Shooting range for peace – Harstad Tidende
In a debate post, Frode Bygdnes (R) wrote that putting 8 of the Armed Forces’ 12 new firing and training ranges offshore on the Finnmark coast is an escalation of the tension with our neighbor to the east.
Nils Håheim-Saers disagrees, and responds with this reader post:
When Norway became a member of NATO (1949), there were no plans to defend Finnmark by force if necessary. Norway, together with our allies in NATO, made no plans to refuse the Soviet Union to occupy Finnmark. On the contrary.
The history books tell us that NATO’s defense plans together for Norway during the Cold War were based on Finnmark being the speed bump for the Soviet war of aggression we all feared would come. Finnmark’s role as a county in the Cold War defense plans was to slow down the Soviet Russian military’s invasion of NATO member Norway.
NATO needed time to come to our rescue. Therefore, a speed bump was needed for the Soviet advance from the national border to NATO’s marching areas in Troms.
It was NATO that together would force the Soviets out of Finnmark by military force if the war came. Not Norway alone. This was practiced in various units during the Cold War. NATO exercises became commonplace here in northern Norway.
One of my earliest childhood memories is such a NATO exercise. Glimpse out of the living room window in Grovfjord in the late 70’s. Smell and light at night. Large planes flying low past.
The Cold War ended with the start of the 90’s. Visionary and wise heads of state in both the Soviet Union and the United States at the same time contributed to us in Norway experiencing perestroika, people-to-people cooperation and increased trade with the country that after the dissolution of the Soviet Union became Russia. The danger of a cold war culminating in nuclear ragnarok disappeared.
Then the Norwegian Armed Forces also disappeared from Finnmark. There was no reason for NATO to need any speed bumps against the military power from the east. Only the Border Guard remained in Finnmark. A police assignment that the Armed Forces solved with its crews. In the same way as the Royal Guard in Oslo.
Eventually, Russia got a new head of state. In February 2007, during the annual security conference in Munich, Vladimir Putin delivered the speech, which was described as the turning point in relations between Russia and the West. Here he came with a clear warning to Western leaders.
“I am convinced that a moment has come when we will have to seriously reconsider the world’s security architecture,” he said in front of a gathering of top politicians and security experts from around the world.
As early as 2013, the Chief of the Russian General Staff of Russia’s Armed Forces, Valery Gerasimov, wrote an article outlining a plan for how Russia will wage such a war – as a warning of what was to happen in Ukraine.
“Wars are no longer declared, and the boundaries between peace and war become blurred. The role of non-military instruments in achieving political and strategic goals has grown, and in many cases they are more effective than the use of weapons,” he said. wrote the Russian general in the military magazine The military-industrial courier in February 2013.
He argued that Russia should use one instead “Wide range of political, economic, information, humanitarian and other non-military means”. This must be used at the same time as utilizing «The protest potential of the locals».
“All this is supplemented by covert military operations, including information warfare and the use of special forces. Open use of – often under the guise of being peace-building forces and crisis regulation – is used only in a special power, mainly to achieve ultimate success in the conflict ».
Russia became increasingly assertive, and carried out more of its annexation of the Crimean peninsula in 2014. The hybrid war gained a face through small, green men.
Norway shares a 196-kilometer border with Russia. From Treriksrøysa to the Arctic Ocean. Finnmark shall be defended by force, open military force if necessary. It is a new policy from Norway. This new policy came with the Minister of Defense Frank Bakke-Jensen.
When Norway’s policy is that Finnmark is to be defended by military force, this is also NATO’s policy.
It may be worth asking the question whether the party Red in its policy does not want Finnmark to be defended? Is the Red Party willing to sacrifice Finnmark from Norway if Russia openly threatens military power?
The Border Guard is again on how it can use military force against an opponent who may wish to use military force openly against us. Finnmark Landforsvar has been re-established as a military unit with the Porsanger battalion and first-time service in its own county has been established for Home Guard soldiers from Finnmark. The land force is in place in Finnmark. It practices.
It is therefore natural that the military navy Norway and NATO also stay in practice in Finnmark. Shooting exercises at sea need firing ranges just as shooting drills on land need firing ranges on land. In Finnmark.
The distinction between state security and social security has been shown.
Russia uses non-military and military means of force against the West in a life-threatening mix. Well, in November 2021, we are in the middle of Russia’s hybrid war. Poland, Lithuania and Latvia are considering being NATO holding crisis talks on the increasingly used situation on the border with Belarus, according to Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki.
Mateusz Morawiecki said on November 14 that he and the prime ministers of the Baltic countries were discussing whether to hold such talks under Article 4 of the NATO Charter. It states that “the parties will consult with each other whenever one of them believes that some share territorial inviolability, political independence or security is threatened.”
Down on the continent, in other words, war is already a fact. On Wednesday, November 10, Charles Michel, President of the European Union, stated; “We are facing a brutal hybrid attack on the EU’s borders.”
Norway was exposed to the same type of hybrid attack from Russia in 2015 with 5,000 people as an effector across the Storskog border crossing in Finnmark.
Russia has gathered 92,000 troops near the border with Ukraine and is preparing for a possible attack in late January or early February 2022, according to the head of the Ukrainian intelligence service Kyrylo Budanov. The Russian foreign intelligence service SVR believes that the situation is reminiscent of the one that was in the summer of 2008 and which ended with Georgia forcibly trying to control the breakaway province of South Ossetia.
Russia is thus gathering large military forces in the border area with Europe in the east. At the same time that Belarus (..on behalf of Russia?) Has already started its maneuver in the hybrid war against the EU in the west. Russia clearly shows that it is willing to use all means – including military force – to achieve its political goals.
That is why it is important for Norway and NATO to communicate clearly: Finnmark is part of Norway. The whole of Norway must be defended by NATO. This is in stark contrast to the Cold War message from Norway and NATO. Then Finnmark would only be a speed bump.
Establishing firing ranges at sea, practicing with Norwegian and allied naval forces in Finnmark is not an aggressive act from Norway. To establish a firing range at sea is to communicate to Russia in Finnmark will be defended with open force, if necessary.