When visiting Svalbard Moscow said it was “provocative”, but all was peaceful when the same lawmakers on Thursday walked all the way to Russia’s borderline with Norway.
On the eve of Victory Day May 9th, more than 20 vessels sail out for combat training in the Barents Sea at the same time as NATO vessels are on exercise outside Northern Norway.
The Armed Forces prepare for show-off of their special designed Pantsir-SA and Tor-M2DT, both short and medium-range surface to air missile systems on belts.
95 percent of the soldiers with the Northern Fleet are now on professional contracts, following a year when Russia increased defense spendings by 5.4%.
Leader of the regional party office in Murmansk, Andrey Kapitonov, was recruited by Russian agents as part of a plot involving liberal Parnas and the Norwegian secret police. Then it all backfired on the Russian security service.
«The Kola Peninsula is saturated with nuclear facilities, so the topic is very relevant for us,» says Aleksandr Metelkov, Chief of staff at FSB’s operational headquarters in Murmansk.
While Norwegian, British and American soldiers are exercising in Finnmark, Russia has demonstrated underwater stealth technology in a submarine-to-submarine kill exercise.
Up to five percent of our military personnel are women and there are 300 representatives of the «weak sex» among our officers, the powerful naval fleet says.