The United States Senate has unanimously voted in support of Finland and Sweden's application to join the Western NATO alliance, with only Sen. Josh Hawley being against the resolution.
The Wednesday vote provides support for the two nations to join NATO as the House approved a resolution in a bipartisan 394-18 vote last month that formally supported the two Nordic countries' application. All of the opposition votes in the House came from the Republican Party.
Senate Supports Finland, Sweden NATO Applications
Hawley's lone opposition vote against the resolution did not come as a surprise to other lawmakers. He had previously announced his intent to vote no to the resolution earlier this week, outlining his opposition in an op-ed published by The National Interest.
The senator said that he does not believe the United States should expand its security commitments in Europe because the U.S.'s "greatest foreign adversary" is China. The official also argued that growing the nation's security commitments in the region would make Americans less safe, as per The Hill.
The Republican wrote that the two Nordic countries wanted to join NATO to head off further Russian aggression in Europe. He said that this was entirely understandable given their location and security needs. However, he noted that this was not the case for the U.S. as it was in Asia.
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Hawley said that the threat was the People's Republic of China and noted that when it comes to Chinese imperialism, the American people should know the truth. This was that the United States was not ready to resist it.
According to the New York Times, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said that Finland and Sweden's membership will strengthen NATO even further. He noted that this was made all the more urgent given Russian aggression in Europe and Russian President Vladimir Putin's immoral and unjustified war against Ukraine.
Western Military Alliance
The Democrat noted that Putin was indirectly strengthening the NATO alliance and that nothing shows it better than the Senate's resounding approval of the resolution. All of the 30 current members of NATO must ratify the accession of the two Nordic countries for their applications to be approved.
So far, 22 countries have shown their support but as recently as two weeks ago, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan threatened to block the membership bids, which could prolong the process. However, the U.S. support of the applications is seen as a crucial step and the vote is considered a major victory for President Joe Biden.
The Democratic president previously sent the protocols for ratification to the Senate in July, which paved the way for the vote that needed two-thirds of the Senate to succeed. The next stop now is for Biden to sign an instrument of ratification to the treaty.
A spokesperson for the State Department said that once Biden has signed an instrument of ratification, that instrument is deposited (in the case of a multilateral treaty) with the treaty's depositary, which is the case for NATO. These final steps will not happen on the same day as the Senate's vote and final arrangements for depositing the instrument of ratification have not yet been made, CNN reported.
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