> We (the USA) literally engineered a coup in neighboring Ukraine in 2014

This is literally Russian propaganda.

Reality is a harsh mistress. The state of our current society, and the world, can be almost entirely explained by a near-universal ignorance and lack of critical thinking skills.

We have spent rougly $5.1 billion dollars via USAAID and other governmental and quasi-governmental agencies over decades to build our influence and work towards installing a friendly regime. This is not up for debate among anyone, in any country, that is even barely aware of the facts.

https://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/21/politics/dollars-for-demo...

Assistant Secy. of State Victoria Nuland (and wife of arch neo-con Robert Kagan) was literally recorded discussing the coup with US ambassador to the Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt about who to install as Prime Minister before the coup happened. The veracity of this recording is not disputed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QxZ8t3V_bk

Nobody remotely reasonable and intelligent can understand the history and the actions taken (let alone listen to the smoking-gun recording) and not be absolutely certain what took place here. That is even without considering the long, long history we have of toppling governments and regimes we deem "unfriendly".

Cognitive dissonance is a hell of a drug.

I don't need to look up any of that to say that Sweden isn't being fearmongering. It could be a 100% true, but Russia still showed it was willing to invade and annex a neighbor, so it's rational to prepare defenses against them if you are in their neighborhood. This isn't a Russia bad, US is good thing. This is a reasonable response to any large power within range of you that has shown the desire to use military might to achieve their goals.