Resistance and Infrastructure-Denial Training Study

Executive Summary

Russian doctrine treats the 65km Suwalki corridor between Kaliningrad and Belarus as the seam to close in a Baltic war, isolating Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia under the Kaliningrad missile umbrella. Russian forces depend heavily on rail for fuel and ammunition, and Ukraine has shown that sustained strikes on railways, bridges, and signal cabinets delay advances by days and force troops into rear-area protection. The Baltic Defence Line, in place since 2024, is static and imposes no attrition once a corridor is contested. Lithuania has a volunteer auxiliary (the Riflemen Union and the National Defence Volunteer Force, KASP) and a small Special Operations component, but no published pipeline preparing vetted reservists for resistance and infrastructure denial on home soil under wartime law. References exist: Ukrainian SSO, Polish JW GROM, UK SAS, and the LITPOLUKRBRIG format. The recommended next step is a Ministry of National Defence study, with Seimas oversight, defining scope, legal predicate (Article 142 wartime regime), vetting, and KASP / NATO integration. Structure is for Lithuania to determine.

The Problem

The Suwalki Gap is the only land link between Poland and the Baltic States. Russian planning treats Belarus as an extension of the Western Military District and assumes a synchronised pincer from Kaliningrad and Belarus could sever the corridor in the opening days of a war, after which sea and air reinforcement would be heavily contested by S-400 air defence and Iskander missiles based in Kaliningrad. The Baltic Defence Line of bunkers and obstacles, in place since 2024, slows but does not stop a determined breakthrough.

Lithuania has a small Special Operations element and a large volunteer auxiliary (the Riflemen Union and KASP), but the Statute of the Lithuanian Riflemen Union does not assign an offensive sabotage role, and there is no published training pipeline that prepares vetted reservists for resistance and infrastructure-denial tasks on home soil. The gap is doctrinal and legal as much as technical.

Without action: If a corridor is contested and Lithuania has no trained resistance cadre, the country relies entirely on conventional NATO reinforcement crossing a contested seam. Allies arrive into a rear area that imposes no friction on the attacker.