Baltic States Seek Permanent NATO Presence

• 05.15.2015, 21:43
•  Europe,  World

Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia will formally ask NATO to deploy several thousand troops as a deterrent to Russia. They want to have NATO troops based permanently on their territory, as a result of their growing fear of Russian "aggression," news24.com reports. 

The Baltic states, which were once part of the Soviet Union and have considerable number of ethnic Russian minorities, will appeal to NATO to ask for a brigade, which, in NATO case, is usually comprised of 3,000 to 5,000 soldiers.

NATO’s Secretary General, Jens Stoltenberg, promised to go carefully through the letter and assess the proposals.

ʺAn allied presence is an essential prerequisite for Latvia’s security in a situation where Russia does not change its policies regarding the Ukraine conflict and at the same time strongly demonstrates its military presence and potential in the Baltic Sea regionʺ, - Latvia’s Defence Ministry declared in its statement.

The 3 countries have been even more alarmed when the number of Russian military aircraft and ships approaching their borders sharply increased, although Russian officials keep on telling that NATO in its turn has also conducted major military exercises across central and eastern Europe, and Russia has just done the same near Ukraine’s border and in Kaliningrad, which is a part of Russia, neighbouring  Lithuania and Poland. By the way, the interesting thing is, that Poland also turned out to be "seeking Permanent NATO Presence", according to their military planning document, which asked for some "bases with heavy equipment" from NATO.

In response to all this panic, Vladimir Chizhov, Russia’s ambassador to the EU, declared: "This request to NATO is rather motivated by local politics than a genuine security situation. As far as I am aware, nobody is threatening the Baltic countries – at least, nobody that I know of."