Lithuania buys more weapons, beckons their makers to invest locally
Giedrimas Jeglinskas, the chairman of the Lithuanian parliament's Committee on National Security and Defence, told Defense News the country's authorities have decided to increase its level of military expenditure to between 5% and 6% of its GDP from 2026 to 2030.
This would place the nation atop of NATO in terms of spending. Similarly to the other two Baltic states, Estonia and Latvia, Lithuania has boosted its military expenditure in the aftermath of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
'Our capability target is a division that we need to arm to make it a reality, so we need to increase spending to speed up the development of divisional assets. We need tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, air defense and some other high-tech assets to ensure this division's readiness,' Jeglinskas said.
'We need to arrive at the level which will allow us to deter potential aggression,'he added.
In December 2024, Lithuanian Defence Minister Dovilė Šakalienė inked a contract to buy 44 Leopard 2A8 tanks during an official visit to Germany. In Berlin, Šakalienė met with German officials to discuss issues related to the two nations' defense cooperation, including the heavy maneuver brigade of 4,800 personnel that the German Armed Forces, the Bundeswehr, is to deploy to Lithuania in the summer of 2025. The move is designed to bolster NATO's eastern flank.
Last year, the State Defence Council, Lithuania's top defense decision-making body, authorized the country's National Defence Ministry to also kick off the acquisition of tracked CV90s, which are made by BAE Systems Hägglunds.
In 2025, Lithuania's defense spending is to total some €3.2 billion ($3.5 billion), or around 3.9% of the country's GDP, according to data from the National Defence Ministry.
Alongside their work to equip the new Infantry Division with new gear, Lithuanian officials are also developing a program similar to Estonia's initiative to lure weapon and ammunition makers to its Ämari military base.
As part of these efforts, Germany's Rheinmetall is carrying out a project to build a new ammunition plant in Lithuania, and Vilnius hopes to attract more defense industry players.
The Lithuanian Ministry of Economy and Innovation 'and the Ministry of National Defence are working tandem on the so-called Green Corridor to attract investors. Rheinmetall is one of those deals, and more producers are coming, as we're holding talks with several manufacturers of explosives,' according to Jeglinskas, who represents the co-ruling Union of Democrats for Lithuania.
In November 2024, Rheinmetall launched the construction of a plant to make 155 mm artillery ammunition in Lithuania. Located in Baisogala, the factory is to commence operations in mid-2026. As part of the €180 million investment, around 150 jobs are to be created locally.
'A state-of-the-art production facility, including a shell manufacturing and load assembly pack, is being built in the municipality on an area of around 340 hectares,' the German company said in a statement. Once completed, the plant 'will be able to produce tens of thousands of 155 mm calibre artillery shells per year.'
Jeglinskas said the Lithuanian government's responsibility is to support potential investors with a wide range of assistance, including financial aid, to attract more defense-focused investments.
'It's the government's role; the government needs to put money into certain companies, and state capital is needed is push forward such investments that are of strategic importance to Lithuania and its security,' the lawmaker said.
Meanwhile, in Estonia, the country's authorities are making efforts to settle producers of weapons, ammunition and equipment in different locations across the country. In addition to the defense industry park in Ämari, a larger defense park is to be made available for manufacturing projects by both domestic and foreign defense companies.
