How Estonians are managing the threat of a Russian invasion

The Home Cafe Days, or Kodukohvikute paevad in Estonian, are the summer highlight on the island of Hiiumaa. Every August, the residents of Estonia's second-largest Baltic Sea island open up their homes for three days and offer up home-baked cakes, home-smoked fish and home-brewed beer. They celebrate their short summer amid children's laughter and pop music.

Ave Ungro, 44, thinks the festival is "extremely important," especially now in times of war. "It helps us Estonians stick together: Celebrating together, talking, thinking about the future," she told DW.


She said that Kodukohvikute paevad was as important as the shooting lessons provided by the Women's Voluntary Defense Organization, or Naiskodukaitse. Ungro has been a member since the start of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

"Like most Estonians, probably, I was in shock on February 24, 2022. Mainly because of the realization that the life we had known so far could no longer go on in the same way," she said.

Ungro decided to shape her new life and prepare her family, her island and her country for a possible Russian attack.

Training to defend Estonia
Since then, the speech therapist has spent 48 hours a year training with the Naiskodukaitse and has already completed five different programs: Safety, first aid, military skills, field catering and the history of the Estonian volunteer defense league.

"I did pick up a weapon in the military part," she said. "But I didn't shoot once."

She hopes that she will never have to make use of her military training. If the worst happens, she would prefer to be involved in evacuations.

The Naiskodukaitse was founded in 1927, banned during the Soviet era and reestablished after Estonia regained independence in 1991. It is part of the Kaitseliit, a larger volunteer defense league comprised of well-trained armed civilians intended to support the regular armed forces in times of war. Both units are accountable to the Estonian Defense Ministry.

Ungro said she's not afraid of a Russian attack. She knows that her island in the Baltic Sea is strategically important, since it lies between the Russian city of St. Petersburg and the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad and could potentially be invaded, but she said that despite what certain Western media outlets had reported, there was no feeling of fear.

Estonia invests 'a great deal in security' Marek Kohv from the International Center for Defence and Security also doubts that Hiiumaa could become a second Crimea, which was annexed by Russia in 2014. He told DW that Hiiumaa and Estonia in 2025 could not be compared with Crimea and Ukraine in 2014.

He said Estonia might be a small country, but what was important was "that we invest a great deal in security."

Indeed, Estonia, an EU member, already invests 3.4% of its GDP in defense. This is set to rise to 5.4% by 2029, breaking a record among NATO states.

Kohv explained that Estonia's culture of self-defense was deeply rooted. "And we have regional allies such as Finland, the new NATO member, but also other Baltic states such as Lithuania and Latvia, as well as Poland, the military superpower in Europe."

He added that Estonia's membership of NATO was crucial — thanks to Article 5 and the principle of collective defense, any attack on Estonia would be considered an attack on NATO as a whole, and other armies would be implicated.

He also pointed out that Western military technology was superior to Russian technology. He said the idea that Russia could attack Estonia with nuclear weapons was an empty threat, considering that the proximity of St. Petersburg, which would also be affected by radioactivity in the event of a strike.

Acts of sabotage and GPS jamming
What analysts say is of more acute importance than a theoretical Russian attack on Baltic states are the very real acts of Russian sabotage, such as repeated damage to undersea communication cables or the jamming of GPS signals that can cause aircraft to disappear from the radar.

This happened to two planes flying from Finland to Estonia in April 2024. Both had to return to Helsinki after their GPS signals were seemingly interfered with.

Ships in the Baltic Sea have also been affected — and these problems are increasing. Western intelligence services suspect the jamming activities to be controlled from nearby Kaliningrad.

Kaliningrad is a 'dagger pointed at Europe'Russia has a lot of military equipment stored there, including nuclear-capable Iskander missiles, said political scientist Sergey Sukhankin from the Saratoga Foundation, a US-based nonprofit.

Calling Kaliningrad, where he was born, a "dagger pointed at Europe," he explained that not only was the enclave located between the EU states of Lithuania and Poland but it was once "a bastion of the Soviet military, one of the most militarized places in the world." Today, Kaliningrad is regaining that status.

Back at Home Cafe Days, Ungro isn't thrilled about her regional neighbors and acknowledges how serious the acts of sabotage are, but she would not dream of leaving her "magical" island.

After the festival, she showed DW her "secret spot" on the coast, a headland surrounded almost entirely by water on all sides.

"Look, a sea eagle," she called out. "What a beautiful place! So many birds. It's so quiet here. That's the beauty of Hiiumaa. And it should stay that way."