Swedish security could become more fragile after a Ukraine peace agreement, Sweden’s Minister for Defence (Minister for Defence) Pål Jonson said in an interview with SVT published on 31 December 2025, warning that any deal could allow Russia to redeploy forces toward the Baltic Sea region and intensify pressure on Sweden and its NATO allies.
What Jonson says Russia could do in the Baltic Sea region
Jonson argued that Russia’s war in Ukraine is currently limiting Moscow’s ability to pose an immediate military threat in Northern Europe, because the Kremlin is consuming large quantities of personnel and materiel on the battlefield. A peace deal or ceasefire, he said, could change that balance by freeing resources for redeployment closer to Sweden’s neighbourhood, including the Baltic Sea.
Jonson also stressed that any settlement should be shaped “as far as possible” on Ukraine’s terms, while acknowledging that even a deal favourable to Kyiv would still reduce Russia’s operational constraints compared with a full-scale war.
Signs of military build-up near St Petersburg
According to Jonson, Sweden is already seeing indications that Russia is preparing military infrastructure for additional troops in areas around St Petersburg. He said he could not rule out a deterioration in the security situation once Russia regains freedom of action after a ceasefire or peace agreement.
The warning echoes a broader pattern in Nordic and Baltic threat assessments: Russia’s conventional forces may be degraded by the Ukraine war, but Moscow is expected to continue rebuilding and adapting its posture along NATO’s northern flank.
A Nordic warning about troop shifts after a ceasefire
Jonson’s comments come as other Nordic leaders have raised similar concerns. Finland’s Prime Minister Petteri Orpo has warned that Russia could redeploy troops closer to NATO borders in Finland and the Baltic states if fighting in Ukraine slows or ends.
For Sweden, the risk is not only about the number of troops Russia could move, but also about what that shift would mean for the wider military balance in the Baltic Sea region, where air defence, long-range strike systems and naval access are closely linked.
Sweden’s NATO posture after 7 March 2024
Sweden joined NATO on 7 March 2024, ending a long period of military non-alignment and embedding Swedish defence planning within the alliance’s deterrence and collective defence framework.
Since joining, Sweden has accelerated investments in air defence, naval capabilities and readiness, while the government has also pointed to a rapid rise in defence spending under NATO accounting. The Swedish government has forecast defence expenditure of about 2.4% of GDP in 2025, and it has also announced plans to lift spending further to around 2.8% of GDP in 2026.
In Swedish defence planning, the Baltic Sea—and strategically important territory such as Gotland—has become even more central, both for Sweden’s own security and for NATO’s ability to reinforce the region in a crisis.
Hybrid threats and the undersea cables problem
Even without a large-scale military redeployment, Sweden and its neighbours have been dealing with a rise in hybrid threats, including suspected sabotage and disruption of critical infrastructure.
At the end of December, Finnish authorities seized a cargo vessel suspected of damaging undersea telecommunications cables in the Baltic Sea, in a case that has renewed focus on vulnerability in the region’s seabed infrastructure. The episode added to concerns that Russia-linked tactics could seek to test Western resilience through deniable, non-military pressure.
