Sensing weakness on the Western side (why might that be?), Russia keeps on probing.
Via the Finnish newspaper Ilta-Sanomat (and Google Translate):
Russia’s demands for “security” still apply not only to Ukraine, but to all of Europe and the NATO defense alliance – as well as to Finland and Sweden.
In short: Russia still wants to prevent any expansion of NATO.
And that’s not all.
Russia still wants to nullify all the accessions of new NATO member states and their improved defenses that have taken place since 1997.
Russia demanded this as early as December 2021, shortly before Vladimir Putinlaunched a large-scale war of aggression against Ukraine in February 2022.
However, the same requirement is still in force. The only difference is that the requirement to reset NATO membership now also applies to Finland, which joined NATO in 2023, and Sweden, which joined NATO in 2024.
Meanwhile, from the International Institute for Strategic Studies:
In early December 2025, French officials reported the detection of several drones over the Île Longue nuclear-submarine base in Brittany, western France. The base hosts France’s nuclear-powered ballistic-missile submarine (SSBN) fleet, which carries the bulk of the country’s nuclear warheads on submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs).
These were just the latest of a wave of “mysterious” drones seen over sensitive Western facilities. Some can be attributed to hobbyists and others, but “the patterns of the drone incursions around nuclear bases — the use of more capable non-hobby drones, the similarities between incidents, and the spate of them in quick succession at a time of high tension in Europe — suggest a hostile state actor is behind them.”
No prizes for guessing which state actor might be to blame, although it would — to put it mildly — be of interest to know from where they are taking off.
On that topic, a team of students in Germany decided to look into this after drones nosed around critical German infrastructure. They narrowed their study down to three ships sailing under flags of convenience but linked to Russia. Full story here.
Meanwhile, the latest version of the National Defense Authorization Act would, at the very least, slow the withdrawal of U.S. forces and infrastructure from Europe and would, if it becomes law, authorize $175 million for the Baltic Security Initiative, an initiative that ought to make sense to anyone with an atlas.
And so far as that corner of Europe is concerned, Estonia is now investing over 5 percent of GDP in defense spending, Lithuania has approved a figure of 5.38 percent for 2026, and Latvia 4.91 percent.
When planning its approach to European security, the Trump administration should take some satisfaction in the way it is rightly persuading Europeans to take more responsibility for their own defense. That effort can continue without a hasty, ill-conceived reduction of the U.S. presence on the continent. That would be a gift to Putin, Xi Jinping, and their partners in Tehran and Pyongyang, a blunder that would make Biden’s scuttle from Kabul look like the work of a Bismarck.