Sweden and Finland completing the accession process would count as new countries.
This is question #11 in the Astral Codex Ten 2023 Prediction Contest. The contest rules and full list of questions are available here. Market will resolve according to Scott Alexander’s judgment, as given through future posts on Astral Codex Ten.
1,000
3.00@Bart5f6d You were right about Finland. That is who Hungary approved. Erdogan has signaled Turkey will also vote to approve but maybe not until after their election this summer.
Turkey is objecting to Sweden. They are all right with Finland but Sweden and Finland will likely insist on a package deal. The question then is whether Turkey is actually willing to stop this from happening while they are under pressure, plus some percent of random other barrier. My prior is that Turkey will extract some amount of consideration for this, but that such objections rarely actually stop such things from happening - there is a long history of ‘everyone has to agree’ actually happening across Europe. So I mostly agree with the 85%, maybe a tad higher. There wasn’t much liquidity so I bought M100 of YES.
Turkey seems sympathetic to Finland joining, less so Sweden. Betting yes at 80%
@ErickBall Finland and sweden are very friendly and Finland may not join without Sweden. Both countries are also already partnered with NATO and being full members isn't a huge difference.
@SemioticRivalry Being full members is a massive difference. It's the difference between sending you money and materiel when you're invaded vs sending troops and actively joining your war.
@whenhaveiever Article 5 is the single most powerful multilateral commitment in history by a wide margin.
@whenhaveiever It’s only ever been invoked against Al-Qaeda. If invoked against a nation state that is the end of history for that place.
@whenhaveiever So, like, yeah I agree and think you way understated the distinction of anything. NATO is end of the world force for whomever is unlucky enough to be down range. This should be more widely discussed because it makes Putin look less crazy and also more vulnerable than he does on TV.
@SemioticRivalry Turkey is also trying to join the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (China’s NATO equivalent) so it’s mostly performative. Erdogan is like an expensive marionette puppet that gets passed back and forth between Brussels, Moscow and Beijing. The only person nobody can trust but each can control when it’s their turn pulling the strings. A true geopolitical man whore.
@BTE Sounds like he understands the median voter theorem. There's significant value, if you can capture it, in being the member of your bloc that is closest to the other bloc, as long as your bloc doesn't kick you out for it.
@whenhaveiever Oh yeah, Erdogan is a once in a generation political tactician. He won’t be fully appreciated for a long time. But he will also probably torture me if I ever step foot in Turkey for the previous man whore comment. Wish I was kidding.