Finland’s President Alexander Stubb said he did not believe Russia would risk an attack against a Nato country, telling Germany’s Bild newspaper it would “make no sense” to test the resolve of the alliance.
Western officials have warned of a growing risk of Russian hybrid operations, including cyberattacks, against European countries potentially leading to a direct confrontation with the Nato alliance. German officials have said they assess Russia would be in a position to attack a Nato country by 2029.
“If anyone has a crystal ball like that – that’s great. I simply see neither evidence nor facts to support it,” he told Bild in an interview published on Saturday, adding he did not believe that Russia “would ever want to attack Nato, the world’s most powerful military alliance”.
Stubb, whose country joined Nato in 2023, abandoning its previous policy of neutrality following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine a year earlier, said the alliance had to be prepared for any scenario but he did not believe Moscow was in a position to go to war with Nato.
He said Nato’s strength in conventional weapons, missiles and nuclear weapons was too strong to attack, adding that he had intelligence information to back his assessment.