Posted on 02/24/2015 2:09:46 PM PST by Tailgunner Joe
Narva (Estonia) (AFP) - Estonia marked its independence day Tuesday with a military parade featuring NATO hardware and troops on its eastern border with Russia amid heightened east-west tensions over Ukraine.
Around 100 British, Dutch, Spanish, Latvian and Lithuanian troops marched in the snow alongside some 1,300 Estonian soldiers to mark the independence of the formerly Soviet-ruled republic, now a member of the European Union and NATO.
"History has taught us that if we do not defend ourselves, nobody else will," General Riho Teras, Estonia's chief of staff, said at the parade.
"The events in Ukraine that have kept the entire world awake, demonstrate very clearly that we ourselves must maintain security," he added.
Two US Stryker armoured personnel carriers and a number of Dutch CV90 tanks were also on parade, equipment NATO has brought into the Baltics for a wave of exercises on the heels of Russia's 2014 annexation of Ukraine's Crimean peninsula and subsequent meddling in that country's east.
The annual parade has taken on particular importance this year in the context of jitters in the Baltic countries.
Holding the parade in Narva on the Russian border, where a majority of residents are ethnic Russian, was seen by commentators as sending a strong signal to Moscow about NATO's committment to collective defence.
General Adrian Bradshaw, NATO's Deputy Supreme Allied Commander Europe, said last week that Russia could try to seize territory from the alliance's states off the back of fighting in Ukraine.
British Defence Secretary Michael Fallon reportedly also told journalists last week that there was a "real and present danger" to Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
bump
If I were living in Estonia, I would be nervous - NATO membership or not.
Two thoughts:
Eastern Estonia is about 90% Russian. You really want to poke the bear?
Lots of those same nationalities had waffen SS divisions in the same area. You really want to poke the bear?
The Bear is the only one doing the poking over there, even flying bombers -carrying nukes- over UK territory
Yeah - and the UK is so upset over that they cut their miniscule defense budget even more...
some org in their government proposed replacing subs with F-35’s as a nuclear deterrent
It is as if they never heard of second-strike capability
Does that mean all of those ethnic people will support Russia? Why then, from Russia, do Russians and possibly even Muslim Chechens have to go fight in Eastern Ukraine?
FWIW, a view from Estonia...
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