© Michele Ursi/ShutterstockState border between Lithuania and the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad
So Lithuania, with an army of just 8,850 active-duty personnel and 5,650 reservists, is now enforcing a blockade of sorts against Russia through Kaliningrad. The latter was seized from Germany at the end of World War II and ended up separated from the rest of Russia after the Baltic States seceded from the Soviet Union. Vilnius is forbidding transport of coal, metals, electronics, and other E.U.-sanctioned products to Kaliningrad, whose governor said that roughly half of the territory's typical imports were on the ban list. Lithuanian officials claimed to be only "following orders," as it were, from a higher authority. Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda announced:
"We just implement the sanctions, which were imposed on European Union level, and this has nothing to do with the bilateral relations between Russia and Lithuania."With Russian flights over E.U. territory also prohibited, resupply of the isolated oblast is possible only by sea. For Moscow, blocking internal transit, even transit conducted through a third country, could be a casus belli.
Comment: It is often the chihuahua that starts the dog fight.