NATO/US Military Build up in Eastern Europe-Russian borders

Convoy of 36 USArmy Stryker vehicles crossed the border between Hungary & Romania.

Convoy of 36 USArmy Stryker vehicles crossed the border between Hungary & Romania.

"The Lithuanian government said on Friday it would proceed with negotiations to buy 88 Boxer armored fighting vehicles in a deal worth up to 400 million euros ($439 million). The decision, where the Boxer was selected from a list of 12 suppliers that also included Swiss Piranha and American Stryker vehicles, came as the Baltic country moves to bolster its military amid tensions between Russia and the West over the Ukraine crisis. “After this decision, the project of the largest ever defense purchase will move forward swiftly,” Lithuanian armed forces chief Jonas Zukas told reporters. Senior government sources told Reuters the value of the deal was expected to be no higher than 400 million euros.



That would still represent is a big undertaking for Lithuania, whose total defense budget stands at 425 million euros this year. The Boxers are to be equipped with 30mm MkII guns and anti-tank system Spike-Lr, both manufactured by Israeli companies, the sources said. The Boxer is produced by the ARTEC consortium, a collaboration between Germany’s Rheinmetall MAN Military Vehicles and German defense contractor Krauss-Maffei Wegmann."

Source: http://defence-blog.com/army/lithuanian-military-chooses-88-german-boxer-armored-fighting-vehicles.html

1.30 AM with Millitary Police assistance they break. Slovaks are angry
Link in Polish
http://wyborcza.pl/1,75478,19364644,nocny-atak-macierewicza.html

Army Commander: Russia Could Cut Off U.S., NATO Allies from the Baltics



Putin has conducted military exercises and placed advanced missiles in Kaliningrad, near Poland and Lithuania.Russia could split NATO’s defenses by launching an offensive from the enclave of Kaliningrad near Poland, the commander of U.S. Army Europe warned this week.

The Soviet Union annexed Kaliningrad—a territory sandwiched between Poland to the south and Lithuania to the east—after World War II. It has continued to be of great strategic importance for Russian President Vladimir Putin, who deployed short-range, nuclear-capable Iskander ballistic missiles there in 2013 to counter European missile defenses.

Russian military activity in the region has captured the attention of Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, commander of U.S. Army Europe, Military.com reports:

Hodges pointed to the “Suwalki gap,” a 60-mile sliver of flat terrain in northern Poland that runs east-to-west from Russian-ally Belarus to Lithuania and the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad, where Russian President Vladimir Putin has placed his most advanced anti-aircraft and anti-ship missiles.

Putin has ratcheted up tensions in the area with frequent, unannounced “snap exercises” of his military near the Suwalki region, combined with the construction of a new airbase in Belarus.

“There’s never an observer there” when Putin calls a snap exercise, Hodges said. “We find out about them when they’re happening. That’s a threat, a concern that we have.”

A Russian offensive in the area could cut off other NATO allies from the Baltic Sea and the Baltic states of Lithuania, Estonia, and Latvia:

A surprise thrust by the Russians through the Suwalki gap would cut off the Baltic states of Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia—all NATO members—and the troops and weaponry already stationed in Kaliningrad could limit a NATO response.

“They could make it very difficult for any of us to get up the Baltic Sea if we needed to in a contingency.”

Russia is also challenging NATO’s periphery in Ukraine, where it has backed separatists in a conflict that has claimed more than 9,000 lives. The United Nations said this week that Moscow continues to funnel ammunition, arms, and fighters into the eastern part of the country.




Russia Could Block Access to Baltic Sea

Russia has moved ballistic missiles to and conducted nuclear strike drills from its Kaliningrad exclave, prompting Pentagon fears that Moscow could block access to the Baltic Sea.

There is a “significant amount of capability” in Kaliningrad, including anti-ship weapons, air defenses, and electronic warfare equipment, Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, commander of U.S. Army Europe, said Wednesday.

“They could make it very difficult for any of us to get up into the Baltic Sea if we needed to in a contingency,” Hodges said in a briefing at the Pentagon.

Russia has conducted what NATO commanders call “snap exercises”: large-scale drills that are not announced and use sophisticated arms. When NATO holds drills of similar size, Russian observers are invited and typically attend. But NATO officials are not invited to Russian’s snap exercises held in Kaliningrad and nearby Belarus.

