Finland "falling behind" Nordic NATO members on conscription

The Finnish Defence Forces are “falling behind” their Nordic NATO neighbours when it comes to conscription.

That’s the warning from the Finnish Conscripts Union Varusmiesliitto a year after the country joined NATO, and with an eye to a future where demographic shifts mean there are dwindling numbers of young men available and willing to undertake military service.

“There is no question that Finland is falling behind,” says Elina Riutta, the chairperson of Varusmiesliitto.

“We’ve been promoting the idea of gender-equal conscription for almost 20 years,” she tells Finland Insider.

Among the Nordic countries, Finland is now an outlier when it comes to including women in its conscription model.

Norway introduced a new conscription law back in 2013 which made it the first NATO country to draft men and women into military service.

Sweden has selective military conscription for men and women, and an option of civilian service for those 18-24-year-olds who aren’t chosen for basic military training. The government wants to see 10,000 young people called up for conscription each year.

And in Denmark, where women can already volunteer to do military service, the government announced in March new plans for more gender-equal conscription.

But in Finland, a country which likes to talk up its “whole society” approach to defence and security - not to mention its gender equality credentials - there’s little or no public or political discussion about the subject (although around 1500 women have volunteered to do military service this summer, according to FDF).

“Our goal is to have it a selective model like in Norway, but with the same amount of conscripts as we have now, 20,000 per year,” explains Elina Riutta, who did her year-long conscription in a mixed-gender air defence unit.

Under this proposal, those not chosen for military service could opt instead for civilian service. The Defence Forces budget wouldn’t have to change, Varusmiesliitto claims, because there would be no increase in the overall number of conscripts - although Riutta concedes that other ministries running civilian service programmes would need a budget boost to cover the work.

“We are the last Nordic country in this matter that is not doing equal conscription,” she says. “Everything that can be done must be done now, because as a small nation we cannot afford to overestimate any available resources."

Public support, political silence

A study carried out by Helsinki University in 2003 found that slightly more than half of Finns were in favour of gender-equal conscription but despite this, it hasn’t been a subject that Finnish politicians or the Defence forces have been eager to raise.

The Minister of Defence, Antti Häkkänen (NCP), declined a request to comment on the subject.

“Finland’s military leadership has always struck me as slightly more conservative than in other Nordic states. Unlikely to push politicians for this change,” says Eoin McNamara, a Research Fellow at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs FIIA.

“A lot of security systems in Finland are steeped in tradition. A lot of recent senior commanders have tended to be lightly conservative both in their approach to politics and towards military change. More so than in other Nordic countries I would say, having observed Swedish doctrine and military transformation in recent years,” he adds.

President Stubb opens the door to future discussions

One recent sign that perhaps decision-makers could be willing to at least start discussing a change in Finland’s gendered military culture came recently from President Alexander Stubb.

During a Veterans’ Day speech in April, Stubb said that the benefits of military service “for society and for the individual […] are not gender-specific.”

“For this reason everyone deserves a uniform right and obligation to participate in military or civilian service.”

Experts say it’s an inevitable consequence of Finland’s population trends that women will need to be conscripted.

“If the defence forces want to keep up the wartime troop strength we have now, because of the demographic trends the conscription will have to be extended at some point in the not too distant future" says Minna Ålander from FIIA.