In 1989, the Baltic people formed a human chain that spanned across Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia in protest of the Soviet occupation of their countries.
In 2013, after an extremely controversial referendum, the Crimean peninsula was annexed by Russia. In the two years that have elapsed, eastern Ukraine has become an active war zone with frequent civilian casualties, and the debacle of the Air Malaysia passenger plane going down over the newly Russian air space. Meanwhile, Ukraine’s neighbours to the north, the Baltic States, have grown increasingly nervous with sightings of Russian bombers as far west as Scotland, and with increased Russian military presence around the Baltic Sea.
In an interview with the BBC, the former president of Georgia, Mikheil Saakashvili, now governor of Odessa in Ukraine, stated that Putin is obsessed with the idea of testing NATO, and that the Baltics will be next on Putin’s land wish list. Speaking from experience as a man whose country went to war with Russia in 2008, he believes that Putin intends on revisiting Georgia and Azerbaijan as well.
While this aggression on its borders with former Soviet states may appear a haphazard method of testing his influence over NATO, the areas being targeted by Russia are all very strategic naval ports, as with Crimea. Riga, Latvia’s capital, is the northernmost non-freezing sea port, and on Latvia’s western coast, the city of Liepaja is home to one of the largest military ports in the Baltics with prime access to the Baltic Sea.
The most recent event causing outrage in the three small countries has been the Russian chief prosecutor’s office re-examining the legality of the 1991 independence granted to the Baltics. Over the past 800 years, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia have all been occupied intermittently by Russia, and other major historical powers, in large part because of their strategic location on the eastern shores of the Baltic Sea. After gaining independence from Soviet occupation in 1991, all three countries sought NATO membership after a long history of living under foreign occupation. In recent years, the Kremlin has viewed this as a hostile challenge to its security interests. In this past month, the Kremlin declared the transfer of Crimea from Russia to Ukraine in 1954 illegal.
While there IS a minority of ethnic Russians in the Baltic States, it is far smaller in proportion to the minority in Ukraine, most of whom emigrated there during the Soviet occupation looking for work. The Baltic peoples have lived on the shores of the Baltic Sea for at least the last millennium, and will not give up their homes without a fight. Lithuania has already re-instated the draft, with Latvia considering it. American tanks now patrol the eastern borders, and with worrying echoes of the Cold War, NATO has stationed troops in Estonia for training exercises and has increased its air force on its eastern order by sending four RAF Typhoons to perform regular patrols. While these may just be exercises for the NATO troops, their arrival being personally greeted by the Estonian president and minister of defence suggests that this is more than just training. British MP Philip Hammond stated very pointedly that the increased NATO presence in the Baltics is for the purpose of making it very clear that NATO will stand by its allies.
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