2024-04-20 23:35:12
Journalists drew attention to the strengthening defense of the Baltic countries. It is indicated that excavators and cement mixers will soon be on their way to the fields of Estonia, so that NATO’s eastern border with Russia will be significantly improved from a military point of view. Hundreds of reinforced bunkers will be installed near the border with Russia, which will become part of a new defensive line designed to protect the Baltic countries from a Russian attack.
For its part, Lithuania is opening more than a dozen so-called countermobility parks, warehouses for equipment such as anti-tank barriers, barbed wire and concrete blocks designed to slow down a potential offensive by the occupiers. Latvia, like the other two Baltic countries, has also built fences on its borders with Russia or Belarus.
The ongoing work is an obvious sign that the security of the NATO frontline states is now strongly determined by Russia’s war in Ukraine, according to the authors of the text. The danger has also increased after the occupiers halted Kiev’s counteroffensive last summer and regained the initiative on the battlefield.
The Baltic leaders, who saw Russia’s defeat in Ukraine as the best way to ensure their own security, now see the initiative shifting to Moscow.
“Ukraine is now an existential issue for us,” Žygymantas Pavilionis, head of the Foreign Affairs Committee, explained to The Financial Times.
In addition, warnings of a possible Russian attack on NATO within the next decade have poured in in recent months. Journalists of the daily drew attention to the fact that not only Vilnius, Riga and Tallinn are sounding the alarm, but also the ministers of Stockholm, Berlin and London, who all hint at a possible confrontation within 2-8 years.
Along with the growing anxiety comes the feeling that the Baltic countries are safer than they have been for centuries due to their membership in NATO. This is a “paradox”, Lithuanian Prime Minister Ingrida Šimonytė admits in the publication.
Russia, whose defense spending already accounts for about 6-7 percent. GDP, has revved up its defense industry machine and is producing 4 million per year. artillery shells, hundreds of tanks and armored vehicles. Most of them are low-tech equipment for low-tech warfare, but Russian factories are far ahead of Western countries. Moreover, once the Kremlin has shifted to a war economy, it may not be able to go back.
“The question is not whether [Rusija] wants to stop, and whether she can stop, says I. Šimonytė. – Because when your entire bet is on a military economy, you have millions of people who are armed and trained. And suddenly you say, “Now we’re going home.” I mean, it could mean that the economic model will fail… . That’s why I think it’s dangerous.”
Janis Kažociņš, Latvia’s former national security adviser and former head of Latvia’s external intelligence service, sees two possible scenarios in the near future.
In the first case, Russia is succeeding in Ukraine and is trying to take advantage of a weakened West.
“The way to do it is fast help [netikėtas puolimas] In the Baltic countries, justified nuclear threats would also follow,” he presented his version. The second scenario – if Ukraine and the West remain united, then Russia could try diversionary provocations rather than a full-scale military attack – has dozens of hybrid attack options, ranging from sabotage and assassination to incitement of the local Russian-speaking population.
True, Vaidotas Urbelis, political director of the Ministry of Defense of Lithuania, believes that many such predictions can be made.
“In terms of scripts, I could come up with 100 scripts,” he noted.
According to an anonymously interviewed European diplomat, the most important thing is that the Baltic countries are in danger: “In multiple ways: not only military, but also societal, hybrid, economic.”
The Financial Times also drew attention to the fact that Russian-speaking minorities make up about a quarter of the population of Estonia and Latvia. Baltic officials admit they are vulnerable to disinformation in Russian media, but say Moscow’s ability to use them as a weapon is shrinking as older generations die off and younger people become more integrated.
“It has changed a lot, especially with this young generation,” points out Estonian President Alar Karis.
In Lithuania, the Russian-speaking minority is much smaller, but it is vulnerable due to its geographical location, the authors explain. It borders the heavily fortified Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, which Lithuanian intelligence believes has nuclear weapons, and Belarus, which is now firmly controlled by the Kremlin.
According to many military experts, Lithuania is home to the most vulnerable part of the entire NATO territory – the Suwalki Corridor. Detaining Russia in this location means depriving it of the opportunity to take advantage of any geographical disadvantage of the Baltic States.
As written in the text, a few years ago NATO’s plan to defend the three Baltic countries was as follows: first let Russia occupy them, and after a few months oust its army with mass forces. Today, the strategy is different – to fiercely defend NATO territory “from the first subway” and prevent Russian invaders from terrorizing cities, as happened in Ukraine.
As a result, the defense alliance is gradually strengthening its presence in the Baltic states. NATO has been conducting air patrol missions over these three countries since their accession in 2004. After Russia annexed Crimea in 2016, it added international battalions and battle groups to its forces. It is now expanding those battalions, each of about 1,000 soldiers, to brigades of 3,000 to 5,000 soldiers. These forces are expected to take part in any Russian offensive until reinforcements arrive, which could also come by sea after Sweden and Finland join NATO.
“Our understanding is simple: when Russia looks at us, it looks at the capabilities that are here and now, today. Russia believes they could delay and disrupt reinforcements. Deterrence is not stable if it is based only on reinforcements”, V. Urbelis revealed Lithuania’s position.
2024-04-20 23:35:12