The aggressive behavior of Russia and Finland's NATO membership have altered the strategic environment in the Baltic Sea.
NATO warships in the Baltic Sea
The lookout on the starboard wing, which is on the right side of the bridge, has binoculars brought up. From the little cloud on the horizon, four battleships appear one after the other. It's 10:40 a.m. The German corvette Erfurt has come into contact with the NATO naval force, which is headed by the frigate Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, out here in the Gotland Basin, the broadest and deepest section of the Baltic Sea.
Not so long ago, a meeting like the one this morning in the first week of June would have been quite unusual. But today, everything has changed.
In the far right corner of the bridge, Bianca Seifert is seated in her usual spot. With her crew, the 42-year-old, who joined the Navy in 2004 and became the first female captain of a Bundeswehr vessel in 2021, is traveling a great distance. She won't likely return until the beginning of July.
The first journey takes travelers to Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. The schedule includes patrols and a significant NATO maneuver. "The corvettes are again concentrated on our home waters," the captain of the "Erfurt," who commands 60 women and men, said. "As often as we are in the Baltic Sea this year, it was not normal for us for a long time."
Deterrence is the aim
From their home port of Warnemünde, they had a tendency to travel in the other way for many years. They often traveled west and then south to the Mediterranean, where Germany frequently sent forces for the UN operation off the coast of Lebanon, after Guns n' Roses' "Sweet Child O' Mine" had faded away as the concluding music of "Erfurt". However, with the Russian assault on Ukraine, attention has once again turned to national and alliance defense, particularly NATO's eastern flank. Baltic Sea is what this implies for the German Navy.
Bianca Seifert, the first German woman to become the CO of a warship
The maritime turning point, which is once again only focused on deterrence, is now being implemented in the naval headquarters, diagonally across from the Baltic Sea stadium of the second division soccer team Hansa Rostock. Vladimir Putin, the president of Russia, which borders the Baltic Sea and is currently facing domestic opposition, should not even consider assaulting a nation in the region after Ukraine.
"We are now calling at ports like Riga or Tallinn much more frequently," said Flotilla Admiral Stephan Haisch, who is establishing the future NATO headquarters for the Baltic Sea in Rostock -Bündnispartner blows.For this reason, as part of its itinerary, the "Erfurt" also makes a stop in Klaipeda, Lithuania.
According to Haisch's recollection, the deterrent signal on February 24, 2022, was particularly potent: "Right after the start of the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine, more than 20 units of the German Navy were sent to sea within a very short time so that there was no doubt about our readiness to defend ourselves."Currently, the Baltic Sea is home to four to six German naval units on average.
There are more exercises on the "Erfurt" today because there are more workouts today. Still close is the Alliance Rapid Reaction Force. It is possible to see the supply ship "Spessart," which provides gasoline to the fighting forces and is also taking part in the NATO exercise. There are already two more ships in Tallinn. The sister corvette "Ludwigshafen" follows the "Erfurt" at a suitable distance.
At 12.40 p.m., the loudspeakers abruptly blared, "Everyone at battle stations! The Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania is under attack." The "Erfurt" also came under fire from two missiles. "Ready for action" appears shortly after that. The railing is now practically at sea level thanks to the current "hard to port" track. To fire its fully automated anti-aircraft cannon, the boat's "RAM," or "Rolling Airframe Missile," it must be manoeuvred into position.
It still only strikes once in this practice, and only one missile may be rejected. The imagined leak on the lower decks has to be sealed by a portion of the crew. Due to the possibility of an air assault now coming from a new direction, the next intercept course is set up on the bridge.
For younger individuals, the Baltic Sea is uncharted terrain
Only those who have lived in East for a longer period of time know it like the back of their hand. Many of the participants in Seifert's driving school obtained their driver's licenses while sailing off the coast of Lebanon, and as she notes, they first had to "get along with the high volume of traffic." Every day, more than 2,000 ships with a length of more than 50 meters navigate the Baltic Sea. Many people are unaware of what to watch out for and where. The captain only half-jokingly remarks, "The younger ones in particular, have to learn what's east of Bornholm again."
Hours before, the "Erfurt" had passed Kap Arkona on Rügen, the location from where the Kremlin's listening and reconnaissance stations are rumored to be able to see and hear everything up to that point. Lieutenant Captain Peter, "Kaleun" of the "Erfurt" states, "The Russian units will have us on their screens and will know that we are on our way to Tallinn."
