Estonian PM says Baltic states would be “wiped off the map” under current NATO plans : worldnews

That comes with beeing a border country.

Germany had exactly the same scenario during the entire cold war. NATO plans were to pull back to the rhine and France made it pretty clear they would use their nukes the moment soviet troops step one food on French soil.

There was literally no scenario where it wouldnt have ended with armageddon for Germany in the cold war.

So honestly this comes with beeing a border country of NATO. It was a known possibility when they joined.

And no NATO country is stupid enough to put its best troops that are available, primarily european ones, into the baltic poket only to be destroyed in case of war.

Militarily the baltics are doomed because Russia owns Kaliningrad. The land connection would be cut eather by a ground assault or by constant artillery from the russians. The NATO airforce cant immediatly support any actions in the baltics for at least the first few days up to a few weeks do to the baltics beeing compleatly within the Russian AA bubble. Flying into that area for ground support without taking out the russian AA positions on russian soil in positions prepared for years would be stupid.

And without Air support and compleat air supremacy NATO forces are significantly weakend. The best example can be seen in Ukraine what happens if Russia doesnt have to worry about an enemy airforce, they just use artillery to wipe out any resistance. And the baltics with their key positions are within russian artillery range from day 1. NATO forces dont even get close in terms of artillery to russia (quantity, not quality).

NATO armies are designed for a war of movemeant, defending the baltics would be a static defense because any movemeant would just get drowned in artillery by russia (again, look at the current war in ukraine). You can have as many manpad or Abrams as you want, if you cant silence the enemy artillery you are doomed.

It is far better for NATO to gather troops in Poland and slowly advance to take back the Baltics. Or to force Russia to abandon its attack and divert troops by attacking towards St. Petersburg from Finland or advance through Ukriane/Belarus directly on a wide front.

Defending the baltics and sending the most combat ready troops NATO (or more accuratly the european NATO members) have into a small area where Russia has the initial advantage simply do to geography and how mdoern AA works is simply stupid and would be wonderful news for Russia. If the strongest NATO force is in the baltics and not in Poland it loses all its flexability to react or take the initiative. A NATO force in Poland forces Russia to defend against an attack in 3 directions (Baltics, Belarus, Ukraine) while if they are in the baltics Russia knows they wont going to move or attack anything else.

Nato only has one sufficent force it can deploy before the americans arrive in force in europe and most europeans can gather their armies in the deploymeant areas to go on the offensive. The first weeks, in any WW3 szenario Russia will have the advantage do to only having to move and coordinating one military, not 20+. NATO wins any war without a doubt long term but its a slow juggernaught. Suiciding its initial response force in a false attempt to defend the baltics (which by the way would still be compleatly blown to shit in any scenario by the russians and look like Mariupol at best).

Its militarily stupid and would have the exact same result as not defending it: Everything gets blown to shit. It would literally weaken NATO significantly to station major troops in the baltics with no significant benefit and just a higher cost.

Its like flying troops into Stalingrad instead of launching a proper, organized and multi supported assault. Its literally giving Russia all the initiative and binding NATOS hands for no military gain.