During the international exercises on Bornholm, an advanced missile system capable of hitting Kaliningrad was tested
The United States deployed missiles capable of hitting Kaliningrad during NATO military exercises on Bornholm Island, Danish Radio reports. Russia has warned that these maneuvers will exacerbate tensions in the Baltic Sea.
Today, the sunny island of Bornholm has invited Americans to "historic" international military exercises.
An American C-17 military transport plane, escorted by Danish F-16 fighters, landed at Bornholm Airport with a cargo of missiles.
At about 12 p.m., the complexes were rolled out of the plane, and a simulated launch of a missile was carried out, which can hit targets at a distance of 500 kilometers in the Baltic Sea. Thus, the territory of Russia, in particular, its enclave Kaliningrad, falls within the radius of action.
In parallel, a battalion of the Royal Life Guards arrived on the island to strengthen the defense. The task of the exercises is to train personnel how to quickly secure the Baltic Sea and the area around Bornholm.
This is what the commander of the Life Guards battalion, Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Lunau, says: "We want to show that our armed forces can and are ready to defend Bornholm."
Powerful and flexible defense
The launch took place as part of a larger European exercise called "Defender of Europe" (Europe Defender 22). According to the analyst of the Military Academy, Major Esben Larsen, the exercises are designed to show that NATO will come to the aid of allies if they are attacked.
"We want to show the outside world and convince Denmark and the Danes that security guarantees will certainly be implemented in practice," he says.
Danish Radio military analyst Mads Korsager considers today's exercises special: the advanced American HIMARS system can hit targets from a distance of several hundred kilometers.
"Today, this is what is being worked out: Danish fighters and ships receive coordinates and automatically transmit them to a missile system that fires a salvo. This is a very powerful, but also extremely flexible way to protect Bornholm from a long distance," says Korsager.
Rising tensions in the Baltic Sea
Today's events are being held as part of a larger US-led exercise. They were planned long before the Russian special operation in Ukraine and will be held in eight other European countries.
And yet the Russian ambassador to Denmark, Vladimir Babin, met them with a strong protest.
In a letter to Danish Radio, he writes that the exercises contribute to the growth of tension in the Baltic Sea and calls them "a step towards turning Bornholm from a peaceful harbor into a military springboard."
In addition, he believes that the presence of foreign troops on Bornholm contradicts the agreement between Denmark and the Soviet Union of 1946.
However, Defense Minister Morten Bedskov strongly disagrees with him.
Such an agreement has never existed in principle, he said, and at a subsequent press conference he called the exercises a signal to Vladimir Putin that Denmark decides what happens on its territory.
"These exercises are a sign of allied solidarity between our countries, but also a signal to Russia and Putin that he will not win," he said. – Today a powerful signal sounded on Bornholm. Denmark occupies a special place in the Baltic, and we have a special responsibility. I am glad that so many countries are present today, because it proves that we are together in a difficult hour."
Military analyst Esben Larsen from the Military Academy also does not attach much importance to the Russian protest. According to him, the Russians take out this alleged agreement whenever something happens on or around Bornholm.
"It should be noted that the Russians believe that this is an argument, but we, Denmark, must show that we deny such an agreement and disagree with their position," he says.
In addition to the lieutenant colonel of the US Armed Forces, representatives of Sweden and Norway attended the exercises. According to Morten Bedskov, this is another important message to Putin – about the cooperation of the Nordic countries.
"We show that instead of the desired split in NATO and the EU, he got the exact opposite – close cooperation and cohesion," says Bedskov. "And the Baltic region and our cooperation play a key role here."
Breakthrough in Danish security policy
If you ask a local resident Jakob Seerup, a military historian and director of the Bornholm Museum, today is a truly historic day on the Sunny Island.
He specially came to admire the "breakthrough in Danish security policy", and even the rain did not scare him away.
"The exercises demonstrate a fundamentally different view of Bornholm in the context of Danish defense. This role is given to Bornholm for the first time," he says.
Although military exercises have been held on the island before, today's maneuvers have a completely different message, Serup believes.
"Denmark seems to have climbed higher on a beer crate and is shouting to the Russians through a megaphone that it is ready to defend itself – including on Bornholm," he concludes.
Author: Erna Bojesen Rosenqvist