Russian Baltic relations and Russian expansionism

Since the annexation of Crimea in March and the invasion of eastern Ukraine shortly thereafter, the aggressive Russian behavior has intensified in the Nordic-Baltic Sea region. Many of Russia’s aggressions include airspace intrusions. On May 21, Russian aircraft briefly breached Finnish airspace, causing Finland to scramble its fighter jets. Several weeks later, Russian jets entered Latvian airspace four times in two hours. Toward the end of August, Russia breached Finnish airspace four times in one week. And on Sept. 17, the most serious Russian incursion of Swedish airspace took place, when two Russian jets briefly passed by close to the Swedish island of Öland, prompting Sweden to scramble several JAS Gripen jets to intercept the intruders. Foreign Minister Carl Bildt called the latter incident "the most serious aerial incursion" into Swedish airspace he had seen during his eight-year tenure.

The growing Russian hostility has also been obvious at sea. On two occasions in August and September, Russian military ships intercepted a Finnish vessel carrying Swedish research personnel. The underwater incursion outside Stockholm this weekend follows the same pattern, but takes it one step further by moving the hostility out of international waters and into Swedish territory.

Besides traditional military intimidations, the threat of Russian hybrid warfare has grown, notably in the Baltic states. A large part of this consists of information warfare, or direct propaganda. In Latvia, for instance, many of the Russian-speaking media outlets have been bought by Russian companies,  Russia claims that their minority groups in Baltic states are not given fair representation