On Monday, Finland’s parliament unanimously approved a new Defense Cooperation Agreement (DCA) with the US that gives the US military access to 15 bases in the Nordic nation, which shares an over 800-mile border with Russia.
One of the places where the US can now position troops and equipment is a border guard base in the northern Finnish town of Ivalo. The base is just 20 miles from the Russian border, making it the closest military facility to Russia that US troops can access.
The US and Finland signed the DCA in December 2023, following Helsinki’s accession into NATO earlier that year. By admitting Finland, NATO has more than doubled its border with Russia, and Moscow has responded by building up its military forces in the western portion of the country.
The US signed a similar DCA with Sweden, which was ratified by the Swedish parliament last month. The deal gives the US access to 17 bases in Sweden and allows the US military to travel freely through the country.
The Swedish DCA faced opposition from Sweden’s Green and Left parties, but it passed through parliament in a vote of 266-37, and 46 members of parliament didn’t vote. The opposition’s main critique was that the agreement leaves open the possibility of the US storing nuclear weapons on Swedish territory, as it does in Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Belgium, and Turkey under NATO’s nuclear sharing program.
