The headquarters of NATO ground forces is being established in Finland, which will be in charge of an armored brigade of 4-5 thousand soldiers and operations to defend the country, Iltalente writes, citing sources in the North Atlantic Alliance.
The headquarters will be located in the city of Mikkeli, 140 kilometers from the border with Russia. It is already known that the NATO brigade will definitely include Swedish and Norwegian military. Also the unit, known as FLF (Forward Land Forces), will be equipped with armored vehicles, including tanks. It will report to the alliance’s headquarters in Norfolk on the U.S. East Coast.According to the publication, the deployment of the brigade will be officially announced in the coming weeks.
The preparations for the establishment of NATO headquarters in Mikkeli became known in the spring. The Finnish authorities made such a decision “to strengthen preventive deterrence” against the background of the ongoing war in Ukraine and Russia’s attempts to provoke a migrant crisis on the border. Earlier, NATO land brigades were deployed in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
In turn, Norwegian Defense Minister Bjorn Arild Gram said that the headquarters in Mikkeli was being created with the participation of the kingdom’s military. According to him, Oslo is in favor of the Nordic countries being under Norfolk’s leadership in the new NATO structure. For this purpose, about 375 officers from the alliance countries will arrive at the headquarters to coordinate land forces operations and prepare to manage the military forces of Sweden and Finland if necessary.
The day before, Finnish Defense Minister Antti Häkkänen confirmed that he is in talks with several NATO countries about the deployment of alliance troops.The aim, he said, is for these forces to be able to arrive in the republic in “crisis situations,” to which he referred, among other things, to the “tense atmosphere on the border.”
From August 31 to September 6, a national exercise involving 3,200 military personnel and 500 pieces of equipment will take place in various parts of Finland, including near Russia.
The day before, the Russian Foreign Ministry expressed concern over Finland’s growing military activity. The ministry’s official spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said it started after the country joined NATO in the spring of 2023. “We have repeatedly noted that the foreign policy of the Finnish leadership is being built today in line with the line of the collective West to inflict a strategic defeat on Russia,” she said, adding that Moscow views the upcoming exercises in this very context.