“We find out about them when they’re happening,” Hodges said.

For exercises in Kaliningrad, Moscow has deployed the mobile, short-range Iskander ballistic missile, Hodges said.

“We have seen them do exercises where … there’s a nuclear strike,” Hodges said. “They don’t [say] gray land, and silver land, or red land, or stuff like that. They say ‘NATO is the adversary’ when they do their exercises. I mean, they’re pretty blunt about that.”

Hodges said Russia has not conducted a full-scale drill to specifically block access to the Baltic Sea. “I haven’t seen one exercise that looked like a complete rehearsal for that,” he said, but “they’ve done lots of the components that would be required to do those various things in terms of air, maritime, [and] land forces.”

Earlier this year, Russia warned Denmark that Danish ships could become nuclear targets if its government took part in a NATO missile defense project. Hodges called those threats an “irresponsible use of the ‘nuclear’ word.”

“You can understand why our allies on the eastern flank of NATO, particularly in the Baltic region are nervous, are uneasy,” he said.

Tucked between Poland and Lithuania, Kaliningrad is a strategic outpost for the Russian navy. The Russian air force also has a presence there. By blocking access into the Baltic Sea, Russia could prevent NATO forces from reaching its Baltic allies of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania.

Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine nearly two years ago, American forces have spent more time in Eastern Europe training with NATO allies. Those exercises are expected to continue in coming years, Hodges said.

NATO Allegedly Plans to Approve Military Expansion in Eastern Europe

Less than a week after the US defense secretary announced a major boost in spending on the Pentagon's activities in Europe, rumors have surfaced that NATO plans to expand its military presence in Poland and the Baltic states in a move that, as Russia has repeatedly warned, will further undermine regional peace and security.

The initiative was outlined on Friday, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing unnamed sources in the US and NATO. The official announcement is expected to come next week following a meeting of NATO defense ministers in Brussels.

"Officials said the size of the force and precise national contributions won't be determined until later this year. But they said defense ministers are likely to approve a mission to oversee and enlarge what are currently bilateral deployments to Poland and the Baltic States," Julian E. Barnes noted.

Earlier this week, US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter announced that the DoD plans to request $3.4 billion for fiscal year 2017 (up from $789 million for the current budget year) to reinforce its military presence close to Russia's western borders. The funding will help the US to rotate more troops in the region, conduct more war games and preposition additional military hardware.

These moves, according to Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, "create grounds to implement military plans against Russia and take practical steps to push military infrastructure closer to Russia's borders." Zakharova described the manner in which these initiatives are carried out as "aggressive" and added that NATO uses a non-existent threat from Russia as a pretext.

Russia will respond with "fitting political, diplomatic and military" measures to Washington and NATO's "unfriendly" attempts "to exert pressure" on Moscow, Zakharova noted.

The United States and its partners in NATO have increased their military presence in Eastern Europe and the Baltics following the outbreak of a civil war in Ukraine, which the West largely blames on Russia. Moscow has repeatedly said that it is not a party to the conflict and does not pose a threat to anyone.

Read more: http://sputniknews.com/politics/20160206/1034332599/nato-expansion-eastern-europe.html#ixzz3zPmCRkh6

Large scale US Military Convoy in Germany

Riga Simplifies NATO Navy Access to Latvian Territorial Waters


According to the statement, the move comes due to changes in the security situation in Europe.

A shift in circumstances as well as Latvia's commitments as a member of NATO makes quick NATO access to Latvia’s waters preferable, the country's Defense Ministry said earlier, adding that the new procedures applied to both training drills and real critical situations.

Latvia's previous rules for territorial water access by foreign ships were adopted in 2010. The rules stipulated a complex procedure involving a Foreign Ministry permission involving engagement with three other ministries as well as the Latvian National Armed Forces.

Latvia has been a member of NATO since 2004. Russia has repeatedly warned that increased NATO presence close to its borders is provocative and poses a threat to regional and international stability.

US and Poland Army soldiers travel in armored combat vehicles through the streets of Lodz, Poland.

"Estonia will host a record number of U.S. troops during the allied Saber Strike exercise this summer, BBC’s Ukrainian service has reported.

