Tag: Åland

The non-military issue of Åland

On By Corporal FriskIn Finland15 Comments

The demilitarisation of the Åland Islands is (again) a hot topic. There are a number of misconceptions regarding the demilitarisation itself and the potential military threat. Let me therefore be very clear: yes, there is some geostrategic value to the islands, but despite this, the question of how to defend the demilitarised islands is first and foremost one of ethics, moral duty, and politics. From a (purely) military point of view, the issue is in fact rather manageable for the time being.

Acknowledging that this runs counter to much of the discussion so far, it need to be stated that several of the individual parts in the traditional picture painted are indeed correct – included the fact that whoever controls the islands controls much of the northern Baltic Sea and can isolate Finland, that a surprise operation through an air transport or two loaded with paratroopers suddenly veering away from the St Petersburg – Kaliningrad run is difficult to stop, as well as the fact that retaking an archipelago is generally much harder than defending it. However, that overlook the basic issue that the three factors above does not combine as the world looks today or for the foreseeable future.

There is exactly two countries able to do prolonged military fighting in the archipelago of Åland without running into a logistical nightmare. Of these, one of them is Sweden, and I trust they won’t do anything stupid. Here the Finnish-speaking Coastal Brigade advances during an exercise, a unit that certainly would be able to provide interesting capabilities to any fight over the islands. Source: Merivoimat FB

Åland is made up by 6,700 named (and a further 13,000 unnamed) islands. You obviously would not need to put people on all of them to control the whole archipelago, but there is a significant number of locations you will need to physically man to actually secure the Åland Islands in the way needed to exert sea control (or just create a level of sea denial) over the norther Baltic Sea and the sea lanes into Finnish ports or Stockholm. To properly defend an archipelago, it is also key to be able to quickly shift defenders from one location to another to meet enemy offensives, meaning an invader on Åland would need to bring either helicopters or small fast craft – preferably both. A good example is the Finnish experience in the face of Soviet raids and tactical offensives coming out of the strategically defensive Hanko (Gangut) naval base in the summer of 1941, where the attacker choosing the field of battle – which being an island was geographically limited – meant that the attacker could more or less always rely on numerical superiority and a successful defence usually rested on the ability to quickly reinforce the battlefield under fire.

So what would happen if a Russian force suddenly decided to steer away from what looked like an ordinary supply run and enter Finnish airspace or territorial waters? There is indeed a chance that they would be able to reach Mariehamn before the FDF has opened fire, in particular in the case of a scenario like a civilian airliner suddenly squawking an emergency and altering course. However, even here the thinking flourishing on social media and in newspapers is somewhat misguided as it usually overlooks the role of both intelligence and QRA/readiness-work. Would an invasion come as a complete surprise? Possibly, but we also know that the FDF is continually adjusting readiness levels in response to Russian movements. If a large Russian convoy was sailing in the Baltic Sea there would be a measured response in Finnish naval readiness, likely including vessels with anti-ship missiles lurking the shadows of the southwestern archipelago.

And here’s the catch which often get overlooked: the larger the first wave the less likely a strategic surprise is. Sure, history has seen some spectacular failures of readiness and as Ukraine has demonstrated knowing when to mobilise reserves is a surprisingly difficult decision, but let’s go back to the point made above.

Actually occupying Åland in a meaningful way in which you are able to do something militarily useful with it will require a significant amount of forces, far more than any emergency-squawking airliner will bring in. And in a difficult balancing act as soon as you start loading your air transports or landing craft with the fast craft needed to be able to shift around reinforcements, the long-range weapon systems to provide air defences and anti-shipping capabilities, and the logistics train to ensure that the troops and systems are able to function you are also looking at a serious decline in the number of troops even a Russian all-out amphibious or airlift effort could bring in.

An S-300 TEL with four missiles going to Syria back in 2015. If you plan on using these to defend your invasion of Åland, I hope you choose when to fire them carefully, because four shots won’t last long and those already meant you sacrificed quite a few potential soldiers that otherwise could have fit inside that transport. Source: Russian MoD via Wikimedia Commons

And then we are looking at what would happen after the invasion. Finland could quickly start to make life rather miserable for the occupiers by cutting of their lines of supply and striking locations that aren’t properly defended in an island-hopping campaign inching ever closer to the main islands while all the time forcing Russia to spend ammunition and resources they can’t replace. With Sweden in NATO securing the west and southwestern approaches the Russian situation would look even grimmer, and the Russians trying to bring in enough heavy firepower to keep the Finnish (and Swedish) navies and air forces at bay would mean even fewer forces to reinforce the outer islands being targeted by the Finnish (and Swedish) marines.

