The forces stationed in Estonia are learning the lay of the land and mapping out how best to defend the small Baltic countries should the worst-a Russian invasion-ever come to pass.ĭespite its small size and population (around 1.3 million), Estonia isn’t resting on its laurels, instead ramping up defense spending to 3 percent of GDP by 2024 and procuring high-end weapons such as air defense systems and HIMARS rockets, systems that have been dispatched to lethally effective use in Ukraine.
The United Kingdom leads a NATO battle group that is stationed in Estonia, alongside forces from France and Denmark. There are 18 major exercises scheduled in NATO countries between May and September this year, according to data from NATO’s military headquarters. Those exercises have only increased in size and scope since last February. Spring Storm is one of dozens of large military exercises that NATO countries have organized to flex their military might in a signal to Russia. The United Kingdom is dispatching Wildcat and Apache attack helicopters to Estonia to participate in Spring Storm, while France sent AMX-10 RC armored fighting vehicles and Caesar self-propelled howitzers. “They need to be able to see us with our allies ready to fight from the first moment.” “Russia only understands one thing, and that’s power,” one military officer said.
One major ingredient to the deterrence recipe, at least NATO allies hope, is conducting exercises like Spring Storm. But not nearly enough to ease the rattled nerves of its eastern members. To sum things up from the interviews so far: NATO has done a lot since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine last February to shake off the cobwebs and get back to its old job of collective defense, Cold War-style. SitRep is along for the ride here, gauging the atmosphere on NATO’s vulnerable eastern flank and interviewing top European officials at the annual Lennart Meri security conference in Tallinn this weekend. The exercise, dubbed Spring Storm, is meant to stress-test how allied militaries will work and fight together, in the (hopefully unlikely) event of any military incursion from Russia. In recent days, it has become a beehive of activity for Estonian, British, French, and other NATO country forces ahead of a massive military exercise involving 14,000 troops from 11 countries. The Tapa base, Estonia’s largest, is one of the closest of any NATO member to the Russian border. TAPA ARMY BASE, Estonia-On a bright Wednesday afternoon near bucolic forests in the Estonian countryside, hundreds of soldiers rushed around the country’s largest military base, preparing for a war they hope they will never have to fight.
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