Defence minister: Suwałki Gap is sufficiently protected by Polish and NATO forces

Asked at a press conference about the Suwałki Gap, dubbed "the most dangerous place on Earth" by Politico, Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Mariusz Błaszczak said that it was "sufficiently protected" both by allied and Polish armed forces.

He reminded that the NATO Enhanced Forward Presence initiative had been approved at the Alliance summit in Warsaw in 2016. He added he had been personally focused on the development of units stationed on the eastern flank, including creating of the 18th Mechanised Division and developing the 16th Mechanised Division.

Błaszczak also said that the Suwałki Gap was the responsibility of the 16th Division, especially of the 15th Mechanised Brigade, "which is among the best Polish Army units in terms of experience in facilitating interoperability with allied forces".

The 15th Mechanised Brigade is stationed and practices with American, British, Romanian and Croatian forces, which together form the NATO Battle Group Poland.

"One of the key elements of the security system structure, of resilience in this part of our country is cooperation with Lithuania," minister Błaszczak said. He also reminded that the headquarters of the Multinational Division North East were located in Elbląg. The unit coordinates operations of four NATO battalion battle groups deployed as part of Enhanced Forward Presence in Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.

He also underscored that among the units affiliated to the HQ in Elbląg was the 15th Mechanised Brigade and the Lithuanian Mechanised Infantry Brigade Iron Wolf (Geležinis Vilkas), which "practice together, built interoperability, which is extremely important when it comes to deterrence".

"Because our basic task is enemy deterrence, not letting the aggressor to cross the border and invade the territory of the Polish state," he added.

A few days ago, quoting Western military planners, Politico wrote that in case of confrontation between Russia and NATO, "the 'Suwałki Gap' would likely be the first point of contact".

The Suwałki Gap is an approx. 100-kilometres-long border area between Poland and Lithuania, which is squeezed between the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad to the west, and Belarus to the east. The strategic importance of the corridor is that it is the only land passage between the Baltic States and Poland, and consequently the rest of European their NATO allies.