From NATO exercises in Lapland to underground shelters, new border fencing and economically isolated communities, Finland is adapting to a security landscape transformed by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
In the forests around Rovaniemi, the imagined enemy is advancing into Finland from the north-east. Nobody involved in the exercise needs to name the country represented by the attacking force. Cold Response 2026 brought more than 32,000 troops from 14 NATO countries to Norway and Finland. Above the Arctic Circle, soldiers trained to defend positions and move through deep snow, freezing temperatures and immense distances. The exercise was designed to test not only combat readiness but also the ability of allied forces to operate together in one of Europe’s most demanding environments. For Finland, however, the scenario is more than an abstract military exercise. The country shares an eastern border of approximately 1,340 kilometres with Russia. For decades, Finnish security policy was built around military non-alignment, a powerful national defence system and a carefully managed relationship with its eastern neighbour. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine overturned that balance. Finland joined NATO on 4 April 2023, becoming the alliance’s 31st member. Sweden followed in March 2024, transforming the strategic map of Northern Europe and giving the Nordic countries an unprecedented degree of military integration.
A new generation prepares for an old threat
Cold Response revealed a generation of young Nordic soldiers whose understanding of national defence has been shaped by the return of large-scale war to Europe. Young Finnish reservists participating in the exercise described military service as a responsibility shared across society. Finland maintains general conscription for men, while women may volunteer. After completing their initial service, conscripts enter a large reserve that can be mobilised in a crisis. Several participants said the invasion of Ukraine had changed how they regarded that responsibility. Defending the country was no longer a remote possibility associated with the experiences of grandparents. It had become something for which they believed they might genuinely need to prepare. Soldiers arriving from elsewhere in the Nordic region expressed a similar shift in attitude. They regarded the defence of Finland as a collective obligation rather than a purely Finnish concern. Some acknowledged that they would be afraid if called to fight, but added that neutrality no longer appeared morally or strategically sustainable when another Nordic ally was threatened. This emerging Nordic defence culture combines national traditions with NATO’s principle of collective security. Finland contributes its conscription system, extensive reserve and experience of operating in forests and sub-zero conditions. Norway brings its long-standing role in NATO’s northern defence. Sweden adds advanced military technology, strategically important territory and control of the island of Gotland. Cold Response is therefore not simply a winter warfare exercise. It is part of the construction of a more integrated Nordic security region extending from the Baltic Sea to the Arctic.
A country built to endure a crisis
Finland’s preparations are not limited to its armed forces. Since the Second World War, the country has developed one of Europe’s most extensive systems of civil protection. According to Finland’s Ministry of the Interior, the country has approximately 50,500 civil-defence shelters with room for 4.8 million people. Most are reinforced-concrete shelters inside privately owned buildings. During normal life, these spaces may function as storage facilities, sports halls, metro stations or underground car parks. Finnish regulations require them to be capable of conversion to emergency use within 72 hours. This dual-purpose design reflects a fundamental feature of Finnish preparedness: readiness is embedded in ordinary infrastructure rather than confined to military bases. The change in the security climate is also affecting civilian behaviour. Volunteer reservist groups have reportedly attracted more participants since 2022. Some members meet regularly for physical training, weapons practice and other forms of preparedness. Participants describe the war in Ukraine as a warning that Finland cannot assume peace will continue indefinitely. For others, preparation has entered the home. Residents in the eastern regions have installed cameras and alarm systems, created spaces from which they can follow international events and experimented with drones during voluntary defence training. The perceived threat is not necessarily an armoured invasion across the frontier. The spread of long-range missiles and inexpensive attack drones in Ukraine has demonstrated that danger may also arrive from the air.
The border closes
The new tension is most visible along Finland’s eastern frontier. From August 2023, more than 1,300 third-country nationals arrived at the Finnish border from Russia without the documentation normally required for entry. Finnish authorities concluded that foreign officials or other actors were facilitating what the government describes as instrumentalised migration: the deliberate movement of people towards a border to exert political pressure and create instability. Finland progressively closed its eastern land crossings. They have remained closed until further notice, separating communities and families that had previously moved regularly between the two countries. The Finnish Border Guard is also constructing a barrier along approximately 200 kilometres of the most sensitive sections of the frontier. It is not intended to cover the entire border, much of which passes through forests, wetlands and sparsely inhabited northern territory. Instead, the fence is concentrated primarily in south-eastern Finland, where surveillance and rapid intervention are considered particularly important. By February 2026, more than 100 kilometres had been completed in the south-east, with the overall project scheduled for completion by the end of the year. The barrier is not presented as an impenetrable wall. Its purpose is to delay unauthorised crossings, direct movement towards areas where it can be monitored and give border patrols more time to respond.
