London, Dec. 7: Military alliance Nato has expanded defence plans in parts of eastern Europe amid fears that Russia poses an increasing threat, US diplomatic cables released on Tuesday by Wikileaks showed.
Contingency plans were drawn up for the three Baltic states — Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania — earlier this year after they lobbied for extra protection following the 2008 Russia-Georgia war, said the leaked cables.
The US has also offered to beef up Polish security amid fears of a resurgent Russia, said the cables, despite the policy of the US President, Mr Barack Obama’s administration to “reset” relations with Moscow.
Painful memories were stirred in the Baltic states — all former Soviet republics — as Russian troops poured into Georgia in August 2008, the cables show.
“Events in Georgia have dominated the news and discussion here like few other events in recent memory,” said a cable from the American embassy in Riga, Latvia, cited in The New York Times.
Latvians, at least ethnic Latvians, “look at Georgia and think that this could easily be them,” said the dispatch, one of some 2,50,000 US diplomatic cables leaked to whistleblower website Wikileaks and now being slowly released in small batches.
The US admiral, Mr James Stavridis, Nato’s top commander in Europe, proposed drawing up defence plans for Baltic states, which had joined the military alliance in 2004, according to the leaked correspondence.
Nato military officials agreed in January this year to the policy, which groups the Baltic states with Poland in a new regional defence scheme codenamed Eagle Guardian, said the cables, according to Britain’s Guardian daily.
Calls by eastern Europe for more security guarantees had been stymied by western Europe, and in particular Germany, which feared such moves could antagonise Russia.