They sit between Russia and the sea…
They are all to concosius of an attack by Russian against them and NATO and a American Presiddnt watching Putin try to Pac-Man the Ukraine…..
The American Sec Of State has made the trip to the countries in recent days to provide assurances that their membership in NATO means they will NOT stand alone…
US Troops have been sent to the Baltic countries in the recent two weeks of the Ukraine fighting…
In a region that borders Russia, and which all too well remembers the forced rule of the Soviet Union, the Baltics are warily watching the crisis in Ukraine as a bellwether for their own security. Ukrainian flags are hung from doorways and draped from balconies across the capitals of Lithuania and Latvia. Blue-and-yellow posters, lights and billboards broadcast the region’s support for Ukraine. In Vilnius, the Lithuanian capital, a commuter bus had replaced its digital route display on Monday with a message that read, simply, “Vilnius 🤍 Ukraina.”
In Riga, the Latvian capital, Mr. Blinken said it was “very moving” to see the outpouring of support for Ukraine in the Baltics, which he praised as a longtime “democratic wall” against authoritarian rule.
But Baltic leaders appear unsatisfied with the level of military support the United States is providing to help deter Russian advances, either to Ukraine directly or to its allies in Europe. Mr. Rinkevics also said international sanctions against Mr. Putin’s allies could be toughened, and he called on European states to stop the oil and gas imports from Russia that have become Moscow’s economic lifeline.
Russia provides 10 percent of the world’s oil and more than a third of the European Union’s natural gas. Western sanctions are largely engineered to allow companies in Europe to continue to buy Russian energy, and the White House has resisted more aggressive penalties for fear that they would drive up the price of gasoline and other energy costs for Americans.
Europe, Baltic leaders told Mr. Blinken, has entered a new chapter.
“Unfortunately, the worsening security situation through the Baltic region is of great concern for all of us and around the world,” said President Gitanas Nauseda of Lithuania. “Russia’s reckless aggression against Ukraine once again proves that it is a long-term threat to European security, the security of our alliance, no matter how the end of the war in Ukraine comes.”…
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Mr. Blinken sought to reassure the officials that, as fellow members of NATO, the Baltic States would be robustly defended should Russia try to move in.
Citing the NATO collective defense pact that “an attack on one is an attack on all,” Mr. Blinken said the United States and the rest of the military alliance “will defend every, every inch of NATO territory should it come under attack.”