Imatra and the economic price of isolation
The consequences are particularly severe in Imatra, a small city only a few kilometres from the Russian border. For decades, its geographical position made it a centre for tourism, retail, transport and cross-border commerce. St Petersburg lies approximately 200 kilometres away. Russian visitors once came to shop, stay in local hotels and use Finnish services, while goods and workers travelled in both directions. That economy has largely disappeared. Empty freight wagons on the railway towards St Petersburg have become a symbol of the change. Trains that once carried Russian timber now stand unused, while businesses and workers formerly dependent on cross-border trade face an uncertain future. Residents describe high unemployment, declining commercial activity and a city that can sometimes feel abandoned. Some would like the crossings to reopen, arguing that ordinary people should not be held personally responsible for the actions of the Russian government. They recognise Russia as a security concern but also remember it as a longstanding commercial partner with which border communities had learned to coexist. Others believe the frontier should remain closed indefinitely. For families with memories of the Winter War, today’s tension is connected to a much older trauma. When the Soviet Union invaded Finland in November 1939, the country resisted for 105 days. Although Finland preserved its independence, it lost around a tenth of its territory. Approximately 400,000 people were displaced from the ceded regions. In many Finnish families, these events are not distant history: parents or grandparents were among those forced to leave their homes. People living only hundreds of metres from the present border therefore view the possibility of aggression through stories inherited within their own families. Some see the fence and the closed crossings not as excessive precautions but as protections against the repetition of a national catastrophe.
Families divided by geopolitics
The closure is particularly painful for the more than 30,000 people believed to hold both Finnish and Russian citizenship. Before the restrictions, residents of south-eastern Finland could cross the frontier quickly to visit relatives, work or maintain homes and businesses. A journey from Imatra to St Petersburg could take little more than two hours. Now the same trip may require a train to an airport, a flight to a third country and another flight back towards north-western Russia. A destination only 200 kilometres away has become an exhausting international detour. One dual citizen living in Imatra described being effectively cut off from an elderly and seriously ill parent in St Petersburg. The resident, who also had Ukrainian family roots and opposed the invasion, felt that the restrictions imposed punishment based on identity rather than individual actions. Such cases reveal the moral complexity of border security. Finland must protect itself against a state it considers willing to employ hybrid pressure. At the same time, the countermeasures affect people who may have no connection to the Kremlin and who regard Finland as their home.
When security begins to divide society
The most dangerous consequence may be a gradual erosion of trust. Some residents of the border region now openly distrust Russian citizens, including long-established neighbours and people with dual nationality. The fear produced by the war risks turning national origin into a measure of assumed loyalty. That response is understandable in a region marked by invasion, displacement and decades of uneasy coexistence. Yet it also presents Finland with a difficult challenge. A resilient society requires more than military readiness, shelters and fences. It must be able to distinguish between the actions of a hostile government and the identities of individuals living within its borders. Finland’s comprehensive approach to security has always depended on social cohesion. If suspicion divides local communities, one of the country’s most important defensive strengths could begin to weaken.
The frontier of a changed Europe
Finland’s eastern border now concentrates many of the defining tensions of contemporary Northern Europe. In Lapland, multinational forces rehearse the defence of the High North. Beneath Helsinki, civilian shelters wait behind the familiar façades of ordinary urban life. Along the frontier, a new barrier cuts through forests once crossed by travellers, workers and families. In Imatra, silent railway wagons recall an economy built around a relationship that has abruptly collapsed. Finland is unquestionably better prepared than most European countries for a military or civil emergency. Its conscription system, reserve, shelters and culture of preparedness provide an extraordinary degree of resilience. NATO membership has added the commitment of allied forces to that national capacity. Yet security carries a price. It is paid by struggling border towns, divided families and communities learning to live with permanent suspicion. The Finnish frontier is therefore more than the line separating NATO territory from Russia. It is a place where historical memory, Arctic defence, economic survival and individual rights now collide—and where Northern Europe is discovering what preparedness means in an age when peace can no longer be taken for granted.
Suggested Online Sources
Intermin.fi
Valtioneuvosto.fi/en/situation-at-finlands-eastern-border
Raja.fi/en/the-eastern-border-barrier-fence
Um.fi/current-affairs
