Category : Insights
Assistant Professor at the Rabdan Academy, Defence and Security Department
Disclaimer:
The views and opinions expressed in the INSIGHTS publication series are those of the individual contributors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of Rabdan Security & Defense Institute, its affiliated organizations, or any government entity. The content published is intended for informational purposes and reflects the personal perspectives of the authors on various security and defence-related topics.19 Sept 2024
Strategic and Operational Challenges in the Nordic, Arctic and Baltic Regions
Back to the bad old days: 2024 becomes increasingly reminiscent of 1984
Europe’s security situation has been deteriorating for more than a decade, prompting both Finland and Sweden to apply for NATO membership in May 2022 with the intention to accede to the alliance together. Finland joined on April 4, 2023, and Sweden joined on March 7, 2024. The accession of Sweden and Finland to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) presents a radically transformed geostrategic challenge spectrum for Russia in general, and for the recently re-established Moscow and Leningrad Military Districts[i] in particular, effectively turning the Baltic Sea into NATO’s ‘internal lake’, doubling NATO’s land border with the Leningrad Military District, and tripling of the alliance’s operational depth relative to the Leningrad Military District.
A stable and secure Northern Europe is a critical precondition for a safe and stable Euro-Atlantic region. It is high time to implement adequate Alliance plans and resources to enhance Lines of Communications (LOC), expand and reinforce supply routes, and secure widely distributed basing of force components across the High North and the Nordic Allied territories.
NATO allies and stakeholders: Capabilities, Collaboration and Characteristics
NATO’s evolving posture and strategy in Northern Europe will be underpinned by a more explicit division of capabilities and responsibilities. According to a recent report[ii] from the Finnish Institute of International Affairs (FIIA), allies and stakeholders can be divided into four categories in terms of their role in regional security:
Frontline nations share a border with Russia or Belarus and are thus most exposed to potential military aggression. They should therefore commit most of their resources and efforts to defend the frontline of the Alliance. The regional frontline nations include the Baltic states, Finland and Poland. Hubs are more protected nations, whose main role is to act as reception or staging areas for military operations in the frontier. Moreover, hubs should also be able to offer military support for their more vulnerable allies. In the Northern European theatre, Denmark, Sweden and Norway will first and foremost function as hubs Finland and Poland can play a role as hubs and even security providers along with the United Kingdom and Germany. A security guarantor provides strategic assurance – extended deterrence – for all regional allies. In the Northern European theatre, the United States remains the ultimate security guarantor of the area.
An Alliance Knowledge Defence Requires Security, Collaboration and the Right Policy and Mindset
The Swedish and Finnish Defence Technological and Industrial Base (DTIB) engages in production and systems integration of fighter aircrafts, naval surface vessels, submarines and land warfare platforms. It also provides cost-efficient services and subsystems (e.g. ammunition, IT systems and sensors). Prolific technology transfers, a market driven Defence and Security R&D agenda, and administrative and legislative openness, are areas where Sweden and Finland stand out in a European context.
Northern Europe is evolving into an increasingly significant region for Euro-Atlantic security
A stable and secure Northern Europe is a critical precondition for a safe and stable Euro-Atlantic region. Sweden (and Finland) will be integrated into NATO’s military structure – its operations planning, force structure, Command-and-Control (C2) system, and Integrated Air and Missile Defence System (IAMDS). With the accession of Sweden and Finland to the Alliance, Northern Europe will form a coherent geostrategic structure although the different subareas of Northern Europe have their distinctive security dynamics and concerns.
Furthermore, different security policies no longer limit the depth of regional military cooperation. Since 2022, NATO has further reinforced its deterrence and defense posture. The number of multinational battlegroups in the eastern parts of the Alliance, originally deployed in 2016, has doubled from four to eight, with 40,000 troops assigned under direct NATO command. The Nordic countries have historically had differing national security priorities due to varying geopolitical and geostrategic circumstances. However, being members of the Alliance provides a common foundation for strategic and operational defence planning, for operational and tactical force generation, integration and deployment, and for training, education and standardization.
