In recent years, Russian exercises have often been held in the Baltic Sea, and this tends to aggravate the situation in the region. Some of the recent maneuvers involved missile firing near Latvia. Russia asked the Latvians to close the airspace without specifying the time of their holding. Eventually, Moscow abandoned this element of the exercise program, which prompted the Latvian authorities to think that the Russians simply wanted to see the reaction to their threats. The exercises were deployed near the borders of Sweden and Poland. At the meeting of the US President with the leaders of the Baltic states, Latvia reported that the Russian military are going to first experience rocket firing live.

Many experts reassure that Russia's influence in the Baltic region is not as significant as it might seem, while others say that Russia's military potential is growing, not only at sea: on land, the S-400 missile systems, Iskander systems and other weapons are installed .

Analyst of the German Marshall Fund, Jorg Forbrig, in an interview with Polskie Radio, calls the Baltic Sea the most difficult region, bordering the territories of NATO and Russia.

"In Poland they are well aware that the Kaliningrad region is an esklav of the Russian Federation surrounded by the territory of NATO. For many years we have witnessed how Russia is increasing its military presence in the Baltic: modern Russian weapons are appearing on land and at sea. The process has gone so far that Moscow theoretically took control of part of the Baltic Sea and can limit the access of NATO ships and aircraft to these territories.

At the same time, the Russians began to modernize air defense systems around Kaliningrad and Petersburg, and now it partly covers the Baltic. This weakens the defensive capabilities of the Baltic and partly of Poland. "

According to the analyst, Moscow is trying to demonstrate its capabilities in the exercises in the Baltic Sea. Some of its actions are designed to impress not only the neighbors (in particular Latvia), but also other countries, for example, in Sweden.

In the light of the latest events in Salisbury, Jorg Forbrigg denies the possibility of Russia striking NATO. "The poisoning of Skrypal is an illustrative case that occurred on the territory of a member state of the North Atlantic Alliance. Despite the fact that this attack was aimed against specific people, the Alliance had to respond adequately and respond to it.

Had there been no reaction, Moscow would have received a signal that in the future its operations in NATO countries will go unpunished, and the possibility of a repetition of something like this has increased. However, by our reaction, we proved that the West and NATO are ready to give a tough answer.

Mr. Forbrig believes that it is necessary to strengthen security not only for the Alliance as a whole, but also for the level of individual states, as Russia's recent actions in the Baltic region cause concern.

* Based on polskieradio.pl