Russian 'Plans For War On Sweden' Cause Concern

[Ryan Ruck]

Russian 'Plans For War On Sweden' Cause Concern

April 7, 2014

Russia has intensified its espionage efforts in Sweden to include war preparations, Swedish security service Säpo warned on Monday.

"The most serious threat we see right now is war preparations," Säpo chief counter-intelligence analyst Wilhelm Unge said at a press conference on Monday.

While stressing that such preparations did not necessarily mean anything dramatic, he said: "It's no secret that Russia is engaged in this. It's a little bit worrying."

Unge said Russia's intensified interest in Sweden was evidenced by simulated flight attacks on Swedish targets as well as attempts to recruit spies, increased signals intelligence, and the purchase of a significant number of maps.

"If you weren't carrying out war preparations against Sweden, you probably wouldn't have any military intelligence here. The intelligence service is part of the Russian general staff and just the fact that they are here indicates some kind of intent," he said.

The simulated flight attacks were a particular point of concern for Säpo.

"You don't carry out these kinds of things unless you can actually conceive carrying out an attack in the future," Unge added, refusing to go into further details.

The news came as part of Säpo's annual intelligence assessment, which also pointed the finger at 14 other countries with espionage interests in Sweden including China and Iran. Russia, however, was revealed to have the strongest presence in Sweden.

"Russia is the biggest intelligence agent in Sweden. They're interested in everything really - politics, finance, technology, and military information," Unge explained.

"It's one of few countries that has a very broad intelligence interest in Sweden."

Unge added that the intensified spying was likely a result of Russia's involvement with Ukraine and Crimea, but the analyst remained tight-lipped about further details.

[American Patriot]

So everything we've been saying is coming to the light now, isn't it?

[Avvakum]

The liberal Swedes better remember their history, Putin's regime has not forgotten;




List of wars between Russia and Sweden

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Wars between Russia and Sweden have been recorded since as early as the 12th century. These conflicts include:

War	Notes
Swedish–Novgorodian Wars	A series of conflicts in the 12th and 13th centuries.
Russo-Swedish War (1495–97)	Result of an alliance between Ivan III of Russia and Hans of Denmark.
Russo-Swedish War (1554–57)	Prelude to the Livonian War.
Livonian War (1558–82)	Fought for control of Old Livonia in the territory of present-day Estonia and Latvia.
Russo-Swedish War (1590–95)	Instigated by Boris Godunov in the hope of gaining the territory of the Duchy of Estonia.
Ingrian War (1610-17)	Including an attempt to put a Swedish duke on the Russian throne.
Russo-Swedish War (1656–58)	Part of the Second Northern War.
Great Northern War (1700–21)	conflict in which a coalition led by the Tsardom of Russia successfully contested the supremacy of the Swedish Empire in northern Central Europe and Eastern Europe.
Russo-Swedish War (1741–43)	Also known as the Hats' Russian War.
Russo-Swedish War (1788–90)	known as Gustav III's Russian War in Sweden, and Catherine II's Swedish War in Russia.
Finnish War (1808–1809)	.

See also[edit]

• Northern Wars
• Russo-Polish War (disambiguation)
• Russo-Turkish War (disambiguation)
• Russo-Persian Wars (disambiguation)
• Russo-Finnish wars

[Ryan Ruck]

Swedish Military Rejects Call For 'New Doctrine'

March 6, 2014

Sweden Deputy Prime Minister Jan Björklund demanded this week that Sweden reviews its defence policy and called for a doctrinal shift following Russian actions in Crimea. On Thursday, the Armed Forces Supreme Commander Sverker Göransson replied that the Swedish military was heading in the right direction in its reform work.

"I stick with my view that we are on the right path with our doctrine and the organization that we are currently building," Göransson told the TT news agency.

Since cancelling mandatory military service, Sweden has moved towards professionalizing its military as well as looking into "pooling and sharing" solutions, in which different nations specialize their military capacity and then jointly contribute to coordinated operations.