Finally, building Alliance capabilities requires a mindset shift
A shift of policy and strategic thought must be made towards a knowledge, dynamism, and cooperation mindset, permeating defense and security policy, legal and financial frameworks, science, technology and innovation agendas, strategy and operational planning. With knowledge, excellence, versatility, advance knowledge on high readiness, and a proactive doctrine for science and technology and an ability for taking initiative will enable defense forces in Northern Europe to achieve higher effectiveness and improved coordination between government agencies, industry, research and technology organizations. These measures will ensure implementation and deployment of defence capabilities with high credibility and a broad mandate for all governance levels.
By international standards, Sweden and Finland possess a uniquely advanced DTIB relative to their population and defense budget size. The breadth and depth of Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, and Medical (STEMM) competencies, and the high level of efficiency in leading and organizing Science, Technology, and Innovation through Government, Academia and Industry collaboration (Triple Helix[iii]), has led to several world leading products, such as the SAAB Gripen multi-role fighter and Global Eye Airborne Early Warning & Control (AEW&C) aircraft, SAAB Kockums submarines and stealth surface naval ships, Ericsson and Nokia wireless technologies, and the Patria Armored Modular Vehicle and BAE Systems/Hägglunds Combat Vehicle 90 series.
Sweden's and Finland’s Influence on the Broader Northern European Security Landscape
Sweden’s and Finland’s defence capabilities are designed to accurately and rapidly detect, analyze and engage adversarial actors, events and circumstances, and sustain continuous, comprehensive operational awareness – with allies and partners, through the entire Euro-Atlantic security landscape. In their respective 2024 Budget Bills, the Swedish and Finnish Governments have allocated additional funding to military defense, thereby surpassing the basic requirement for NATO member states, 2% of National GDP .
Sweden is investing in strategic knowledge-building, risk-sharing and tempo-acceleration
The Swedish Government launched its defence innovation initiative[iv] in 2024, issuing a directive for a multi-year development and change process where the Government, business and academia all have important roles to play, in a “Triple Helix” consensus and collaboration, including the Swedish Armed Forces and associated agencies, as well as with other Strategic Innovations Programs, local, national and global constituting a unified innovation system.
In Sweden, most defense industries invest their earnings in R&D and Innovation, bearing the commercial risk in investments. In most parts of the world, industries are fully dependent on Government support for defense R&D and Innovation, accepting low or no commercial risk with owner equity. The Swedish Government is making extensive long-term investments in STEM2 competencies, Science and Technology, Innovation, and international collaboration. Working in extensive Triple-Helix collaboration, Government, industry and Academia shapes a strong DTIB, a fundamental for building and reinforcing a future, Whole-of-Government, Knowledge-Based Defence.
Sweden’s and Finland’s Science, Technology & Innovation provide strategic advantages
Sweden has overtaken the United States (US), climbing to second position in the 2023 World Intellectual Property Organization Global Innovation Index (WIPO GII)[v], only surpassed by Switzerland. The top six innovation nations are listed in Table 1.
WIPO further concludes that Sweden is a leader or runner-up in four out of eight Innovation Ecosystem Components, also called “Innovation Pillars” in Table 2:
Opening the market for defense capabilities
Today, the Swedish and Finnish DTIB engages in production and systems integration of fighter aircrafts, naval surface vessels, submarines, and land platforms. It also provides cost-efficient services and subsystems (e.g. ammunition, C4I systems and sensor systems).
The Swedish defense industry is completely privately owned, and the market is the most open in Europe[vi] [vii]. Unlike several European nations, Sweden has privatized its entire defense industry, and opened it for foreign ownership, forcing it to compete for international contracts. This has served Sweden well, especially during periods when the Swedish customer was not placing large orders, resulting in recurrent commercial success on the international defense market. Finland is employing similar but not identical measures, since a substantial part of the Finnish defence industry is still government owned.
