GERMAN, U.S. MILITARY ASSISTANCE TAKES SHAPE.

A group of U.S. Army special-purpose troops is in Lithuania this week to assist that country’s nascent special force and to prepare for a joint exercise code-named Winter Forest. The undertaking is part of the U.S.-Lithuanian program known as Military-to-Military, financed by the United States. Lithuania’s Vytautas the Great infantry battalion, based in Kaunas, was earmarked last year for development as a crack force to be trained for special combat operations.

In Germany last week, senior Defense Ministry officials and army and navy commanders received separate Latvian and Estonian military delegations headed by the two countries’ chiefs of staff, Juris Arness and Vello Loemaa. The talks focused on the training of Latvian and Estonia cadets and officers in German military schools, the provision of German military advisers to the two countries’ armies, and German assistance for the development of their navies. (10) The Baltic states are developing military cooperation with the West not only collectively, but also on a country-to-country basis. However, the bilateral programs indirectly advance inter-Baltic military cooperation and serve as stepping stones toward the three countries’ common goal of joining NATO.

Russian Duma Deputies Claim Baltic Fleet, Sevastopol.