Björklund said on Tuesday, however, that Sweden must be able to defend Gotland against Russia in light of fresh fears of Kremlin aggression in ex-Soviet states Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia. In an invasion scenario, the minister argued, Russia could move to occupy the strategically located Swedish island in order to cut off a key potential NATO counter-strike base.

Sweden is a NATO partner, not a member, but the deputy prime minister said the situation in Ukraine should make more Swedes ponder joining the military alliance. He also said it had been a "big mistake" to dismantle Gotland's defence capacity during the rule of Social Democrat Prime Minister Göran Persson.

"You have to build up your fire brigade to the same dimension as the risk of a fire," Björklund said. "How many people thought that Russia would go into Crimea? The same argument could hold true for the Baltic states."

While Göransson rubbished the call for a doctrine shift, he agreed with Björklund that Sweden must take Russian actions into consideration.

"We have a new security-political environment that is very unpredictable," he said. "The reform taking place in Russia shows that they will use military measures when they see fit."

The Swedish air force flew several Jas Gripen fighter jets to Gotland on Monday in response to a large-scale Russian marine training exercise off the coast of Kaliningrad, but said the threat level had not gone up.

The reinforcement was deemed routine by military experts. Göransson on Thursday said there was no need to permanently increase the defence capacity on the Baltic Island.

The Armed Forces, he said, "had very good insight into incidents and developments".

[Avvakum]

Well Putin drove Sweden and Finland closer together;

Russian Aggression Prompts Finnish-Swedish Military Pact

By Kasper Viita May 6, 2014 5:01 PM CT 65 Comments Email Print

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Finland and Sweden are looking into pooling their defense resources as the crisis in Ukraine shifts the Nordic states’ military-policy focus to protecting their home turf from participating in international peacekeeping.
The countries yesterday agreed to conduct a study by October to find ways to ensure the same money spent on arms will stretch a longer way. Cooperation will begin next year with a focus on the period from 2016 onward, according to Finnish Defense Minister Carl Haglund and his Swedish counterpart Karin Enstroem.
Finland and Sweden aren’t members of the North Atlantic Treaty Alliance, though they joined the European Union together in 1995. Finland shares a 1,340-kilometer (830-mile) border with Russia -- more than the other 27 EU members combined -- and fought two wars against the Soviet Union during World War II. Popular opposition has stopped the two countries from joining NATO.
“We have a neighbor who has demonstrated a couple of times in the past six years that military power and the threat of using it are simply instruments in the political toolbox,” Charly Salonius-Pasternak, security policy researcher at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs, said by phone yesterday. “For a small nation, this is a terrifying idea.”
Popular opposition to joining NATO has centered on the belief that Russia is becoming slowly more democratic and that economic ties will keep conflicts from escalating, Salonius-Pasternak said. That argument has now “received a strategic blow.”
Crimea Annexation

According to NATO, Russia has amassed about 40,000 troops along the Ukrainian border since annexing Crimea in March, prompting the worst standoff with the U.S. and the EU since the Cold War.
Finland sells about 10 percent of all exported goods in Russia, its biggest trade partner. More than 80 percent of Finland’s imports from its eastern neighbor are energy products, including 100 percent of natural gas used in Finland, according to data by the customs office.
The defense cooperation announced yesterday is limited to peacetime, according to the ministers. Still, it also implies improving potential war-time capabilities, Salonius-Pasternak said. “No reasonable politician can any longer say that the situation is as before and that Russia’s increasing military might poses no problems,” he said.
More Spending

Sweden plans to spend 5.5 billion kronor ($850 million) more on defenses each year by 2023, including purchases of more fighter jets and submarines. Finland must also find a way to replace its fleet of jets that’s reaching the end of its lifespan in about 10 to 15 years. Finland may increase spending on its military due to the crisis in Ukraine, Haglund said.
“The web of treaties and agreements we’ve focused on building has in a way been torn apart, we have to react on that,” Sweden’s Enstroem said. “It’s natural that more focus has been directed to defense” in the Nordic region.
The pact with Sweden doesn’t conflict with possible membership discussions with NATO, Haglund said. While neither country has applied for membership in the alliance, they are paying close attention to each other’s stances toward the bloc.
Justifications for the pact and for NATO entry are very similar, Salonius-Pasternak said. Sharing equipment costs and improving air- and naval-defense capabilities are the main attractions to working together, he said.
“The same logic applies in both instances, the difference is collaborating with one country or almost thirty countries,” he said. “As long as Finland has defense forces with similar tasks as now, we need a certain number of fighter jets and their armament.”
Fighter Jets