Of course, you may check the corvette's location online as well. The "German Warship F262" may be located on websites like Marine Traffic as long as it maintains the AIS monitoring system turned on, which it does even in these times of crisis as a confidence-building step. The so-called radar master, Captain Hendrik, claims that "our Russian friends never switched on the AIS," adding, "We only turn it off for our exercise."
They are still aware of the location of Putin's Baltic Fleet at the operations center on one of the lower decks. Lieutenant Stephan, who is independent of the Internet, is in charge of maintaining the "above water situation picture". Underneath circular cupolas, the "Erfurt" is equipped with video sensors, electronic reconnaissance equipment, as well as its own and the allies' intelligence. "There are cameras on every Baltic Sea beach," claims Stephan.
An increasing volume is to be anticipated, particularly here, north of the Kaliningrad base and the second Russian access point to the Baltic Sea after Saint Petersburg. But also fishing boats can be on the move for the Kremlin, says Stephan: "Theoretically, they could eavesdrop on our mobile phone communications from there." "A Russian sail training ship and a unit of the Boykij class are 16 nautical miles away," he reports.
Regular interactions with Russians
These encounters are once more commonplace. Captain Seifert recalls that during the attack on the Ukraine, things were "more tense," but now things are back to "business as usual." Escalation is against the rules. Haisch earlier stated in Rostock: "When encountering each other at sea, both sides deal with each other professionally: Sufficient distance is maintained, nothing is provoked, i.e. no use of fire control radar or pointing of weapons." This is how Seifert becomes the drill with the 76-millimeter on-board gun till the next day and says: "Of course we don't fire the alarm if a Russian unit is in the vicinity."
The old foe from the Cold War, once again the "most direct threat to security" according to the new NATO strategy, has no hostile intentions, at least not in the Baltic Sea. "The Russian Navy has not yet entered other sovereign waters," says Stephan in the operations center, where they also keep an eye out for submarines, which are obviously more difficult to spot and caused great concern last year, particularly in Sweden. "Unlike in the airspace, where the Russians are constantly flying in and our alarm squads are raising, the Russian Navy has not yet entered other sovereign waters."
The addition of Finland to NATO, and perhaps shortly also of Sweden, fundamentally alters the geostrategic position in the Baltic Sea.
-Flotilla Admiral Stephan Haisch
In Rostock, where they want to continue to constantly monitor the security of vital infrastructure like internet cables on the seabed and the wind farms above them, despite the damage of the Nord Stream pipelines, there is still no all-clear. Flotilla Admiral Haisch speaks of "norm behavior" and claims that there haven't yet been any maritime provocations: "In some cases, a decrease in Russian activity can be observed because military personnel have been withdrawn from the Baltic Sea for the war of aggression against Ukraine." Recent events in Moscow may have strengthened this pattern.
New balance of power
The Baltic Sea's roughly 400,000 square kilometer power structure has altered in any case, and not just because the West is asserting itself more. "The entire geostrategic situation in the Baltic Sea will change completely with the NATO accession of Finland and hopefully Sweden too soon," claims Haisch. "If we can use the airports and ports in Finland and Sweden, for example the one on the island of Gotland, that will happen completely new surgical options."
The NATO nations might more effectively monitor the eastern Baltic Sea from the elongated Swedish island, which the "Erfurt" sails by at such a large distance that it cannot be seen. Military planners also recognize the island for its numerous tiny coves where ships may be hidden.
Additionally, if the goal at hand was to help the threatened Baltic republics, the supply lines would be substantially shorter. The accompanying defense plans are presently being amended and will be agreed at the NATO summit in Lithuania in mid-July. More soldiers and equipment would arrive much more quickly. According to Stephan at the operational control center, "the Baltic Sea can almost be described as a 'Nato inland sea'" now that the Finns and Swedes are allies.
The "Erfurt" will make a halt at the conclusion of its journey to represent the changing circumstances after having to go over waves that were two to three meters high the night before arriving in Tallinn. She is now anchored at Visby, the city of Gotland, where the Swedish Navy has stealth ships stationed.
There is a symposium on the evolution of European military strategy being organized by Sweden's EU Council Presidency. According to Christoph Heusgen, a former adviser to Chancellor Angela Merkel and current head of the Munich Security Conference, which is hosting a portion of the conference on Gotland on Wednesday, "the Baltic Sea was already strategically important during the Cold War, but it is now even more so," and "our event in Visby with the corvette 'Erfurt' expresses that in a certain way."
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