In short, a Russian invasion of Åland would quickly turn into a wetter and colder version of Điện Biên Phủ

That is from a purely military point of view. A Russian invasion of Åland within the next decade or so would almost certainly be little more than a nuisance that would be over within a month or two. Compared to several other possible scenarios, Åland is not among the most serious ones.

However, going for the purely military scenario might not be politically or ethically doable. There is a sizeable number of people living in Åland. These are Finnish citizens, peacefully going about with their lives. To leave them under Russian occupation even for a limited time is a difficult moral choice, as that would mean leaving them to suffer through the scenes witnessed throughout Central and Eastern Europe in the late 40’s and Ukraine during the ongoing war. Besides the looting, raping, and killings, it’s evident that once supplies would start running low the last meal and drops of fuel on the island would not go to the civilian population but rather to the invaders.

As such, while not necessarily called for from a strictly military point of view, from a humanitarian point of view ensuring that own forces deny the enemy an easy entry certainly can be seen as the proper course of action. Here we run into the question of demilitarisation, but it also needs to be acknowledged that the legal situation is far more complex than often claimed, with the different treaties (1856, 1921, 1940, 1947, 1991) containing different wordings and restrictions, which might or might not be relevant today depending on who you ask. Crucial is that Finland is responsible for the defence, and under that Finland is able to take a number of steps to ensure the mission can be performed. So far Finland has decided not to e.g. declare that an enhanced forward presence on the islands are warranted. Would Finland legally be able to do so? The harsh answer is that it really doesn’t matter. If a sovereign country opts to state that something is their interpretation of the legal documents they’ve signed it is really difficult for any country thinking otherwise to do anything about it, especially if that country happens to be an international pariah involved in a war of aggression, and something along the lines of temporary rotations of a readiness unit into the island is close enough to the literal wording of the treaties that Finland could get away with it (especially considering that the parties involved in addition to Russia largely consist of our closest partners).

If called upon, I have little doubt that the Finnish reservists would fight to liberate Åland the same as they would any other region. But the fact remain that the current media discussion is painting a picture of Åland standing out as the only region whose inhabitants are ungrateful for the FDF wanting to be able to do so with as few losses as possible, and that is in addition to the islanders already being the only ones not directly taking part in the military defence of the country. Source: Merivoimat FB

The big issue here is the islanders themselves. I will hazard a guess that I am among the majority of Finns in that while the handful of islanders I’ve met have seen like decent enough people, the current behaviour of their political leadership and certain other highly vocal persons are making it look like the islands are inhabited by a bunch of spoiled brats who demand that the mainlanders will come and save them in case of war, but won’t take any part in aiding in that operation or even allowing the FDF to make any preparations to be able to do so. While I and countless of others are prepared to pull on the uniform and risk our lives to defend the homes of our families and those of our fellow citizens, it certainly feels nicer to do so when there is an understanding that these fellow citizens aren’t actively working against us being able to do so as safely and efficiently as possible – my personal goal is after all to be able to return home unhurt to my family after the war. If some ungrateful fellow isn’t going to take part in the defence, I can live with that – there is a bunch of non-military tasks needed to keep society running after all. But if that ungrateful fellow says I can’t prepare properly, leaving me with less of a chance to successfully get home safe and sound, I will admit that my interest in risking life and limb is somewhat diminished. This strange situation where the political leadership of Åland really should be the ones begging FDF to maintain a presence there to avoid unnecessary suffering among their fellow islanders and instead they make themselves look like naive jerks is in honesty somewhat confusing.

The other island

On By Corporal FriskIn Baltic Sea2 Comments

In the shadow of Sweden re-militarising Gotland, the focus of the Finnish discussion rapidly turned to two things: Why is the Finnish government cutting defence spending in the budget proposal presented this week, and what to do with our own blank spot, the Åland islands?

The Åland islands have been demilitarised since the (First) Crimean War of the mid-19th century. The Russian Empire, to which the Grand-Duchy of Finland belonged back then, had built an impressive coastal fortress at Bomarsund, which an Anglo-French force captured in 1854. The whole siege cost both sides less than a 100 dead each, and would probably have been all but forgotten if not for two aspects: The first ever Victoria Cross was awarded for gallantry shown during the battle, and the fact that the peace Treaty of Paris (not to be confused with the 1947 edition) that ended the conflict declared the islands demilitarised (though not the surrounding waters).