The cost to replace the 62 F-18 Hornet jets acquired in the early 1990s is estimated to be at least 5 billion euros ($7 billion), Haglund has said. It compares with 6.8 billion euros of austerity measures introduced by the government since 2011.
Sweden’s armed forces don’t have enough staff or equipment to defend the country, according to an April report by the National Audit Office. Supreme Commander Sverker Goeranson in 2012 said that the military can only defend a limited area for about a week without outside help. Sweden has cut the budget of its once-formidable armed forces after the end of the Cold War, opting to focus on international missions in countries including Afghanistan, Sudan and Kosovo.
Similar concerns were voiced by Finnish officers in a survey conducted by the Finnish Officers’ Union in January. Military spending is “inadequate” for maintaining independent, credible defenses, according to 77 percent of officers who responded to the survey. The survey also showed the majority of Finnish officers support joining NATO. The government should pay more heed to their views, Salonius-Pasternak said.
“It’s pointless that the field experts aren’t being heard in an issue because it’s considered too political,” he said. “That’s like excluding the nuclear safety authority from a discussion on building a new nuclear reactor.”
To contact the reporter on this story: Kasper Viita in Helsinki at kviita1@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Jonas Bergman at jbergman@bloomberg.net Kati Pohjanpalo

[Ryan Ruck]

Scandanavian Airlines Flight In Russian Spy Plane Near Miss

A Scandinavian Airlines flight had to take last minute evasive action to avoid colliding with a Russian spy plane just off the Swedish south coast in March, according to a report which emerged on Thursday.

According to a Sveriges Television report on Thursday, the incident occurred on March 3rd just 50 kilometres south of the Swedish city of Malmö - home to over 300,000 people.

The plane was reportedly a Russian Ilyushin 20m military aircraft used for signals surveillance. The two aircraft are reported to have passed by each other a mere 90 metres apart.

The Swedish Accident Investigation Authority (Statens Haverikommission) has reviewed the incident and decided against opening an investigation into the matter.

"We have let the matter go. Firstly the incident occurred over international waters, moreover the plane was Danish registered. This means that it is outside our area of ​​responsibility," Jens Olsson at the board told the TT news agency.

According to Olsson, the Danish Accident Investigation Board (Havarikommissionen for Civil Luftfart og Jernbane - HCLJ) has also decided against investigating the matter.

The SAS flight SK 681 had just taken off from Copenhagen's Kastrup airport bound for Rome when the crew received information that an unidentified craft was in their path and which had not shown up on their in-flight warning system.

Jens Olsson explained that he believed these types of events to be rare. While he declined to speculate on the likelihood of an airborne collision, he described the situation as an "unpleasant experience".

Lieutenant Colonel Stephan Persson Tyrling, head of the air operations section of the National Defence University, opined that 90 metres is to be considered very close and classified the incident as "very serious" .

"The pilots in the civilian plane had spotted it, but with a little poorer visibility you don't know what could have happened," he said.

According to Persson Tyrling, Russia has built up its military capabilities in recent years with an increased presence in the Baltic states. He cited an incident last autumn when Russian bombers carried out attack exercises against Sweden.

He added furthermore that Russian military aircraft had broadened their field of operations since the days of the Cold War.

"South of Bornholm was about what you could imagine then. They didn't fly much further west," he said.

He however expressed understanding that the Accident Investigation Commission elected not to pursue the matters saying that he doesn't believe any crime to have been committed as the Russian aircraft was in international airspace.

[American Patriot]

Wonder how many other near misses haven't been reported like that? The US wouldn't report them, I'd bet.