How Estonia Is Planning for the Worst

When Russia invaded Ukraine a year ago, it was shocked to find Ukrainians of all kinds were willing to defend their country—some by serving in the military, others by keeping civil society going. The will to defend is, in fact, decisive for countries facing aggression. But while many people may support the idea that their country should be defended, governments must channel such willingness into practical tasks, and then demonstrate to the prospective aggressor that the country is willing and able to thwart any attack.

Finns are famously willing to defend their country. In the most recent annual survey conducted by the Finnish Ministry of Defense, 82 percent declared themselves willing to take on tasks—military or civilian—supporting the country’s defense in the event of invasion.

But Finland has prepared itself for this ever since it was last invaded, during World War II. With Ukrainians demonstrating—as the Finns did during the Winter War of 1939-40—the extreme importance of a will to defend that encompasses every part of society, neighboring Estonia is trying to create one, too. Its Prime Minister, Kaja Kallas, who received a resounding vote of confidence on Estonia’s parliamentary elections on March 5, has set the tone by standing her ground against Moscow.

Estonia also faces the same challenge as other countries: What tasks can ordinary civilians carry out in support of the military?

“In the past, building defense willingness was mostly a byproduct of general public outreach and communication,” Helmuth Martin Reisner, director of defense resolve at Estonia’s Defense Ministry, told me. “But our new permanent secretary wanted to make our approach to defense willingness more structured and coordinated, with an emphasis on measuring impact. For example, we want our reservists to be highly motivated and ready to defend Estonia, and we want our society to support our service-members and the armed resistance against an aggressor.”

Reisner is the official in charge of making this happen. His position was created earlier this year, and he must not only create that resolve but also ensure civilians’ participation in resisting aggression is properly coordinated and linked to military efforts. A national will to defend that merely amounts to individual Good Samaritan efforts won’t deter an aggressor.

But a country full of people willing to defend their homeland in different ways, who are trained to do so, and whose efforts are coordinated by the government will signal to a prospective aggressor that attacking may not be worth the effort. That’s what Finland has so successfully been able to communicate to Russia.

Estonia also surveys its population—citizens and non-citizens alike—annually on matters of national security. In the most recent poll, conducted a short while after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, 81 percent of the population believed that armed resistance in case of an attack against their country was definitely or somewhat necessary, 9 percent more than in 2021. Two-thirds said they were very or somewhat willing to participate in defensive activities according to their capabilities and skills, 10 percent more than in 2021.

Worryingly, however, 31 percent said they’d try to leave if the country were attacked, compared to 55 percent who would stay. (Among non-Estonian citizens, the percentage wanting to leave was particularly high: 40 percent.) And only one-third said they would know what to do in case of an attack by a hostile state. The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak, one might conclude.

Reisner’s job is thus to strengthen the flesh: to make it easier for Estonia’s residents to not just believe in defense but want to contribute to it. One question that has baffled the Defense Ministry is why Estonian reservists—everyone who has completed military service—overwhelmingly support military defense but are reluctant to participate in exercises. “The main barrier is related to the person’s income level; the second is health; and the third is lack of support from family members,” Reisner said.

While the ministry can’t do much about the level of supportiveness from spouses or a reservist’s health, it can try to improve the always-difficult arrangement between reservists’ civilian employers and the military. “We’re speaking with different employers to find out how to motivate private enterprises to be more supportive,” Reisner told me. “It might be tax deductions if you continue paying the full salary for reservists on exercises, a commendation like the Michelin star, or some other type of incentive.”

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Estonia also faces the same challenge as other countries: What tasks can ordinary civilians carry out in support of the military? Yes, they can improvise after disaster has struck, and Ukrainians are powerfully demonstrating that citizens can quickly form ad hoc groups after an invasion. But since other countries have the benefit of time, they would do well to map out such tasks, and train people for them, before disaster strikes.

This month, Reisner’s team will poll Estonians to discern what types of roles—from frontline to support—they would be willing to fulfill. “But there isn’t always a role for every form of civilian expertise in a conflict,” Reisner admitted. “What’s the exact role of an HR specialist in a war? There may be one, but that’s not the case for every line of work.”

During the Cold War, Sweden was the unsurpassed master of such total-defense planning and training. All levels of government maintained a regularly updated list of positions that would need to be filled in case of war. If a key civilian position—a power-plant engineer, say, or a doctor or teacher—needed to be maintained during a war, those people would not be called up to military service.

Conversely, people with certain wartime-applicable skills—soldiers, of course, but also civilians such as journalists who could help the government’s wartime communications—had so-called war placements: duties they were scheduled to take up if war broke out.

When Russia invaded Ukraine, civilian Ukrainians improvised to form groups supporting the military effort and the daily running of society. Russia, meanwhile, planned the invasion so poorly that its mobilization and the resulting departure of several hundred thousand other men has left Russian workplaces with a labor shortage. (Because Russia lacks a total-defense plan, I predicted this shortage would occur.)

Today, software engineers and social-media influencers could play an important role in a country’s defense too.

Sweden’s Cold War-era war placement scheme remains the best in class, but in the past three decades many countries’ economies have radically changed. Today, software engineers and social-media influencers could play an important role in a country’s defense too.

What’s more, people with civilian expertise that’s less useful in wars and conflicts could learn a second skill as part of the country’s defense efforts—and could quite possibly enjoy doing it. To this day, Swedes can join auxiliary defense organizations and gain skills ranging from radio communications to dog-training in support of the defense effort.

With relations with Russia at a low point, Estonia will have to build its population’s will to defend—cultivating not just abstract support of the country’s defense but willingness to be part of it—in record time. The fact that it’s starting with a less homogenous society than Finland further complicates the task.

First, the country has a large ethnic Russian population dating back to Soviet times, around one quarter of the total population. Further, these days the country is also home to many expats, especially in the tech industry, and most recently has welcomed tens of thousands of Ukrainian refugees. While the ethnic Russians were long sympathetic to Russia and Russian President Vladimir Putin, the ongoing war has caused a significant drop in that allegiance. That drop, though, doesn’t automatically translate into support for Estonian defense efforts.

Ethnic Russians, Ukrainian refugees, and tech expats are likely to have different views on Estonia than ethnic Estonians do. That doesn’t mean they can’t be part of collective efforts to keep the country safe, but attracting and organizing their cooperation may be more of a challenge.

Estonia thus illustrates the multiethnic composition of many Western societies today—and to successfully develop a national will to defend, such countries must be able to marshal the potential of all their different groups. That makes a country’s effort to create defense resolve a matter of interest not just for the country itself but for other Western countries too. In Ukraine, on Feb. 24, 2022, the flesh turned out to be as strong as the spirit. Estonia must now achieve the same goal—before an attack.