Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has raised international questions about President Vladimir Putin’s objectives. Some world leaders believe Putin has his sights set on the Baltic states and is trying to re-establish the former Soviet Union.
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Biden: Putin aims to re-establish USSR
“He [Putin] has much larger ambitions than Ukraine,” President Joe Biden said during a news conference about the war. “He wants to, in fact, re-establish the former Soviet Union. That’s what this is about.”
The Baltic states, consisting of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania, are in Northeastern Europe, South of the Baltic Sea.
Fifteen socialist republics were under Russian control during World War II, including The Baltics.
Timeline of Baltic independence from the Soviet Union
Mar. 11, 1990: Lithuania becomes the first Soviet republic to declare its independence.
May 3, 1990: Latvia declares independence.
Aug. 21, 1991: Estonia declares independence.
Dec. 25, 1991: The Soviet Union collapses.
Why does Putin want the Baltics?
Decades later, the Baltic countries share borders with Russia, Belarus, Poland, and the Russian province of Kaliningrad. While the Baltics and Poland are members of NATO, Belarus and Kaliningrad are not.
Stephen Hadley, a former National Security Advisor to President George W. Bush said the lack of strong NATO allies in the region makes this situation problematic.
“My concern would be, for example, if Putin succeeds in what he is doing in Ukraine, he would decide it would be great to connect Kaliningrad back up with Russia via Belarus,” Hadley said. “And that means taking territory from Poland and Lithuania. That means a threat to NATO.”
Will an invasion of the Baltics cause the next World War?
Since the Baltics are a part of NATO, if Russia invades a NATO country, that would violate Article 5 of the NATO alliance, which states “an armed attack against one or more of them…shall be considered an attack against them all.”
“That means war,” Hadley said. “This is a very serious moment for Europe, and I think they are increasingly seeing it that way.”
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