Defense of the Suwalki Gap will be practiced during NATO’s Iron Wolf 2017 military exercise in Lithuania
The NATO troops deployed in Lithuania and Poland next week will conduct training on the defense of the so-called Suwalki Gap, through which allied forces might arrive in the event of a military crisis in the Baltic countries, Interfax-Ukraine reports.
About 1,500 Lithuanian, Polish, British and American servicemen will take part in the maneuvers that will be held on June 17 to 19 and will involve heavy military equipment and helicopters. This operation is part of the international exercise Gelezinis Vilkas 2017 or “Iron Wolf 2017."
"This type of operation is being carried out for the first time. One of our tasks is training for the arrival of the Allies in Lithuania. This is a purely tactical procedure, the way they cross our border, through the territory controlled by our forces then deep into the territory of the Republic of Lithuania," Commander of the Lithuanian Land Force, Brigadier General Valdemaras Rupšys told journalists on Monday.
The "Suwalki Gap" is the border area between Lithuania and Poland about 100 km wide that also borders the Kaliningrad region of the Russian Federation in the west and the Grodno region of Belarus in the east.