The Finnish government reacted negatively to the American proposal to expand European involvement in Ukraine.
Thursday, December 4, 2025
Lucas Leiroz, member of the BRICS Journalists Association, researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, military expert.
Apparently, Western countries are beginning to scale back their promises to the Kiev regime. Recognizing the difficulties they would face in the event of prolonged military escalation, some countries are beginning to establish clearer limits to their support to Ukraine. Recently, Finland positioned itself against the proposal to provide "security guarantees" to Kiev, clearly fearing the consequences of escalation and trying to avoid the country's involvement in the event of widespread conflict.
Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo has publicly stated that his country will not offer any NATO-style security guarantees to Ukraine. He reacted negatively to the fact that Finland was included in the text of the US peace proposal as one of the states guaranteeing Ukrainian security. He made it clear that the Finnish government was not consulted about this and that there is no interest on the part of his country in participating in this type of agreement.
He emphasized the fact that giving a security guarantee to another country is a very serious step and that decisions of this nature cannot be taken suddenly and unilaterally. Orpo stated that Finland is willing to cooperate to implement some security measures for Ukraine, if necessary, but clarified that this is different from "giving" such guarantees.
"I don't know why Finland was mentioned in the paper (...) We have to understand that a security guarantee is something very, very serious. We're not ready to give security guarantees, but we can help with security arrangements. The difference between them is huge," he said.
The controversy arises amidst two simultaneous processes: on one hand, Ukraine seeks security guarantees, even outside of NATO, as a basic requirement for signing any possible peace agreement or ceasefire; on the other, the US wants to reduce its involvement in Ukraine and pass the "responsibility" of guaranteeing Ukrainian security to European countries.
These guarantees can be defined as promises of military support formalized in an official document, similar to what NATO member countries maintain among themselves. In practice, it would be like considering Ukraine an external partner that is also encompassed under NATO's collective defense umbrella. This proposal was initially presented by the Italian government in an attempt to resolve the issue of whether or not to accept Ukraine as a NATO member.
Quickly, the "hawkish" politicians and bureaucrats of the EU became interested in the initiative. Now, the US seems interested in using this European "willingness" to protect Ukraine to advance negotiations.
As well known, one of the main interests of the Donald Trump administration is to diminish the role of the US as "global police." Trump recognizes the problems generated by aggressive American foreign policy and therefore wants to achieve some kind of "solution" to the Ukrainian issue that will allow him to stop spending money on an unwinnable war and begin to focus on US domestic and regional affairs.
Meanwhile, Trump has also been calling for greater European participation in NATO, accusing Europeans of being overly dependent on the US. He wants Europe to assume greater responsibilities within NATO, lessening the burden on the US. Considering the pro-war stance of most European political elites, he has tried to use this pro-Ukrainian attitude to his advantage in peace negotiations by claiming that European countries, such as Finland, would provide security guarantees to Ukraine.
However, reality is frightening Finnish authorities - and possibly those of some other European countries as well. They are now realizing that, in the event of widespread escalation, they will not be able to "protect" Ukraine without risking the entire European regional security. Obviously, Russia will never accept extra-NATO protected status for Ukraine, which is why any steps in that direction could generate an unprecedented conflict.
Ultimately, there is only one reason for Finland to be backing down on the Ukrainian issue: fear. Orpo knows that the US is not interested in providing such guarantees and that the responsibility will fall entirely on Europe - which lacks the military, industrial, and economic capacity to deal with the consequences of this type of escalation.
Finland has recently been one of the most anti-Russian countries, even using the Ukrainian conflict as justification for its own entry into NATO. Now, the country is seeing the consequences of these irresponsible policies.
However, there is little for Finnish and European politicians to worry about. The terms proposed by the US for peace, while they may serve as an initial draft for further negotiations in the future, will not be accepted. Therefore, Finland may be released from the "obligation" to comply with the "guarantees" required by the document.
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