Moving from Deterrence to Defence: First Day of Briefings in Latvia

 I am in Riga this week for briefings with various NATO/Canadian/Latvian players in this area's defence scene and to attend a conference on Strategic Communications run by the NATO centre focused on this stuff (and based in Riga).  I was in Riga in 2017 to check out the new NATO battlegroup led by Canada and to go to the Riga Conference.  

At that time, the Enhanced Forward Presence was a relatively new mission--four countries led small contingents of NATO troops in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Poland (UK, CA, Germany, US respectively).  This force was, despite all the denials, a tripwire--that any Russian attack would kill Americans and Brits and Germans and Canadians and  many other NATO soldiers, which might then trip a serious response that could lead to things spiraling out of control.  Now, the contingents are all somewhat larger and are on their way to being brigade size--3000 per spot and four more spots (Hungary, Slovakia, Romania, and Bulgaria).  The claim/aim is now that these contingents will be more focused on defending these countries, thwarting Russian aggression rather than just deterring it. 

Today, we first met with a Latvian Major in their defense headquarters. He started off by showing a 2016 amendment to their national security law that had two key features: 1) in case of surprise attack, any/all Latvian commanders shall engage in defensive efforts without waiting for orders; 2) resistance cannot be forbidding. The former was a lesson from Crimea--that if Russia blocked the comms, the local forces would still react, rather than waiting for orders.  I had heard something a few years ago that suggested this was the case, and this was good deterrence signaling.  That an effort to establish a fait accompli wouldn't work here.  The second piece was a lesson from WWII where their leader surrendered to Stalin.  I also learned that they re-started conscription this month, but they may not need it if they get enough recruits.  

Things have gotten complicated as Canada is a Framework Nation, which means it leads a multinational unit within a Latvian brigade, while the Danes are leading a NATO Multinational Division-North, which includes the other Baltic countries.  

I asked how the Canadians in Latvia compared to the Brits in Estonia and Germans in Lithuania, and the response was quite favorable to the Canadians (although the major knew he was talking to Canadians so 🤷).

We had a great lunch at a gas station across the street from the base (the food situation at this base is pretty strange), and it was really quite tasty.  

We then met with Colonel Kirstein, who spent a lot of time chatting with us along with his command team.  Canada now has 10 partners in their battlegroup, and the problems are still focused on differing alky and leave policies as I had heard in 2017.  Force generation (which is begging countries to give troops to the multinational force, as Dave and I found out in our book on NATO) still is hard, as the move from Battlegroup to Brigade means more troops and more competition for these troops since every one needs more and a few of those in Canada's space are leading some of the missions.  One of the big differences between EFP and Afghanistan is that most of the force generation in the latter was done by top officials at NATO (SACEUR, Deputy SACEUR, Obama), and for the battlegroup in Latvia, Canada is doing the begging.

So, I asked, how can Canada do this with far less political capital/coercive capability than the US?  The answer in part was working with Canada is precisely attractive because of the absence of strings.  Also, since Canada is not Germany, it also does not present any EU strings or complications.  My own view of Canada's position here is accidental--by being chosen last to lead one of the first four, Canada got the less useful allies.  Tiny contingents from Montenegro and Albania and North Macedonia.  But this has become sold as a plus (and probably is plus-ish)--that Canada is good at managing the complexities of many countries operating in one spot.  I did ask about caveats, and they certainly exist, and the Colonel is tracking them.  Some countries need permission from home, for instance, if they want to train outside of the Latvia base.  

One of the challenges here is that there was resistance to permanent NATO basing in the Baltics as this would violate the NATO-Russia Founding Act.  What's that?  In my view a dead, dead, dead piece of paper.  I have been asking about this for years, and I did hear previously that the Germans recognizing its dead parrot-like state because they want to keep some institutions that they can build on some day.  Today, it was articulated that NATO does not be the one killing the agreement.  I retorted that NATO is the coroner, not the killer, declaring that the time of death was 2014, and the cause of its death was Russian aggression in Crimea.  Anyhow, the way it works with Canada is that it has a three year agreement with Latvia, and it got renewed last year.  This prevents long term planning, because you can't build a schedule out several years.  Which means, for instance, while there might be some major advantages to making the Canadian mission here like ye olde Cold Warre deployments--have troops come over for three years with their families, build schools for the kids, and just settle in for the long haul--it ain't gonna happen.

My colleagues asked a variety of sharp questions about tradeoffs between sending arms carried by Canadians to Latvia versus sending arms to Ukraine to be wielded by the folks there, whether the government understood what it committed to when it agreed to move to a brigade-sized force in Latvia, can Canada do strategic communications (no), and, of course, where we should drink beer.

We have a day at the battlegroup tomorrow, two days of Strategic Communications conference, and then a day meeting folks at the Latvian MoD (time to ask questions about my next project) and the Canadian embassy before hanging out with the cool kids at the NATO Field School, which is run by a CDSN Co-Director--Alex Moens.  

I have already learned a lot, and will continue to drink from the fire hose tomorrow.  This stuff touches on past research (my IR of ethnic conflict stuff way back when, my NATO stuff) and my current stuff (who is minding the store?).  And, no, I have not yet started a crisis among allies.  But I have several days left.