The Swedish Armed Forces: Recent Developments and Future Strategy

Abstract

Sweden is militarily non-allied and has for centuries relied on its own ability to defend itself. Even “neutrality” has traditionally been associated with Sweden, but with increased international involvement this concept has been eroded more and more. Sweden has about nine million inhabitants, is geographically extensive with a length of about 1,500 kilometres from north to south and is, especially in the northern regions, often sparsely populated. Altogether these conditions have had an influence on the dimensioning and structuring of the armed forces. For example, during the 1950s Sweden had the fourth largest air force in the Western world and as late as at the end of the Cold War Sweden, at least on paper, maintained an impressive number of armed forces (850,000 after mobilisation). However the equipment and training of these forces left much to be desired (Åselius, 2005).

Citation

Weibull, A. (2007), "The Swedish Armed Forces: Recent Developments and Future Strategy", Caforio, G. (Ed.) Cultural Differences between the Military and Parent Society in Democratic Countries (Contributions to Conflict Management, Peace Economics and Development, Vol. 4), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 307-312. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1572-8323(07)04021-0