Executive Summary
Open-source intelligence (OSINT) — verified findings drawn from social-media posts, commercial satellite imagery, flight and rail trackers, and court records — became decisive in the Ukraine war from 2022 onward. Bellingcat (UK-Netherlands civilian outlet built around the 2014 MH17 inquiry) and DeepState UA (Ukrainian-army-affiliated mapping platform now used as a default battle-status reference) showed that small, well-trained teams can track unit movements, document equipment losses, and build courtroom-grade evidence faster than classified channels alone. Lithuania has the raw material — Defence Intelligence (AOTD), State Security (VSD), DebunkEU.org, broadcaster LRT, and roughly 17,000 Riflemen Union volunteers — but no civilian-facing centre tying them together. The recommended next step is a feasibility study by the Ministry of National Defence with Seimas, AOTD, VSD, and civil-society input. It should weigh mandate boundaries against classified services, the 2020 Berkeley Protocol on Digital Open Source Investigations, partnership with NATO StratCom Riga, and targeting risk — the 15 April 2026 Russian MoD list naming Vilnius is the live precedent. Structure is for Lithuania to determine.
The Problem
Russian and Belarusian military activity along the eastern border, balloon and drone incursions, and persistent GPS jamming across the Baltic region all leave heavy public-domain footprints — Telegram posts, commercial satellite imagery, rail and flight data, leaked documents. Ukraine 2022-2026 showed that disciplined OSINT teams can track unit rotations, verify equipment losses, and document war crimes from these sources at a fraction of the cost of classified collection. The same techniques apply to monitoring Russian information operations targeting Lithuanian audiences in Lithuanian, Russian, and Polish.
Lithuanian OSINT capability is split across at least four players with different mandates: AOTD (military intelligence, classified outputs), VSD (state security, classified outputs), DebunkEU.org (Vilnius-based EU disinformation watchdog, civilian), and LRT investigative journalism. Independent analysts the project tracks in its bdi.db expert pool — Tatarigami_UA, ChrisO_wiki, Mick Ryan, Phillips O'Brien — operate from outside Lithuania entirely. There is no single Lithuanian-domiciled civilian OSINT centre that publishes verified products, trains analysts to the Berkeley Protocol standard, and feeds findings to the Seimas, the press, and allied partners.
Without action: Lithuania consumes OSINT produced elsewhere rather than producing it. War-crimes and incursion evidence relevant to Lithuanian territory is gathered, if at all, by foreign volunteers without chain-of-custody discipline. Disinformation aimed at Lithuanian audiences is rebutted late and from outside the country.
Lithuanian Context
Lithuania already hosts DebunkEU.org and partners closely with the NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence in Riga. The Lithuanian Riflemen Union (around 17,000 members) is a credible volunteer pool for distributed collection on the Berkeley Protocol model. Whether the right form is a new centre, an expanded DebunkEU.org mandate, a civilian arm of AOTD, or a Seimas-funded NGO is a Lithuanian determination.