The sighting of enemy tanks coming from the north alerted the 41st mechanized infantry brigade, which had arrived in 72 hours from Germany to the eastern end of Lithuania. They are less than 20 kilometers from Belarus, from the “last dictatorship of Europe”, from a vassal state of Moscow that was instrumental in attacking Ukraine and from the fate of the unexpected exile of Yevgeny Prigozhin, leader of the Wagners.
The adversary seems to want to gain control of the Pabradė training ground and take positions to launch a full-scale invasion of the country. “I can safely say that we know what we are doing to protect our Alliance,” says a German army commander, who works integrated with the Lithuanian armed forces. What follows is a demonstration of military might and interoperability capability by deploying dozens of Keiler, Fennek and Leopard tanks to carry out reconnaissance activities, fortify positions and fight back until the enemy is defeated.
The outcome of this "high intensity war" is known in advance. It is the script for the Griffin Storm maneuvers that are taking place these days east of Vilnius, one of the largest military exercises that NATO plans to carry out this year to test the force model agreed upon at the last summit in Madrid, when it was decided Raise from 40,000 to 300,000 the number of high-availability troops that must be ready to move and protect “every last inch of allied territory”, as its leader, Jens Stoltenberg, likes to say.
The German government promised a year ago to reserve a brigade of 5,000 soldiers to protect Lithuania. Without installing them in the country, as the Baltic countries request, but continuously trained to be able to move them with little notice. Thus, the first part of the maneuvers, which began on June 21 and will last until July 7, consisted of moving 1,000 troops from Neubrandenburg to Lithuania, supported by 320 armored vehicles, to test the mobility of the troops.
They came by air, land and sea. Within three days, they were in Pabradė. Troop movements in Europe often run into customs obstacles or roads unsuitable for transporting heavy equipment (the EU is earmarking funds for this), but the operation went smoothly. “Only 0.6% of the vehicles had problems”, such as burst tires, for example, explains German Lieutenant Colonel Benedikt Hoff.
The plan, in the future, is to have material pre-stationed in Lithuania (or the country that each ally is assigned to protect, as NATO will agree at the Vilnius summit in July), but now the German army has brought everything with it: supplies , ammunition, spare parts... It's not ideal, admits Brigadier Christian Nawrat: "Getting here in a couple of days but not having stock or personnel isn't very useful." Many challenges remain (harmonize orders and procedures, improve communications...), but the commitment of the military is total. “Neither for me nor for my men is there a difference between defending Lithuania and defending Germany. This is NATO territory, and we are prepared to return if necessary," says Moritz, head of a division of the brigade.
Although it is a fictional scenario, the starting point of this dress rehearsal, an attack from across the border, is not a hypothetical situation for Lithuanians, but frighteningly plausible. Since it gained independence from the Soviet Union in 1990, Lithuania has always felt vulnerable due to its geographical location. The country (2.8 million inhabitants) is bordered to the south by the enclave of Kaliningrad (Russia) and shares a 679-kilometre border to the east with Belarus, as well as, with Poland, the 65-kilometre Suwalki Strait, the possible weak flank. of NATO (occupying this space, the three Baltic republics would be isolated). Following the annexation of Crimea in 2014, Vilnius has skyrocketed its defense spending (currently 2.3% of GDP), it has closed agreements with the US to reinforce its military presence on the ground and it has one of the the multinational battalions, led by Germany, created by NATO to reinforce its eastern flank, where there are already 40,000 troops in rotation.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine prompted the largest NATO military build-up since the Cold War, but Baltic governments have never hidden their displeasure with the rapid deployment model agreed in Madrid, which they believe would not be enough to repel a Russian attack and they insist on asking for permanent deployments. Paradoxically, on Monday, the same day that the German army was trying to prove to Stoltenberg and the Lithuanian authorities that the model works, the German Defense Minister, Boris Pistorius, seemed to agree with them by announcing that he would send a brigade of 4,000 troops. permanently as soon as they can accommodate it (the German government says that the infrastructure will be ready in 2026).
As a model, it seems difficult to expand. "It's not just about having a presence, but about the ability to have early warning indicators to react quickly if necessary, and these maneuvers show" that it can be done, Stoltenberg defended. The allied leaders will pronounce themselves, in July, on possible adaptations to the force model.
