Journal on Baltic Security

For several years, the Supreme Commander of the Swedish Armed Forces (SAF), M. Bydén, has acknowledged the significance of digital security threats (Bydén, 2017). Even now, he continues to stress the importance of taking such threats seriously; ‘Sweden is attacked everyday by means that harm our society today and in the more long-term. We are not in a military conflict on and about Swedish territory, but we are in a conflict about the values we want to uphold and interests we want to be handled in a democratic way’ (Dagens Nyheter, 2022).

This article examines how a state that chooses to authorize a resistance organization as part of its national defence plan in order to increase its national resilience legitimizes that organization through the three phases of pre-conflict, conflict and occupation, and resumption of sovereignty. It will demonstrate the necessity of a legal framework for its authorization to obtain both domestic and international legitimacy. It will also cover the necessity of compliance with the Law of Armed Conflict (LOAC) during hostilities. Furthermore, it will touch on how this legal framework functions on behalf of the legitimate government in occupied territory against an adversary by not allowing adversarial political consolidation, while also assisting in the prevention of the creation of competing organizations in occupied territory with goals that deviate from those of the sovereign and legitimate government.

Defence policy and related activities, such as territorial defence and comprehensive defence, are considered a matter of national priority and consensus in Estonia since its restoration of independence in 1991. The actual meaning and its content have depended on numerous linguistic and cultural factors. Educational traditions and alliance relations have played an important role as well. In some cases, changes in actual defence policy content first required an ability to change military terminology and outlook. The current study analyses the meaning of territorial defence, comprehensive defence and total defence in official documents and based on focus group interviews among officers of BDCOL and EMA.

While potential threats from Russia and NATO collective defence commitments are similar for Latvia and Estonia, both countries have adopted different approaches in the balancing exercise between territorial defence and military solidarity. Notwithstanding their differences, both are by their nature fully non-aggressive – without room for pre-emptive initiatives, extra territoriality or asymmetrical tools. Given that in a case of a hypothetical large-scale conventional attack both countries would almost entirely have to rest on the allies, external military solidarity is essential. Until the Ukraine crisis, both offered more military solidarity towards their NATO allies than the latter offered to them. As the result of the Ukrainian crisis, allies became more military-solidary with the Baltic nations, especially having established the Enhanced Forward Presence, while Estonian and especially Latvian contributions to international missions and operations dropped. Therefore, it is suggested that both countries increase their efforts to the allied international endeavours.

After the establishment of the Schengen area, it was expected that its members would develop a common policy on external border management and protecting external borders. As the current refugee crisis has revealed, some countries have not met their obligations, which has led to serious difficulties in other