The national park's location is yet to be decided. Public tenders to select investors are scheduled for 2025, representatives of the Estonian Centre for Defence Investments (ECDI), the country's military procurement agency, told Defense News.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
New York Post
31 minutes ago
- New York Post
How Trump's meeting with Putin pivoted from Ukraine cease-fire to full peace deal
WASHINGTON — President Trump made an abrupt announcement about two hours into his private, roughly three-hour meeting with Vladimir Putin Friday — declaring he wanted a full peace deal in Ukraine rather than a cease-fire, The Post has learned. Convinced there were relatively few matters left to resolve, and believing a truce would only prolong the war, Trump set aside his publicly stated goal of a temporary halt in fighting. 'Figuratively, the president sort of threw up his hands and said, 'I'm not interested in a cease-fire anymore,'' a source familiar with the discussion said. 5 President Trump said Saturday he's seeking a full peace deal rather than a truce after meeting with Vladimir Putin. GAVRIIL GRIGOROV/SPUTNIK/KREMLIN POOL/POOL/EPA/Shutterstock Trump expressed concern that the 'focus of the cease-fire' would be on 'how long the cease fire will be' and 'are they going to rearm?' The pivot yielded 'no pushback from the Russians,' leading Trump to exit Anchorage without a cease-fire in hand. Instead, he dialed up Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and European leaders to see if a full peace deal was within reach. The calls yielded a positive response, the source said, and Trump announced on social media that Zelensky would be at the White House Monday for talks. Putin insisted during the summit Ukraine hand over the remainder of the coal and minerals-rich Dontesk, a historically Russian-speaking region that had a Moscow-backed rebellion beginning in 2014. Russia claimed to annex the whole region in 2022. Zelensky has vehemently objected to giving up the northern third of the Donetsk region, arguing it would obliterate more than decade-old defense lines and allow Putin to launch further incursions into Ukraine. The matter may be addressed through an international peacekeeping deployment, the possibility of which was raised during the bilateral discussion in Alaska, with Putin open to a deployment of UK and French troops along the front lines to prevent a recurrence of fighting. 5 Trump left Anchorage without a cease-fire after a three-hour talk made him believe a final settlement could be reached. Trump has in principle accepted the deployment by its NATO allies as a de facto US 'security guarantee' to Ukraine, two sources told The Post. The move comes after Trump previously suggesting a US-Ukraine minerals deal would also effectively give Kyiv a measure of protection. In Anchorage, the Russian dictator floated an 'Article 5-plus' formulation for the peace-keeping force in which China would also send troops, but appeared to back away from the idea and settle on the possibility of NATO ally Turkey — a mediator for Moscow — instead sending soldiers to supplement the more openly pro-Kyiv bloc. European leaders appeared wooed by Putin informing Trump he was 'willing to stipulate' he would not attack additional countries in eastern Europe — though 'Europeans think in centuries' rather than US presidential terms, the source cautioned. 5 Putin accepted the idea of an international peacekeeping force in Ukraine, sources told The Post. AP 5 Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will visit the White House Monday to discuss a possible deal. 'The president got Putin to say out loud and agree to, in some way, memorialize that. … He said, 'I will not attack a European country. … I have no interest in this,' and that has always been the fear on the part of the Europeans,' the source said. 'That went a long way in the calls last night with the Europeans.' In a rare move, Trump took no questions at a planned news conference Friday and boarded Air Force One early for a return flight to Washington, during which he spoke on the phone with Zelensky and various European leaders. Trump firmed up his conviction that a full peace deal was possible during a series of Friday night and Saturday morning calls aboard Air Force One to the European leaders, before announcing Zelensky's Monday visit to Washington. 5 csuarez Zelensky has claimed he cannot cede land without a national referendum, adding complexity to the final end-game if he's amenable to handing over the remainder of Donetsk in exchange for the peacekeeping deployment. 'Every issue is an ancillary issue, except Donetsk,' a source familiar with the Trump-Putin talks said. 'That's the ball game, right there the future of Donetsk.' Russia has made recent gains in Donetsk, including capturing two villages Saturday. The Kremlin additionally took Crimea from Ukraine in 2014 and partially controls three other provinces in addition to Donetsk that it purportedly annexed. The Trump-Putin summit featured dramatic symbolism from the American hosts, with the US leader escorting the 25-year strongman down a red carpet as a B-2 bomber and fighter jets flew overhead, seeming to surprise the guest. Trump then asked Putin to join him in his Beast limousine to drive a short distance to the talks venue, during which they passed another B-2 parked on the runway — serving as a reminder of Trump using the aircraft for a surprise bombing of Iran on June 13 after Tehran balked at a deal with the US. 'The last thing [Putin] saw when he went in that room was a B-2 close up and personal,' a source remarked. Trump was joined in the meeting by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a well-known Russia hawk, and Steve Witkoff, the special presidential envoy who has met previously with Putin — offering additional strategic flexibility for the talks, though they remained led by Trump and Putin. Trump has openly expressed a desire for a three-leader summit between himself, Putin and Zelensky — and the White House currently is a top candidate for the venue.
