NATO is scrambling to fortify a windswept Baltic island that military planners increasingly see as one of the alliance’s most exposed — and strategically vital — front lines against Russia.
Perched in the middle of the Baltic Sea, Gotland sits just 300 kilometers from Russia’s heavily militarized exclave of Kaliningrad. As fears grow over Russian aggression, hybrid attacks and wavering U.S. commitment to European security, Sweden and its NATO allies are racing to turn Gotland back into a military stronghold.
Last week, Sweden wrapped up its first NATO-coordinated exercise on the island since joining the alliance in 2024. Around 18,000 troops from 13 countries trained across Gotland’s dusty plains for a possible Russian assault.
A Russian attack “could happen anytime,” Swedish Chief of Defense Michael Claesson told POLITICO, as soldiers weaved between armored vehicles on the western side of the island.The exercise highlighted the difficulties faced by Sweden: The U.S. shrank its participation — part of a larger pattern as Donald Trump pulls back from NATO — and the Ukrainian troops taking part in the training showed off their drone warfare mastery by rapidly destroying a Swedish armored detachment. Läs artikel