Russia Boosts Northern Fleet To Counter NATO Expansion

Russia will create a new joint-service force as part of its Northern Fleet to strengthen its presence in the Arctic following Finland's accession to NATO and the prospective alliance membership of Sweden, a Kremlin-friendly newspaper has reported.

Russian defense ministry sources told Izvestia that the force would include motorized rifle brigades, regiments and divisions trained for combat operations in Arctic conditions.

One of the goals of the reported move is to strengthen Russian positions around the Kola Peninsula, which hosts Russian strategic assets.

When it was founded in 2010, Russia's Western Military District amalgamated the Moscow and Leningrad military districts with the Kaliningrad Special Region, although units and formations in the Arctic remained part of the Northern Fleet.

Izvestia reported that Russia's Arctic warfare formations, the 200th Separate Guard Motor Rifle Brigade and 80th Arctic Brigade, could be reorganized into a division. The 14th Army Corps, which is the tactical command of the Northern Fleet's coastal defense troops may be incorporated into the Russian army, it added.

The publication said that Arctic forces will include missile and air defense brigades that will "significantly increase the grouping's capabilities in the region." The paper reported that before Sweden and Finland had declared their intentions to join NATO, Russia did not require large forces in the region.

"While Sweden and Finland were conditionally neutral countries, there was no need to keep any large forces in the region," Russian military historian Dmitry Boltenkov told Izvestia, adding that an expanded NATO made it necessary "to strengthen the north-western direction."

Moscow reacted angrily to the accession to the alliance of Finland, which shares an 800-mile border with Russia. Helsinki had been spurred to join NATO because of the perceived threat posed by Russia, following its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Sweden is also seeking to join but its membership, which requires unanimous approval from all members, is being held up by objections from Turkey. Ankara says Stockholm is too lenient on groups it regards as a security threat, including militant Kurdish groups.

"It is unlikely that the Turks will be able to block Sweden's entry into the alliance for long," Inna Vetrenko, head of the Department of Management and Social Technologies at the North-Western Institute of the RANEPA, told Izvestia. "Sooner or later they will be pressured and they will withdraw the veto."

Russian President Vladimir Putin used the expansion of NATO as part of the justification for his full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Over the course of the war, the alliance has united in supplying Kyiv with equipment and training. If Stockholm were to join, it would take the number of members to 32.

Rose Gottemoeller, NATO's former deputy secretary general, recently told Newsweek that Finland's NATO membership, and the prospect of Sweden joining, "turns the Baltic Sea into a NATO lake."

"From a certain perspective, it becomes easier to resupply and defend northern Europe," she said. As alliance partners, the Nordic countries "were already intensively training and exercising with NATO on very complex missions, like air policing over the Baltic to prevent incursions of Russian planes into NATO airspace. "

"Because of their close military cooperation during recent years, I have a feeling they've already been incorporated into planning," she added.

The threat that Russia poses to the alliance will be top of the agenda when it meets for a summit in Lithuania starting July 11.

Newsweek has contacted the Russian defense ministry and NATO for comment.