ICYMI: Gallego Talks Baltic Trip, Finland Joining NATO
WASHINGTON, DC – Rep. Ruben Gallego, co-chair of the House Baltic Caucus and chairman of the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Intelligence and Special Operations, recently led a trip to the Baltic nations of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia, as well as Finland—who is currently seeking NATO membership.
Upon his return, Rep. Gallego spoke to the Arizona Republic about the delegation trip and Finland’s bid to join NATO. Find the full story below.
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Arizona Republic: Gallego talks NATO expansion, Turkey after trip to Finland, Baltic states
By Tara Kavaler
Rep. Ruben Gallego recently visited the Baltic region and Helsinki in support of Finland's bid to join NATO.
Gallego, D-Ariz., and Rep. Don Bacon, R-Neb., emphasized Washington's support of Finland joining the defense alliance.
Finland, along with Sweden, applied May 18 to become NATO members, a move prompted by Russia's actions in Ukraine. Membership is conditional on the approval of all NATO countries.
One NATO member, Turkey, is holding up the group's absorption of Finland and Sweden. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdo?an is stalling the applications of both countries mainly because of Sweden, which has granted asylum to members of the Kurdistan Workers' Party, also known as the PKK. Turkey considers them to be a terrorist organization.
Gallego recently spoke to the Turkish ambassador to the U.S., Murat Mercan, about allowing the two countries to join NATO.
"I spoke to him about the idea of having a strong, cohesive NATO and how Sweden is part of that," Gallego said, in addition to bringing up Finland's bid. "I also talked about how Turkey itself was improving its relations with the West and that this would be a setback to that."
Erdo?an delaying the applications might be a way for Turkey to try to regain access to U.S fighter jets. Three years ago, Congress refused to sell F-35s and later F-16 jets to Turkey after Erdogan contracted with the Kremlin for its S-400 missile defense system.
Other NATO countries saw the deal as a security threat to the alliance.
Gallego, who serves on the House Armed Services Committee, signaled that the sale of the F-35 jets to Ankara was a no-go, but said there may be some flexibility regarding the F-16 jets if Turkey were to vote for Sweden and Finland's acceptance into NATO.
"Not the F-35, because they still have an estimated S-400 Russia anti-air capability that they could use to pair and figure out our vulnerabilities and it would go back to Russia," Gallego told The Arizona Republic. "I have talked to them about F-16s prior to their blockage of the ascension to NATO of Finland and Sweden. But I'm also not going to negotiate for the government on that."
Gallego argued hours before Russia invaded Ukraine in late February that the US should help Ukraine, along with NATO.
Last year, he created the Baltic Security Initiative to fund defense initiatives in the Baltic nations of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania that were formerly a part of the Soviet Union. The trip allowed the representatives, who are co-chairs of the House Baltic Caucus, to exercise congressional oversight over how the money is being used.
Gallego was critical in securing $180 million to pay for things such as technology to destroy tanks and large caliber ammunition.
The financial assistance is critical to advance U.S. and Western interests, he said, and to help discourage Russian President Vladimir Putin from attacking the three allies who are also NATO members.
"The most important thing you want to do is to avoid war. And the way you avoid war is by making sure countries can deter Russia from attacking Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia," Gallego said. "We give them these funds and they actually use it to buy American military weapons systems to help them defend themselves."
Article 5 of NATO's founding treaty on collective defense says the coalition must come to a member country's aid if it is attacked.
While the Baltic countries are meeting their NATO financial obligations of 2% of their GDP, they still need financial assistance because of the countries' relatively small size, Gallego said.