Russia to Create “Coastal Defense Division” 50 Miles from Alaska


The new division is expected to be in place by 2018, and will be responsible for protecting Russia’s Far East, which stretches from the Alaskan border to the Kuril Islands, which Japan also feels they own. Never mind the fact that this part of Russia hardly has any people living there.

It has been no secret that Russia is building up its forces in the Arctic region as the Kremlin covets and wants to protect future access to the natural resources in the region.

Russia is also actively preparing to militarize its eastern coastline with large numbers of troops to be garrisoned from near the U.S. border in Alaska to the Kuril Islands in the south, currently disputed with Japan. The new forces scheduled to arrive in 2018 will be as close as 85km to the US border.

Speaking at a Defense Ministry meeting on Tuesday, Sergei Shoigu confirmed that “there are plans to form a coastal defense division in 2018 on the Chukotka operational direction.”

The minister added that this decision was actually made in July 2015, and is part of a plan to establish a unified system of coastal defense stretching from the Arctic in the north to the Primorye Territory in the south.

The system, according to Mr. Shoigu, is intended “to ensure control of the closed sea zones of the Kuril Islands and the Bering Strait, cover the routes of Pacific Fleet forces’ deployment in the Far Eastern and Northern sea zones, and increase the combat viability of naval strategic nuclear forces” operating in the area.

In other words, the new division will help ensure the defense of Russia’s sparsely populated eastern coast, reports Russian state news agency Sputnik.

Sputnik also quoted some rather threatening comments by Russian military analyst, Sergei Ishchenko, in detailing this deployment. “And most important, of course, is the air base.

There’s so much American fear surrounding anything that Russia says or does. The real question Americans need to ask is whether or not they’re actually trying to pick a fight with America or if lingering Cold War paranoia and hatred spewed by the Obama Administration is creating a sense of irrationality. Anything is possible.

Source: Washington Times

Photo: VITALY V. KUZMIN, WIKIMEDIA COMMONS.



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