How should the United States and NATO prioritize their resources to the Baltic States? That is the topic of this policy paper that Erik Marmei and Gabriel White have written for ICDS. The policy paper outlines a series of weaknesses with the defense in the Baltic States. It is pointed out that despite the fact […]
Estonia
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A military reserve of cyber security experts
Monica M. Ruiz argues in War on the Rocks that the Estonian voluntary Cyber Defense Unit is a model that the United States should implement. I think this is a great idea for many countries, including other countries in the Baltic region. The idea is that citizens who are specialists in cyber security or have […]
Knowledge increases support for women soldiers, says Estonian study
Andres Siplane in an ICDS report about Women in the Estonian Defense Forces: “As an important observation, it has to be pointed out that support for women serving in the [Estonian Defense Forces] is much higher among active service personnel than in society in general.[…] While in society in general almost half of the respondents […]
The Baltic nations would be hard to beat
One of the things that I didn’t touch on in my description about how a war between Russia and the West will play out was the resistance that the populations of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania would muster after a Russian occupation. That was a deliberate omission because you just can’t fit everything into one piece, […]
Maybe former Soviet republics don’t like to be Russia’s “sphere of interest”
Mikhail Barabanov in Moscow Defense Brief: Russia holds the Zapad drills along its western borders once every four years; the previous such event took place in 2013. This year, however, the reaction from some of Russia’s neighbors to the west has been nothing short of hysterical. […] For all the Western concerns, the scenario of […]
Estonia receives Javelin anti-tank missiles
Estonia has received the first delivery of Javelin Block 1 missiles. Javelin is a man-portable fire-and-forget anti-tank missile that is produced by Raytheon and Lockheed Martin. That announces the Estonian Ministry of Defense. The missiles will replace the old MILAN system in both the army and the voluntary Estonian Defense League. Last year Estonia received […]
You have to practice being jammed
Estonian intelligence chief Kapo Rosin has an assessment of the Zapad exercise and Russian doctrine in Defense News: The exercise basically [addressed] two factors. First, how to jam the enemy, which is logical; and second, how to operate [within those] conditions themselves. They of course know that an electronic field is both a challenge for […]
Estonia enhances electronic surveillance of border
Estonia is projecting electronic surveillance of the Narva River with a bit of foreign funding, reports err.ee. The project includes a radar, cameras, electrical connections, a communications solution, and more. The idea is to improve the guarding of the border and increase the chance of detecting illegal border crossings. Given Lithuania’s problems with keeping Russian […]
Danish admiral says submarines are flagrant waste of money
The Defense Commission of the Danish parliament yesterday conducted a hearing on the question of whether Denmark should reintroduce submarines and sea mines in the naval arsenal. Both were phased out in 2005 but especially the importance of submarines has been a question of intense debate ever since. Rear admiral Nils Wang, commandant of the […]
Compensation of reservists causes trouble for Estonia
Having a good reserve is complicated. The material and logistical requirements are obvious as a reserve is not worth much if you are not able to provide simple things like uniforms and weapons when the reservists show up for service. Denmark is a good example of a country with a large reserve of former conscripts […]