Häkämies speech: Difficult talk about actual issue

Defence Minister adds to flood of speech on security policy

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By Kari Huhta
     
      It is now possible to talk about the actual issue at hand, said Social Democratic Party chairman Eero Heinäluoma to his Parliamentary group in Imatra on Tuesday. He was praising the fact that debate on security policy was finally really starting in Finland.
      Defence Minister Jyri Häkämies (Nat. Coalition Party) said in a speech that he held in Washington on Thursday, that the actual issue from Finland’s point of view is Russia.
      In Helsinki, former Foreign Minister and Social Democratic foreign policy steamroller Erkki Tuomioja said on Friday that the speech by Häkämies was a one-sided assessment made in completely the wrong place, showing a lack of due consideration.
      Could it be that Häkämies had read Heinäluoma’s speech, and that Tuomioja had not? It is understandable, if someone has not read all of the speeches concerning foreign and security policy, because there have been very many of them.
      The Häkämies lecture was the first to get the undivided attention of everyone in Finland. Even the audience at the US Center for Strategic and International Studies may have sat up and listened. If some of the other speeches of recent weeks had been held in Washington, listeners might have walked out in the middle of it.
     
Security policy is nevertheless not entertainment, even though it is entertaining at times, so the content of speeches is worth examining more closely.
      The Häkämies address really did differ from the others, and not just because of the stylistic devices that he used. However, it was not quite as exceptional as is occasionally suggested in the discussions that occasionally come out.
      Häkämies did not call into question the Finnish national defence, which is based on conscription and regional defence. He simply put forward the reasons for the strategy. As for NATO membership, he only said that a report is being prepared on what effects such a move might have.
      What brought forth the reaction from Tuomioja, and later also from Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen (Centre), was Häkämies’s assessment of Russia.
      Häkämies said that the three most important security challenges for Finland today are "Russia, Russia, and Russia".
      There was something familiar in that. President Tarja Halonen said in the summer that Finland’s three strengths are "education, education, and education".
      Borrowing rhetorical flourishes is quite common, but at times, things really do get oversimplified.
     
Evaluating one great power in a straightforward manner in the capital of another breaks with tradition. On the other hand, it is very hard to find a European speech on foreign and security policy outside of Finland in recent times that would not express concern about developments in Russia.
      At the time when it was reported in Finland what Häkämies had said about the challenges posed by Russia, the Russian news agency Itar-Tass reported on the conclusions drawn by Häkämies. It said that Russia poses no threat to Finland. Different countries focus on different issues.
      In other Finnish security policy speeches, Russia has been bypassed with fairly little fanfare. They have focused on where and when Finland should take part in peacekeeping and crisis management.
     
In addresses by party leaders to Parliamentary groups, and in national leaders’ speeches at gatherings of Finnish ambassadors, security policy has been given an unprecedentedly large amount of space. Heinäluoma started with the topic, and spent nearly half of his time on it. Vanhanen spent more time on the topic than on agricultural policy. National Coalition Party chairman Jyrki Katainen also briefed SDP parliamentarians on security policy. Foreign Minister Ilkka Kanerva (Nat. Coalition Party) and President Tarja Halonen spoke to the ambassadors.
      The speeches dealt with Afghanistan and Darfur more than Russia. Why could this be? The answer, to borrow the somewhat worn-out rhetorical device, is: NATO, NATO, and NATO.
      Those who are pushing for fast decisions on foreign policy, and those who want to take it more slowly accuse each other of using crisis management for the purpose of opposing or supporting NATO membership. Both sides would seem to be right.
      Häkämies’s speech in Washington was also seen as a statement on NATO, which is also possible.
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 8.9.2007


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Häkämies says Washington speech in line with Finnish policy (10.9.2007)
  Häkämies in Washington: Russia Finland´s greatest challenge (7.9.2007)

KARI HUHTA / Helsingin Sanomat
kari.huhta@hs.fi