The Estonian Armed Forces did not confirm how many U.S. troops would take part; however, they did estimate that over 500 units of U.S. military kit would participate in the exercise.

Saber Strike will be one of U.S. Army Europe's largest multinational exercises this summer in a bid to practise a speedy response with its new rapid-reaction forces in Eastern Europe."

Source: http://www.newsweek.com/estonia-host-record-number-us-troops-allied-drill-445657

In the Luftwaffe 1/3 of aircraft are actually combat capable, land forces have 200-something tanks and worse still, there are no reserves at all. Germany cannot simply take tanks out of storage and refill the ranks - every tactical defeat in battle means annihilation of the Bundeswehr armored forces and a march on Berlin. This could happen over 1 day and Poland could manage that.

German "military industry" would be useless in producing AFVs under conditions of even moderately itnensive conflict.

Germany's military policy since 1945 is budget-supercut. So that they can minimize the corrpution in the army.

French/UK/US contractors get all the profitable parts of the cake, and Germany responds by saying "if you do not allow me to make my own stuffs, then I will buy no stuff".

The backside of that policy is, Bundeswehr used mini-buses instead of AFVs in military exercises.

But at the end of the day, French/UK/US realize that they cannot live without German military techs, since Germany and her neighbors have the most advanced industry and technology backgroud in EU.

Cloudy with a chance of Humvees: Military vehicles plummet from sky in a failed air drill.

No need to quote the article but this would mark the first open steep towards US and EU war against Russia.

We are talking about deployment of offensive force on the border with Russia.

OBAMA REQUESTS EU SUPPORT FOR POSSIBLE WAR AGAINST RUSSIA

Its is evident that US political landscape will not change thus its offensive policy.

US policy is aimed at putting Russia in to submission like EU for instance

EU will have to think twice before saying yes to this offer but with the pudles like that there can be no doubt one way of the other

Will Russia calmly wait for the combined US/EU force in its borders like Saddam did? ...

In such case we are talking about full time US grabbing of EU power in its interest and tensions with Russia escalation to the lvl of new cold war with eventually

undecided EU countries all lining up against combined US/EU pressure thus revealing the true idea of the EU existance.

According to the new book Brzezinski is advertising the idea is that US has already lost the dominant power in the World but not supremacy and the initiative is asked to

regain the foothold by sidening Russia and China by US side but under US leadership.

In that case Russia would than replace the Germany in its place as a strongest Eu country but still under its submission. Similar idea would be offered to China but eventually

US would turn one against the other exploiting the situation for its benefit while preventing Russia-China alliance.

It remains to be seen how will EU countries respond to new US order in light of the sanctions that are biting the EU countries too because why they are thinking about lifting them.

This would in Russia for sure provoke very emotional reaction among the population.

Viktor wrote:No need to quote the article but this would mark the first open steep towards US and EU war against Russia.

We are talking about deployment of offensive force on the border with Russia.

OBAMA REQUESTS EU SUPPORT FOR POSSIBLE WAR AGAINST RUSSIA

Its is evident that US political landscape will not change thus its offensive policy.

US policy is aimed at putting Russia in to submission like EU for instance

EU will have to think twice before saying yes to this offer but with the pudles like that there can be no doubt one way of the other

Will Russia calmly wait for the combined US/EU force in its borders like Saddam did? ...  

In such case we are talking about full time US grabbing of EU power in its interest and tensions with Russia escalation to the lvl of new cold war with eventually

undecided EU countries all lining up against combined US/EU pressure thus revealing the true idea of the EU existance.

According to the new book Brzezinski is advertising the idea is that US has already lost the dominant power in the World but not supremacy and the initiative is asked to

regain the foothold by sidening Russia and China by US side but under US leadership.

In that case Russia would than replace the Germany in its place as a strongest Eu country but still under its submission. Similar idea would be offered to China but eventually

US would turn one against the other exploiting the situation for its benefit while preventing Russia-China alliance.

It remains to be seen how will EU countries respond to new US order in light of the sanctions that are biting the EU countries too because why they are thinking about lifting them.

This would in Russia for sure provoke very emotional reaction among the population.

Putin said they would respond asymmetrical, so now Russian MOD will purchase 700 MLRS systems in the coming years, so 700 of Tornado-G/U/S systems, and maybe outside of the 700 MLRS we may even see ground based Hermes (which maybe increasing it's range from 100 km to 145 km).