Strategic and Operational Ramifications Across Domains and Actors
A bilateral relationship with the United States is considered just as important as the integration into NATO’s political and military structure, especially given the American nuclear deterrent that protects all NATO members. Another vital force component is Multi-Domain Operations[viii] (MDO), underpinned by comprehensive strategies based on a broad, complex, adaptive and often highly integrated combination of conventional and unconventional means, overt and covert activities, by military, law enforcement, and civilian actors, coordinated to achieve geopolitical and strategic objectives. MDO can be executed by both state and non-state actors, through different models of engagement, which may vary significantly in sophistication and complexity.
Adversaries employing hybrid warfare will seek to remain ambiguous, claim pursuit of legitimate goals and aim to keep their activities below a threshold that would result in a coordinated response from the international community. Effective Alliance deterrence and response will be enabled by:
Conclusions: Overcoming Geo-strategic Challenges requires Knowledge, Dynamism, and Cooperation
Sweden and Finland are investing in building and implementing a “Knowledge Defence”, aimed towards successfully overcoming the challenges of a conflict-laden future world. Northern Europe is evolving into an increasingly significant region for Euro-Atlantic security. NATO is currently restructuring and refining its deterrence and defence posture. The Alliance is simultaneously shifting its military strategy from a model of deterrence by reinforcement to one of deterrence by denial, where the alliance will be able to view Northern Europe as a fully integrated part of a strategic whole.
Organizations, services, structures, processes and an evidence-based knowledge base constitute a strategic policy and capability core, maintaining and evolving:
a) Stable and long-term knowledge building within and between prioritized science and technology domains,
b) Highly qualified continuous and global security analysis and Scientific and Technical Intelligence (STI) capabilities, and
c) Structures and regulations ensuring collaboration and exchange of results in global partnerships between research and innovation environments.
Although the different subareas of Northern Europe have their unique security dynamics and concerns, differences in national security policy will no longer limit the depth of regional military cooperation. The Instruments of Power of all Alliance partners must be anchored in common guiding principles for national security policy and security strategy, and provide support for organizational and individual leadership, also within research, development and innovation.
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[i] https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/russian-offensive-campaign-assessment-february-26-2024
[ii] NATO in the North: The emerging division of labor in European security. FIIA Briefing Paper 2023/370. Finnish Institute of International Affairs.
[iii] Leydesdorff, Loet (2012). "The Knowledge-Based Economy and the Triple Helix Model" (PDF). University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam School of Communications Research. arXiv:1201.4553. Bibcode:2012arXiv1201.4553L
[iv] Swedish Ministry of Defence. (2024). A Strategic Direction for Defence Innovation.
https://www.government.se/contentassets/f095f1d430164d2c9af6d66a40a30130/strategic-direction-for-defence-innovation.pdf
[v] World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) Global Innovation Index 2023. GII has been recognized by the United Nations General Assembly to be a benchmark for measuring innovation. www.wipo.int/global_innovation_index
[vi] Swedish Security and Defence Industry Association, https://soff.se/en
[vii] Swedish Association of Small and Medium Size Enterprises in Defence and Security, https://sme-d.se/
[viii] MDO requires more than simple coordination between domains and focuses on more than conflict alone and considers the full continuum of competition, requiring sophisticated understanding of the operating environment. It is the orchestration of military and non-military activities across all operating domains and environments, synchronized with non-military activities to achieve a desired end-state. https://www.act.nato.int/article/mdo-in-nato-explained/
[ix] DIMEFIL: Diplomatic, Information, Military, Economic, Financial, Intelligence, Legal
[x] National Instruments of Power (IoP) are sources of national power. IoP are different for each country and can change over time. When a nation possesses the requisite power to implement its national strategies, it exercises that power through the national instruments.