For Sweden’s Chief of Military Operations, Ewa Skoog Haslum, Western countries should already be prepared to confront a threat.
Two years after joining NATO, which brought an end to its policy of non-alignment, Sweden is taking action in the face of the Russian threat. “Even though we do not have a land border, we are on the front line” with Russia, says Sweden’s Chief of Military Operations, Vice Admiral Ewa Skoog Haslum. “We encounter them daily in the air and at sea, and of course we monitor each other.”
Speaking to a small group of journalists during a visit to Paris, Skoog Haslum praised military cooperation between Sweden and France. During her stay, she visited the French armed forces’ planning and operations command center and the headquarters of the coalition of volunteers, located in the suburbs of the capital. Sweden has already supplied aircraft to Ukraine as well as mine-clearing capabilities. It is taking part in training missions for the Ukrainian army in Europe. “We are also ready to do so on Ukrainian territory,” she says.
The Russian threat is taken seriously. “We would all like to know how much time we have,” before a confrontation, Skoog Haslum notes. “No one can give a date. But we must be ready now because Russia is very clear: it is at war with the West. It is already carrying out attacks, not with weapons, but with hybrid operations.”
Marking territory
A month after a Russian drone flew a few kilometers from the aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle, the Swedish Vice Admiral offers a pragmatic assessment. “The intelligence ship Zhigulevsk was in the vicinity of the Charles de Gaulle,” when it was docked in Malmö, she recounts. The Russian vessel was entitled to sail under the right of innocent passage. “But we had technical evidence of what they were doing,” Skoog Haslum says. “They were interested in the aircraft carrier, but also simply in showing that they were present.”
The device, which was intercepted, did not pose a threat to the aircraft carrier. But this type of destabilizing maneuver is frequent. “We have seen drones several times during exercises. Sometimes we manage to jam them, sometimes they disappear,” she explains.
While all the countries bordering the Baltic Sea are NATO members, with the exception of Russia, the region is not spared from the risk of tension. “I do not like the expression ‘NATO lake.’ One country is deliberately seeking to undermine stability and security in the region,” she says, noting that Moscow’s air and naval capabilities have been little degraded by the war in Ukraine. “We must not be mistaken: Russia is not what it was five years ago. Russian forces have learned a great deal from the war in Ukraine. We are now facing a more agile, more technologically advanced adversary.”
Sweden and Finland’s accession to the Atlantic Alliance constitutes a strategic failure for the Kremlin, which had made NATO’s expansion a security issue for Russia. The Alliance will strengthen its presence along this border. Sweden will serve as the framework nation for the forward land force to be deployed in Finland. It will send a battalion there this summer.
“We will be ready to move to a brigade level later,” the Vice Admiral explains. Norway and the United Kingdom will take part in the mission. “France has also shown a certain interest in deploying land forces in Finland,” Skoog Haslum adds. To build Europe’s defense, Paris is relying on a strengthened partnership with the Nordic countries.
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