with the criticism of the U.S. and Ukraine's other allies that

Ukraine's allies have given it enough military support, economic support to continue fighting,

but not enough for it to win.

We're now four years plus into this war.

Is there some truth to that?

I believe it is, and especially from the beginning, I mean, the first year or so, where

nations were struggling, West and nations were struggling politically to come to a conclusion

whether they would go all in.

So the all-in came eventually, but it was very late.

And I think that the war could have come to another face much quicker, if the support

would have been more substantial from the outset.

I guess the basic question prompted by all of this, given President Trump's comments

about NATO that we've been talking about, given questions about the U.S.'s commitment

to Ukraine and the fight there.

If it came to it, could NATO stand on its own against Russia without the United States?

It's a tricky question, because it's always, it depends on.

Of course there are scenarios where the NATO could be extremely challenged without U.S. capabilities,

but I have very hard to see a situation where NATO would come to a situation of collective

defense, and the U.S. would not be there.

And in any capacity, I think Europe is on a quite good foot.

But of course, it's needless to say that U.S. is a really important ally, and the burden

shifting would also have to take place in an orderly way to make sure that we don't end

up in a challenge security situation compared to now.

You just said that if push came to shove, you actually can't imagine that NATO would

have to respond in a collective way without the United States, Greenland.

Does that, how do you square what we saw unfolding earlier this year with American threats

to take Greenland one way or the other, President Trump's words, with NATO as a collective defense

alliance?

Well, to be able to launch a collective response, all 32 allies have to be behind it.

So NATO was not really a factor in that regard.

You can question what effects it would have had on NATO politically.

But nevertheless, I think also that NATO as a framework that also provided a kind of

a solution to the challenges, to the perceived security challenges, not only Greenland,

but Arctic as a whole, which I think is very easy for, not at least, Arctic nations

like Sweden to buy into, because this is really a feature that we need to address collectively.

And of course, I think we at the end of the day landed safely in using and implementing

NATO as the security framework that it should be, i.e. addressing collective security

challenges that suits all the 32 allies.

We talked in part about NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte, who appeared to be the one who

walked the U.S. ambitions toward Greenland back from a cliff.

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

And of course, he was playing his role, but also the interlinkage to secure General

Grinkiewicz and how...

Spring-O' Light Commander Europe.

Yeah, exactly, exactly, which is always an American.

And how the idea of an Arctic century and NATO activity is not an operation per se,

but it's an activity that sort of collects all the activities of the allies in the Arctic

area of the alliance to provide security collectively in that regard.

So I think this was a brilliant move.

One more on Greenland, which is part of the U.S. reasoning that was laid out publicly

for why the U.S. wanted to control or wants to control Greenland, is that if the U.S. doesn't

control it, Russia will, more China will.

Do you buy that?

I think that the impact of Russia and China in the Arctic as a whole is definitely a

security concern for all of us.

And it also in the links, let's say, the perceptions and the ambitions and the focus on homeland

security for the U.S. with European security, and it binds us together.

And I think it's important, especially now, with the U.S. focus on homeland security,

et cetera, that we try to find new ways not to disconnect, but to reconnect.

And this is one area where I think it's important to really use as a driver for reconnection

between, again, let's say, North American and Eurasian security.

So you're saying, as Sweden looks even farther north to the Arctic, you see both risk

but also opportunity.

Oh, indeed, yes.

Absolutely.

Talk, talk, say more about that.

I see opportunity for increased security, and I see opportunity because obviously, when

the ISIS we can discuss lengthy, why the ISIS are melting, but they are melting.

And so that is not the question here now.

Shipping lands that can go over the top of the world.

Shipping lands will be cut by a third.

So obviously, there will be a lot of interest from different directions.

But there is also quite substantial natural resources that could be reached in a completely

different way.

That would be of interest to many nations, and natural resources can easily be securitized.

And obviously, we need to find ways to deal with that.

So is your sense, General, that the moment of high tension over Greenland, that it is

behind us that we can move on?

I hope so, at least.

And I learned from a U.S. colleague, actually, that hope is not a course of action, but

in this regard, I believe that I hope that we have outbalanced and found a way where

the Alliance plays a crucial role in balancing security interests from the U.S. side with

sort of European interests in the Arctic as a whole.

So I'll bring us to a close by asking you were saying, as we sat down at the conference

table here in the lovely Swedish Embassy in Washington, that you try to get to Washington

once a year or so.

Have conversations with counterparts, take the temperature of what's going on here.

I wondered, do you feel a sense of whiplash, General Klaus in the landing in Washington

in 2026, having conversations with an administration that sees so many issues central to your job,

whether it's Ukraine or Greenland or the NATO Alliance so differently from two years ago,

than the administration that was in the White House then?

Well, of course, there is a difference, but I wouldn't necessarily call it a whiplash,

because there is more of a steady state in the military to military relations.

And of course, the military to military relations are impacted by policies and changes to policies

and politics, no question about that.

But again, since this is the way how democracies work, we also have to adhere to changes to

the different roles.

And going back to what I mentioned about being in an alliance that you actually have to

respect, both the ways and the means and the focus of other nations, and finding ways

not to disconnect and break, in this case, the alliance instead trying to be constructive

and pragmatic.

And to some extent, transactional to find new ways to cooperate, because I'm a firm

believer in transatlantic security and that we are actually, that we actually need each

other.

Does it still feel like a two-way street, the respect?

Yes, yes, it does.

With the fact that, obviously, as we talked about just a few moments ago, that Europe needs

to take more responsibility for our own conventional security.

And again, we have heated the call, we understand that.

And we are investing and we are expanding and we are working hard to meet those requirements,

capability targets in NATO, for example.

General Michael Klassen, Sweden's Chief of Defense and Supreme Commander of Sweden's Armed

Forces.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you so much for having me.

A reminder, you can email us with your feedback and your questions at sources and methods,

all one word, at NPR.org.

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