The reinforcement of the eastern flank of the Atlantic Alliance continues. The German Defense Minister, Boris Pistorius, took advantage yesterday of his visit to the Pabrade training camp, less than 20 kilometers from the border between Lithuania and Belarus, to announce the forthcoming permanent deployment of a brigade with 4,000 soldiers. to the Baltic country.
“Germany was the eastern flank of NATO territory until the end of the Warsaw Pact. We could always count on and trust the will of our allies to protect our security and our freedom,” Pistorius recalled at a press conference with NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg and Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda, who has spent months asking Berlin for a decision along these lines. “As the first European economy and a member of NATO we are prepared to assume responsibilities on the new eastern flank” and “deploy a robust brigade to Lithuania permanently,” he announced.
Pristorius assured that the decision is not related to the deterioration of security in recent days in Russia and Belarus, but until now the German government has remained firm in its commitment to the force model agreed a year ago at the NATO summit. in Madrid. Then, Foreign Minister Olaf Scholz announced that his army would reserve a brigade of 5,000 troops, partially deployable within 10 days, which these days is exercising in Lithuania. Berlin has cooperated closely with Vilnius in the military field since 2017, when it took over the leadership of one of the eight multinational brigades deployed by NATO on its eastern border since 2014.
The main condition of the German government is that the Lithuanian armed forces be able to offer “adequate infrastructure” to its soldiers, specifically barracks, training grounds and storage facilities, a requirement that the Lithuanian Ministry of Defense does not seem to have. many problems to meet in view of the constant expansion of its military infrastructures in recent years. This commitment has been further reinforced with the agreement for the German air force to protect the Lithuanian capital during the leaders’ summit on July 11 and 12.
The Lithuanian government’s goal is for the new military facilities to house German soldiers to be ready by 2026. “I wouldn’t mind if the Defense Minister told me it will be ready in 2025,” Nauseda told Arvydas Anušauskas with a laugh. sitting in the front row of the press conference. For Lithuania, a country of 2.8 million inhabitants and whose armed forces currently number about 20,000 troops, the German announcement represents a numerical reinforcement of its defense capabilities of 25%. The small Baltic republic feels especially vulnerable for sharing a border with Belarus and Russia, in this case through the Kaliningrad enclave and, although grateful for the strong deployment of NATO in recent years on its eastern flank, where there are some 40,000 forces , has always defended that the rapid deployment model is not enough to face the challenges it faces.
“We are in the front line of defense of the Alliance. Our border is the NATO border”, “Russia is waging a bloody war at our gates” and the collaboration with Belarus “may have security implications for Lithuania and the entire region”, said President Nausedas, referring to the alleged agreement between the Kremlin and Yevgeny Prigozhin, the leader of the Wagner mercenary group, to end their threat of rebellion and withdraw to the neighboring country, which has also accepted the deployment of Russian tactical nuclear weapons.
“It is a foolish and irresponsible decision” but “we do not see any indication that Russia is preparing to use nuclear weapons,” said Allied Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, who called on Belarus to stop supporting Russia’s illegal war in Ukraine. . The Alliance, he added, closely follows both developments in Belarus and in Russia. “What we have seen in Russia in recent days shows the fragility of the Russian regime” as well as “how difficult and dangerous it is for President Putin to depend on mercenaries” but “we should not make the mistake of underestimating the Russians,” he warned. .