Something to think about is that 203mm Pion was capable of firing tactical nuclear warheads, so that means 220 mm Uragan/Tornado-U and 300 mm Smerch/Tornado-S will be capable of carrying tactical nuclear warheads as well (which aren't prohibited by the current START treaty).

Dunno why my post didn't go through but...

I think it is hysterical the title and the article. I don think US is that stupid and suicidal and neither is EU. The number of forces they would place at or near Russia's borders I can't imagine exceeds 30,000. If that is the case, Russia would outnumber them at least 3:1 or greater and Russia has the logistical advantage due to home team advantage.

As well, Russia is awash in Soviet gear as well, and much like Armenia and other conflicts showing the people willing to volunteer in order to protect their homeland, would mean Russia could acquire a massive army in a short period, way more massive.

I am aware that a huge portion of those old Soviet equipment may not be working, but I bet it would take very little effort to get them working, and operational status. Advancement in manpads, shorad and anti tank weapons would end up awash in Russia.

I dont think the article is hysterical. Its real. Im not implying US/EU would in such case be in position to launch an effective attack but imagine all the other outcome.

We are basically talking about again drawing the lines of the new Cold War. Russia being sorounded by such force would make all the other under US control states bordering Russia

get much more "balls" to do anti-Russian actions. There would be much higher possibility to draw Russia in the Ukraine and US would gain moral grounds to build the missile shield

right next door. In case of the Russia existing INF, Eu would see it as a hostile act.

Anyway what needs to be done, needs to be done and if EU population does not see the direction its political elites are driwing it towards it could become their ultimate nightmare.

A war between Russia and NATO seems impossibile to happen imo. Nobody is so stupid to start a nuclear war.

F-22 fighter jets are in Romania to keep tabs on Russia's Black Sea antics

The U.S. sent its most sophisticated aircraft to Romania on Monday for exercises aimed to enhance training with other Europe-based aircraft.

Two F-22 Raptors and approximately 20 supporting airmen from the 95th Fighter Squadron, Tyndall Air Force Base, Florida, landed at Mihail Kogalniceanu Air Base along with a KC-135 aircraft from the 916th Air Refueling Wing, Seymour Johnson Air Force Base, North Carolina, officials with U.S. Air Forces in Europe-Air Forces Africa said.

The largest deployment of the multirole fighter to the continent, officials said, is meant to "bolster the security of NATO allies and partners in Europe" while showcasing its flexibility to fly throughout the region.

The deployment near the Black Sea comes as U.S. commanders re-evaluate the military's role, reach and responsibilities in Europe. Russia's resurgence has forced Washington to rethink troop levels in Europe, eyeing a larger, permanent force that would help deter an unexpected fight against Russian forces.

USAFE-AFAFRICA officials did not say how long the stealth jets would be in Romania but added the deployment proves "European bases and other NATO installations can host 5th-generation fighters."

"It is important we test our infrastructure, aircraft capabilities, and the talented Airmen and allies who will host these aircraft in Europe," USAFE-AFAFRICA commander Gen. Frank Gorenc said. "This deployment advances our airpower evolution and demonstrates our resolve and commitment to European safety and security."

In August, the Air Force deployed four F-22s to Europe for the first time ever as part of the ERI. The fighters traveled to Germany, and also forward deployed with A-10s to Estonia, coming close to Russia's borders.

In recent months, the service has been using the F-22 often, "heavily tasked to do missions worldwide," Gorenc said of the August deployment and the F-22's role in Syria against the Islamic State group.

The Air Force also recently deployed a theater security package of F-15s to Iceland and the Netherlands under Operation Atlantic Resolve. The contingent of F-15Cs and about 350 airmen from the 131st Fighter Squadron, Barnes Air National Guard Base, Massachusetts, and the 194th Fighter Squadron, Fresno Air National Guard Base, California, will participate in exercises through September.

As I mentioned on twitter about this; it is great training for Russian air defense men and pilots. They can probably use their radar systems to track the F-22's, and just monitor them. They are 2 of them and being near other aircrafts they will be spotted as well. A joke in all but none the less a good teaching lesson for Russian defenses.

30-35 hours of maintenance for every hour of flight . How are they planning to service F-22s in Romania?