Page 33 - North Atlantic and Nordic Defense

North European and North Atlantic Defense: The Challenges Return

http://www.sldinfo.com/greenland-and-the-arctic-the-emergence-of-a-new-sovereign-state/

The Danish government has just recently released their defense agreement proposal to parliament, and this
agreement highlights the need for increased Danish expenditures and focus on defense, in light of regional
developments.

During my visit this October to Denmark, Admiral Wang focused on what he believes is the nature of the
Russian military threat to Denmark as well as the importance of integrated air-naval modernization to address
what he called a “reverse engineering” approach to deterring the Russian A2/AD threat throughout one might
call the Nordic Zone of Security.

He discussed a briefing he gave last month to the Parliament' s Defence Committee which addressed the
question of whether investing in the Danish submarine force was a priority.

According to an article written by Anders Puck Nielsen and published September 21, 2017:

The Defense Commission of the Danish parliament yesterday conducted a hearing on the question of
whether Denmark should reintroduce submarines and sea mines in the naval arsenal.

Both were phased out in 2005 but especially the importance of submarines has been a question of
intense debate ever since.

Rear Admiral Nils Wang, commandant of the Danish Defence College, made some headlines in local
newspapers with a statement from the hearing that an investment in submarines would be “a flagrant
waste of money”.

Wang’s argument was that a military conflict in the Baltic area would encompass a Russian invasion of
the Baltic states and a subsequent Russian defensive posture in the Eastern part of the Baltic basin.

Denmark would thus find itself in a position where the navy must play the offensive role in a mission to
escort troops to the Baltic states under the support of allied forces counting several carrier strike
groups located in the North Sea.

In this scenario Wang primarily sees a need for area air defense, land attack strike missiles, a range of
anti-submarine warfare (ASW) assets, and mine counter measures (MCM).

However, Wang does not see a role for submarines in this scenario as, supposedly, they do not give any
particular advantage in ASW in littoral areas.

https://romeosquared.eu/2017/09/21/danish-admiral-says-submarines-are-flagrant-waste-of-money/

In our discussion, Rear Admiral Wang contrasted how he saw the Soviet-Warsaw Pact threat as opposed to
the contemporary and evolving Russian threat.

The Soviet-Warsaw threat was one of invasion and occupation and then using Nordic territory to fight U.S.
and allied forces in the North Atlantic.

In many ways, this would have been a repeat of how the Nazis seized Norway during a combined arms
amphibious operation combined with a land force walk into Denmark.

Page 32