With US President Donald Trump and many other world leaders busy with war in Ukrainesome Europeans are worried about what her army is doing Russia quietly in other parts of its borders with Europe.
About 100 miles east of its borders with Finland, in Petrozavonsk, Russia, military engineers expand the military bases where the Kremlin plans to create a new army headquarters that will oversee tens of thousands of soldiers in the coming years. These soldiers, many of whom are now serving in forefront of the front in Ukraine, are meant to be the ‘backbone“A Russian army preparing to confront the North Atlantic Pact Agency, according to Western Army officials and intelligence.
Kremlin expands military recruitments, enhances the production of weapons and upgrades the railway lines in the border areas, according to the analysis of Wall Street Journal.
Finland, which was forced to deliver territories to the Soviet Union in 1940, has passed decades trying to avoid the confrontation With Moscow. Now, having joined NATO after the invasion of Ukraine, it forts its borders with electronic defenses and barbed wire.
Trump, who is pushing Ukraine to accept a ceasefire agreementwhile trying to restore US ties with the Kremlin, he said that the concerns that Russia has ambitions beyond Ukraine are excessive.
Asked about the warning of Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelenski that Russia could wage war in NATO If the US reduces support for alliance, Trump said: ‘I do not agree with this, nor in intellect».
Military experts inside Russia, however, characterize activity along the Finnish border as part of the Kremlin’s preparation for Possible conflict with NATO.
‘When the troops return [από την Ουκρανία]they will look beyond borders in a country they consider to be an opponent, “he said Ruslan PukhovDirector of the Strategic and Technologies Analysis Center, a defensive group of Moscow -based scholars. ‘The logic of the last decade shows that We are waiting for Some conflict with NATO, “he added.
As Russia, then, is getting ready to Increase its military presence along the east side of NATO, Putin ordered the army to expands his ranks to 1.5 million soldiersfrom about a million that was before the invasion of Ukraine.
Accumulation of arms
Russia has dramatically increased its defensive budget to over 6% of GDP – a rate much higher than 3.4% of the US and 2.1% on average in European countries. At the same time, the Kremlin has announced the expansion of the Armed Forces from one million to 1.5 million soldiers.
Russia’s increased financial costs, on the other hand, have pushed the arms factories to complete capacitydriving military industrial companies to extend the production lines And open new facilities, according to European military officials.
In 2021, before invasion, Russia made about 40 of its main tanksthe T-90m, according to estimates by Western intelligence. Now it produces almost 300 a year. A senior Finnish military official said almost no one was sent to the front line of Ukraine, but remains on Russian territory for later use.
Western officials have also been reported and In secret businesses believed to have been carried out by Russia in Europe In recent years as proof of Moscow’s determination to destabilize the West and retaliate its support in Ukraine.
Russian military secret services are believed to be behind plans for the installation of incendiary mechanisms on airplanes of the DHL shipping giant and for the murder of the Managing Director of a German weapons manufacturer.
A European intelligence official said Russia could try to test the cohesion of the alliance with one invasion into a small NATO state, such as Estoniawhich has a significant Russian population.
Russia’s ability to put them with NATO will partly depend on its ability to rebuilt its forces after the war in Ukraine, who exhausted the body of her officers but provided her experience in precision fire.
Military “Renaissance”
For centuries, the Russian army made it one of the Europe’s largest forces. He broke up both Napoleon and Hitler after each of them dared to invade Russian territory. The entry of the Soviet Union into World War II changed the direction of the conflict and laid the foundations for the era of the Cold War that followed.
Putin was based on this military heritage for to justify war in Ukraine and Russia’s efforts to regain its influence in Europe, where former allies such as Ukraine have swollen to the West. Russia seems to bet that a military extension Along the NATO border will force the West to come back in contact with a stronger Moscow.
“OR Russia and the Europe should resume the dialogue with clear understanding of the potential of one for each other, with understanding the fact that we are enemies“, Claus CasinDirector of the Center for Total European and International Studies at the Moscow -based School of Economics.
To gather his forces to the West, the Kremlin changed last year the way he organizes his strengths inside the country, creating New regions associated with the defense of the larger cities ofMoscow and St. Petersburg.
In the Moscow Military District, Russia has incorporate road and rail routes used by its army with those of neighboring Belarus, the narrowest ally of Moscow and a base for the initial invasion of Ukraine.
Russia plans to build new barracks and training venues and upgrade the arsenals and railway lines to accommodate the inflated number of troops in Petrozavonsk And around it.
In the context of military reconstruction, Moscow has reorganize and its administrative structure, creating new military districts focusing on Moscow and St. Petersburg.
This year’s military exercises West (“West”) will, according to military analysts, be the first public demonstration of Russia’s new military power on the border with NATO.
Military officials in NATO’s eastern wing are awaiting a demonstration that aims toa preventing Europe from intensifying tensions with Russia. Regardless of the state of the ceasefire talks, they said, the Kremlin wants to be taken seriously in Europe.
Recruitment pressure
In recent months, in Russia it was observed sharp Increase in recruitment in the army Due to the generous lump sum signature bonuses at both federal and regional level. Payments, in some cases, may reach approximately $ 20,000.
“These one -off payments have increased significantly, making them more than many people would win differently for a whole year,” the Iikka KorhonenDirector of the Institute of Emerging Economies of the Bank of Finland, which is monitoring the Russian economy.
The US estimates that approximately 30,000 Russians enroll each monthfrom about 25,000 last summer. Some Eastern European Secret Services officials say that ranks are now inflated by about 40,000 troops a month.
Extra human resources has allowed the army to alternates new troops in and out of Ukraine and create new units that are trained and housed in Russia, according to some estimates by European intelligence.
Russia adapts plans re -equipment her to meet the needs of the new troops that will park along her borders with NATO. These units will acquire much of the new equipment. Most of what is sent to the front line of the front to Ukraine are old and rebuilt weapons of the Soviet era.