Cooperation & Integration in the Light of Maritime Strategic Challenges

Frederiksberg Palace, Copenhagen

The 2018 Baltic Sea Strategy Forum was hosted by the Centre for Military Studies at the University of Copenhagen on 27 September 2018. It took place in a time of significant security concerns in and around the Baltic Sea area. As a result of the evolving security landscape, including the role of Russia, NATO and EU addressed various defence and security initiatives at high level meetings this summer - with different outcomes and decisions to be implemented and processed subsequently. The combination of external threats and challenges and internal changes in the conditions for Western defence policy, notably ‘techflation’, means that especially the smaller nations, but increasingly also the larger ones will see international defence cooperation as an attractive and important element in their future defence policies.

This is particularly the case for the Baltic Sea area where a relatively small sea is adjoined by a large number of nations with increasingly common security concerns. Baltic Sea defence and security policy issues are thus to a large extent international from the outset – both in terms of ‘downstream’ cooperation on defence and security activities (operations, exercises, training, information sharing, etc.), and in terms of ‘upstream’ cooperation on capability development, planning, education, and so on. For this reason the Baltic Sea Strategy Forum 2018 convened scholars, researchers and military personnel (MoD, Joint Staffs, Naval Staffs), from around the Baltic Sea and beyond, with a view to discuss and identify conditions and potentials for defence and security cooperation – focused on, but not limited to, the maritime domain - in the Baltic Sea context.

The Baltic Sea Strategy Forum is an annual symposium convened on a rotating basis by the institutional members of the steering committee – Åbo Akademi University, the Swedish Defence University, the Institute for Security Policy at Kiel University and the Centre for Military Studies at the University of Copenhagen – or by their partners. The symposium has a focus on strategy in the maritime domain ‘on the Baltic Sea and from the Baltic sea’ and brings together scholars and practitioners from nations around – or with an interest in – the Baltic Sea area, and aims to provide a useful platform for free, frank and innovative strategic debate.

View the 2017 Conference Documentation here:

Contact person:

Speakers and panelists

Dr. Henrik Ø. Breitenbauch
Dr. Henrik Ø. Breitenbauch Centre for Military Studies, University of Copenhagen
Karsten Friis
Karsten Friis Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, Oslo
RADM John E. Gumbleton
RADM John E. Gumbleton U.S. Naval Forces Europe/Africa/U.S. Sixth Fleet
Dr. Peter Haynes
Dr. Peter Haynes Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, Washington, D.C.
Kasper Høeg-Jensen
Kasper Høeg-Jensen Ministry of Defence, Denmark
Tomas Jermalavičius
Tomas Jermalavičius International Centre for Defence and Security, Tallinn
Timo S. Koster
Timo S. Koster Defence Policy & Capabilities, NATO, Brussels
Kristian Søby Kristensen
Kristian Søby Kristensen Centre for Military Studies, University of Copenhagen
Johannes Peters
Johannes Peters Center for Maritime Strategy & Security at the Institute for Security Policy, Kiel University
Professor Magnus Petersson
Professor Magnus Petersson Norwegian Institute for Defence Studies, Oslo
Dr. Gary John Schaub Jr
Dr. Gary John Schaub Jr Centre for Military Studies at the University of Copenhagen
RADM Frank Trojahn
RADM Frank Trojahn Defence Command Denmark
Scott C. Truver
Scott C. Truver Center for Naval Analyses, Washington D.C.

The Baltic Sea Strategy Forum is organized by

The Centre for Military Studies at the University of Copenhagen, Swedish Defence University, Åbo Akademi University and Institute for Security Policy at Kiel University.