NATO increases military presence in Baltics

NATO released the eight-minute reenactment film which presents 'forest brothers', which fought again Soviet power in the Baltic republics between 1944 and 1953, killing civilians and prisoners of war, as heroes fighting exclusively for independence of their countries from the Soviet Union and enjoying broad support of the civilian population, who wanted to restore statehood. The authors of the film claim that the spirit of 'forest brothers' lives in the modern special units of the armed forces of the three Baltic countries.

Experts say that today the Baltic region has become an outpost of information war against Russia. However, it seems that not just informational. Since early 2017, the North Atlantic Military Alliance has already conducted five military maneuvers in the Baltic region. A member of the Federation Council Committee on Defense and Security Alexei Kondratiev said that the objective of the exercises was the possibility of ensuring the transfer of NATO allied forces to Estonia.

"As for the ship group that participated in these five exercises in the past six months, the ships involved in these exercises are capable of carrying cruise missiles of high efficiency, that could reach the Leningrad region and St. Petersburg," the senator said. 

Meanwhile, according to him, "to date the Baltic Fleet has enough funds and forces to neutralize certain threats." However, for the first time such a purpose of NATO exercises raises certain questions, especially in connection with the building up of its presence on land, at sea and in the air along the territory of Poland and Lithuania.

"In such a situation, Russia is taking certain steps to compensate for the threats. We are taking strictly defensive, mirror responds, but the situation in this region is extremely unstable now," Kondratiev said.