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The final assault on Bomarsund. Source: Wikimedia Commons
It should be noted that the legal status is far from clear-cut. The islands have been dealt with in a number of treaties, including the above-mentioned Paris Treaty of 1856, but also by the League of Nation decision of 1921 (expanding the demilitarisation to include surrounding waters), and the treaties with the Soviet Union following the Winter and Continuation Wars. Col. (ret.) Anders Gardberg has written a study on the islands, including the legal aspects, found here.  The questions it deals with are largely unchanged over time, keeping the 20 year old paper highly relevant. Of note is that the 1921 Convention allows for Finland to, if  “‘exceptional circumstances demand’ send into the zone and keep there temporarily such armed forces that are ‘strictly necessary for the maintenance of order'” (as quoted in Gardberg’s paper). A piece of interesting trivia is that unlike what is often stated, the inhabitants of the islands can actually be called up for conscript duty, but only in the Pilot- and Lighthouse authority. This in turn was quickly disbanded and turned into the Finnish Maritime Administration following Finnish independence, making this something of a moot point…

If we however leave the legal fine print aside, and accept the fact that there is currently nothing that points towards the Finnish politicians mustering the willpower to let the needs of the defense of this strategic area prevail over the political inertia of status quo and significant local (and Russian) opposition to an even partial re-militarisation, the question appears how much of a problem this really is?

There is little doubt that today there exists plans for the Navy to conduct a updated version of the WWII-era Operation Regatta, wherein a naval convoy at the outbreak of hostilities quickly shipped the necessary forces to the Åland Islands.

The problem, as is generally the case with the Finnish Defence Forces, is that the number of standing marine units (not counting the ships) ready to intervene at a short notice is negligible. In practice, this means that for Operation Regatta 2.0 to succeed, the crises needs to have escalated over time to the extent that a mobilisation of reservists have been initiated, and the first act of hostilities need to be something else than a ro-ro vessel heading out of St Petersburg suddenly altering its course and unloading a reinforced mechanised battalion in Mariehamn. The absolute nightmare is a coordinated surprise assault by sea and air, allowing rapid transfer of a brigade (or possibly even a reinforce one) to occupy the Åland mainland, something which could easily come out of one of the Russian snap exercises. This would be extremely hard to dislodge, and would effectively cut off Finland from the rest of world, with regards to both military room to manoeuvre and the flow of vital goods such as food and fuel for the society as a whole. This would either require Finland to give in to any demands placed by the Kremlin, let the Finnish society literally starve, or defeat the Russian force on the battlefield.

jehu_u707_lippujuhlan_pc3a4ivc3a4n_kalustoesittely_2016_7
The new Jehu-class fast assault craft of the Finnish Navy. In effect, it upgrades the coastal jaegers’ mode of  transport from ‘truck’ to ‘IFV’ to use a land forces metaphor. Source: Wikimedia Commons/MKFI
The later need not necessarily be by a frontal assault. The major difference between Gotland and Åland is that the former is a largely continuous landmass, while the latter is made up by 6,700 named (and a further 13,000 unnamed) islands and skerries. The archipelago is a battlefield unlike any other. It is virtually impossible to control all islands, leading to the forces being grouped on the ones deemed strategically important from where they can then extend zones of control over the lesser ones. Naturally, this calls for a very delicate balance between overextending and leaving gaps in the defence. As any kind of retreat or bringing in of reinforcements during an ongoing fight is extremely hazardous, operations are usually characterised by swift and determined assaults where the attacker tries to throw the defender into the sea by asserting man- and firepower superiority. If the first attack fails, the only option left is usually to try and withdraw under fire. The Hanko campaign of 1941 is probably the best historical case study to shine light on the dilemmas.

The issue for any Russian troops sitting on Åland is that they are too few to hold all major entryways at any given point. This would be the case even if this was the single main offensive operation in the Baltic Sea region, which would in turn mean that the occupiers would include the 336. Marine Brigade and the 76. Air Assault Division in Pskov (note that this is an understrength divsion). Any Russian occupation would still leave potential weak spots which would allow Finnish coastal jaegers and special forces to set up their own position in close vicinity to the Russian positions.

Finnish marine forces in action

In case the conflict started according to the Crimea-blueprint, where the Russians have deployed forces to protect their (shipping) interests in the area but the different forces aren’t actually shooting at each other, the Finnish troops could theoretically play to the strengths provided by their supply lines being short and well-protected, and create a counter-siege where the occupiers are cut off from the Russian supply bases in the St Petersburg area and the Kaliningrad exclave. This would force the Russians to either escalate the conflict into a real shooting war (one in which they have lost the element of surprise and would clearly be the attacker) or back down. If the shooting war is already a fact, the ability to use long-range anti-shipping missiles from the mainland’s archipelago and light infantry units to operate in the Åland archipelago in hit-and-run attacks and as spotters would create a race to the bottom, where both Finland and the occupying force are under siege, and the question is which one breaks faster.

However, even if the possibility of bouncing back from a strategic surprise is there, this is dependent upon the Finnish government exhibiting the required determination to realise the strategic importance of the islands and put up a fight to defend these. Sadly, this is the single part of the whole Åland question which I feel is questionable.