Seminar on NATO Strategic Concept: what impact on the Baltic States?

The Baltic Defence College continued to bring together academics, diplomats and officers to discuss the most relevant issues related to the Baltic States security. This time subject matter experts were invited to discuss the main aspects of the new NATO Strategic Concept and to share different point of views in order to identify the interests of the Baltic States.

The Baltic Defence College welcomed Ambassador Aivis Ronis who is a member of the Group of Experts for Drafting NATO’s New Strategic Concept. Ambassador Ronis shared his thoughts on the developments of the new NATO Strategic Concept with participants as well with students from Joint Command and General Staff Course and Civil Servants Course.

The College welcomed also LtGen Friedrich-Wilhelm Ploeger who is Commander Combined Air Operations Centre 2, Executive Director Joint Air Power Competence Centre and Commander German Air Force Air Operations Command. As the responsible NATO CAOC Commander General Ploeger described Air policing for the Baltic States and provided an outlook into possible future development.

During the seminar discussions of all the participants were focused on NATO’s role in defence against the most relevant threats to transatlantic security, the necessity of the member states to have political – military reassurance as well NATO partnerships and prospects of NATO enlargement.