Claipeda it is one of the most loved seaside resorts by Lithuanians. A few years ago we would have found the beach crowded with Russian tourists. Today with a passport from Moscow, if you are not a diplomat or dissident, you can no longer enter the Baltic country. However, there are numerous local families who, from a distance, watch with curiosity NATO military exercise which takes place on a delimited but not closed section of the coast.
Defend the Baltic in times of war
The van that takes the journalists to the maneuvering area crosses the path of a campsite. In the shade of the trees, the soldiers of the Vilnius army display their weapons and vehicles in favor of the room. Among them, some very excited children wrap themselves in camouflage nets or peer from cannon targets. The beach is teeming with men and women in uniform. Polish, English, American, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, Canadian. And many Romanians, who make up the crew of the ORP Torun of the Warsaw navy (it’s called “interoperability”) involved, together with ours Saint Mark in the amphibious operation at the center of the 2023 edition of the annual maneuver Baltop a regular exercise which, after the Russian aggression on Ukraine, is much more than routine.
Vessels can be seen on the horizon. A fighter flies overhead. To the south is the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad thorn in NATO’s side. In the South East the corridor of Suwalki, border strip between Lithuania and Poland squeezed between the Oblast controlled by the Kremlin, the ancient Konigsberg that the Red Army wrested from the Third Reich, and Belarus, one of the hottest places in the world. A joint maneuver by Moscow and Minsk would isolate the three Baltic countries from the rest of the Atlantic Alliance. An occurrence that in the first convulsive months of the war in Ukraine had suddenly become much more than a sinister hypothesis. “In the current scenario, the landing of these vehicles has the aim of guaranteeing the safety and protection of the coast”, underlines a Lithuanian officer, not hiding that the ongoing conflict makes preparation even more important.
Operation “Storm Strike”
The four vehicles of the Lithuanian army which were stationed on the sand, to the right of the press centre, set off. It is the beginning of the exercise “Storm Strike” of the Lithuanian marines, a cornerstone of the Vilnius national defense strategy, this year included in the framework of Baltops, the major NATO maneuver in the Baltic, 53 years of history, conceived, obviously in different sectors, when the Lithuania it was still part of the USSR.
The scenario is the reclamation of an area already occupied by the enemy, waiting for reinforcements. The riflemen get out of the vehicles, shoot, advance, pass the Nemirseta beach, they enter the woods. The smoke envelops the shore, amidst the noise of the gusts. Then the dinghies with fellow soldiers arrive from the sea. It is the first wave of the landing. There are deminers on board. Only when the area is deemed clear of traps and obstacles is everything ready for the arrival of the allies, for which air support is crucial. The jets mobilized come from Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, the Czech Republic, Romania, Spain, Turkey and the USA. And from the three Baltic nations. Their deployment is permanent. I am ready to intervene at any moment.
A “Complex and Dangerous” Effort
Then the Lithuanian officer imposes protective goggles on those present. And the unmistakable sound of an approaching helicopter is heard. It’s a EH-101 of the Italian Navy. Raise a cloud of sand that blinds camera lenses. The marines descend from a rope. Baltops 23 goes live. Italians, Poles and Romanians continue the infiltration operation, reinforcing the men of “Storm Strike”.
The aim is “to strengthen interoperability with allies,” he explains Tad Jablonskis, fleet commander of the Lithuanian Navy, “our intelligence has signaled an escalation of the situation and we have strengthened our preparations”. “The area of operations is very large for the available forces to cover, the situation presents many dangers and we have selected a suitable area for the landing of potential adversaries,” continues Jablonskis, “the amphibious landing is a very complex and dangerous endeavor because it requires a high degree of coordination between sea, land and air forces”.
The next chopper is for the reporters. Tailgate open, “like in the movies”, at least for those who have only seen war, real or simulated, in the cinema. Destination the San Marco.