Axios
31 minutes ago
- Axios
Putin made maximalist claims to Ukrainian territory in Trump summit: Sources
The peace terms that Russian President Vladimir Putin laid out in his summit with President Trump included that Ukraine withdraw entirely from two of its eastern regions, two sources briefed on the call told Axios. Why it matters: Trump will meet Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday in Washington. He also told European leaders in a post-summit call that he wants to arrange a trilateral summit with Putin and Zelensky as soon as next Friday, the sources said. But based on Putin's conditions, a major breakthrough appears unlikely. Trump also invited the European leaders on the call to join Monday's White House meeting, the sources said. Breaking it down: Trump and his special envoy Steve Witkoff briefed Zelensky and the leaders of the U.K., France, Germany, Italy, Finland, NATO and the European Commission on Putin's positions last night on their flight back to Washington. They said Putin had demanded that Ukraine cede two of the four regions to which Russia has laid claim (Donetsk and Luhansk), and freeze the front lines in the other two (Kherson and Zaporizhzhia). Russia controls nearly all of Luhansk, but only about three-quarters of Donetsk. Putin presented his willingness to stop pushing forward in Kherson and Zaporizhzhia as a concession, in exchange for Ukraine withdrawing from Donetsk, one source briefed on the call said. In reality, Russia hasn't made any progress in those areas for some time. A Ukrainian source said the U.S. side had the impression Putin was willing to negotiate over the small slivers of the Sumy and Kharkiv regions under Russian control. Between the lines: This proposal calls for significantly more territory to shift from Ukrainian to Russian control than vice versa — something Moscow might argue is reasonable, as Russia has the upper hand militarily, but which Ukraine would almost certainly reject. Putin also requested that the U.S. recognize Russia's sovereignty in the parts of Ukraine it would gain under a peace deal, according to the source. Trump called the meeting a success and said he and Putin agreed on most issues, though Putin appears to have stuck to most of his maximalist demands. The intrigue: Putin did say he was willing to discuss security guarantees for Ukraine, the source said. But he mentioned China as one of the possible guarantors, possibly suggesting he would oppose a security force consisting of NATO troops. Ukraine and its European backers have been discussing the idea of a "coalition of the willing" standing behind Ukraine to prevent a future Russian invasion. Ukraine was encouraged by the fact that Trump endorsed the idea of security guarantees for Ukraine in the post-summit call, according to a Ukrainian official, who said the matter was not discussed in detail. Trump has said this wouldn't be a NATO mission, but Ukraine hopes the U.S. will participate in some fashion. The official said the matter would be discussed further during Zelensky's White House visit. What to watch: Trump told Zelensky and the other participants in the call that he wants to hold a trilateral summit "fast," as early as August 22, two sources told Axios. Putin has not publicly committed to such a meeting.
Politico
32 minutes ago
- Politico
Putin got a warm Trump meeting. Europe is afraid Zelenskyy won't.
While publicly Europe and Ukraine have appeared upbeat, privately officials were wary of Putin's red carpet welcome back to the West, where he secured the veneer of global legitimacy without making the kind of gestures toward peace the U.S., Europe and Ukraine have sought. 'Worries have been there all the way this year, and yesterday's meeting did not really help,' a European official said. Trump's position on the war has yo-yoed in recent weeks. While he had for months blamed Ukraine for the conflict, he had been more critical of Putin and Russia in the lead-up to the summit. He even said Putin would face 'severe consequences,' if he did not agree to stop the war after Friday's gathering. But after several hours of meetings with Putin in Alaska, Trump backtracked on a demand for an immediate ceasefire, again said it would be up to Ukraine to end the fighting and advised Kyiv to 'take the deal,' without specifying what Putin had suggested. Trump said after the summit that he negotiated with Putin over land swaps but declined to provide more details. The White House didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. French President Emmanuel Macron and U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Sunday will lead a teleconference among the 'coalition of the willing' — countries that have indicated they will provide troops and other support to Ukraine at the end of the war, according to a European official. Ahead of the summit, Trump said he supported some American role in providing security guarantees — some form of assurance or support from Washington to deter Russia from attacking again after a peace deal is agreed. Nordic and Baltic leaders welcomed those commitments again after Trump spoke with European officials late Friday. While Trump did much more than usual to consult with Europe in the lead-up to the summit with Putin and after, the frequent contact does not seem to have yielded tangible results. European officials are relieved that Trump did not agree to a deal with Putin but disappointed that the threat of steep secondary tariffs targeting third countries buying Russian oil was tabled. 'They want to try to influence the negotiation process as much as possible, because they know Trump really wants to do it this way, and they don't want to leave the initiative to Putin,' said Giuseppe Spatafora, a former NATO official who is now a research analyst at the EU Institute for Security Studies. 'In general, the Europeans talk much more often to Trump than during the first 100 days, which is good. They have influence. But it's limited.' Zelenskyy's last visit to the Oval Office in February quickly went off the rails when Vice President JD Vance and later Trump both lectured him for not being grateful enough for American support and overplaying what they said was a weak diplomatic position. Zelenskyy's decision to wear a black polo, black pants and boots rather than a suit further soured the atmosphere. But Trump and Zelenskyy have been on better terms in recent meetings, as Kyiv's allies sought to improve the relationship and Trump's frustration with Putin mounted.
