Finland's eastern flank is being built to last, not to wait

In the space of three months Finland finished a border fence, extended the law that keeps its land border with Russia shut, and took in a NATO land force commanded by Sweden. Read one at a time, each looks like a response to events. Read together, they show a state organising its eastern frontier on the assumption that the present standoff will last at least until the end of the decade. The limit on that plan is fiscal rather than political.

The border closure now has a 2028 horizon

Finland began closing crossing points on its eastern border on 16 November 2023. By the end of that month all eight were shut. Four reopened briefly on 12 December and were closed again two days later. The government's stated reason was a sharp rise in arrivals of third-country nationals from Russia without visas; it counted more than 1,300 from the beginning of August 2023. Helsinki described the flow as instrumentalised migration.

The legal basis has since been extended step by step. The Border Security Act, which allows the government to restrict the receipt of asylum applications in a defined area, came into force on 22 July 2024. In June 2025 its validity was extended to 31 December 2026. On 4 June 2026 the government decided that the crossing points would stay closed until further notice. On 3 September it went further and proposed extending the act to 31 December 2028. Since April 2024 applications for international protection have been accepted only at air and sea crossings.

Moscow has not reopened its side either. On 1 July 2026 Russia published a decree suspending movement through seven railway checkpoints, five of them on the Finnish border, including Vyborg and Svetogorsk. Russian officials gave no reason and described the measure as temporary, Euronews reported. Aleksey Zhuravlyov, first deputy chair of the State Duma's defence committee, accused Finland of turning into what he called "a second Ukraine". With the rail crossings shut, the land border is now closed from both directions.

A fence for the places that matter most

The Finnish Border Guard announced on 7 September 2026 that the eastern border fence was complete. It covers 200 km of a 1,340 km border and was placed where a risk assessment found the operational need greatest and construction most cost-efficient. It consists of a 4.5-metre fence, a technical surveillance system, a patrol road network and a 25-metre cleared strip. The project cost €356m, €22m below its budget, after pilot sections at Imatra and Salla in 2023 and full construction in 2024–26.

The fence does not seal the border, and was never meant to. About 85 per cent of the frontier remains unfenced. What the fence changes is the cost of the scenario Finland most feared in 2023: large groups arriving at or near crossing points in the south-east. It is a permanent structure with running costs. It is not what a government builds if it expects the crossings to reopen soon.

What NATO's ninth land force adds

Forward Land Forces Finland, agreed at NATO's 2024 Washington summit, was launched on 6 June 2026. It is the ninth such multinational formation on the eastern flank. Its structure is unusual. The combat element is a Swedish battalion battlegroup of about 600 personnel, expandable to 1,200, based at the Norrbotten Regiment in Boden, in northern Sweden. A multinational staff element sits in Rovaniemi, in Finnish Lapland. The force is under the Supreme Allied Commander Europe, within the area of Joint Force Command Norfolk.

The Barents Observer lists the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Denmark and Iceland as contributors alongside Sweden. Finland's defence minister, Antti Häkkänen, said the arrangement would give allies an opportunity to exercise land warfare in Arctic conditions; the Rovajärvi firing range in Lapland is the obvious venue. His Swedish counterpart, Pål Jonson, praised the speed of the work with Finland and NATO.

Two points follow. First, the force is small and mostly stationed in Sweden. It is a tripwire and a framework for reinforcement, not a garrison. Finland's own wartime army remains the main defence of its territory. Second, it binds Sweden into the defence of Finnish Lapland in peacetime, which gives Stockholm a direct stake in the northern front. The Barents Observer also reports Russian plans to expand forces in the Leningrad Military District facing Finland; it attributes those figures to Moscow's own plans, and they have not been independently verified.

Money and manpower

Finland's commitment dates from April 2025, when the government decided to raise defence spending to at least 3 per cent of GDP by 2029, adding about €3.7bn over four years. The 2027 budget proposal, finalised on 2 September 2026, raises the Ministry of Defence's appropriations by €618m over 2026, adds €1.3bn in authorisations for materiel procurement and proposes €200m in further support for Ukraine. It is the last budget proposal of Petteri Orpo's government before next year's parliamentary election.

The constraint is visible in the same document. The total budget is €92.5bn and the deficit €12.4bn. The government itself said the deficit was being widened chiefly by interest payments and by defence and security spending. Defence growth is now being financed by borrowing at a time when the cost of that borrowing is also rising. The government formed after next year's parliamentary election will inherit both the NATO targets and the debt path.

Manpower is cheaper to expand than equipment. From 1 January 2026 Finland raised the upper age of reserve liability to 65, an extension of 15 years for the rank and file and five for officers and NCOs. The Ministry of Defence expects the reserve to grow by about 125,000 over five years and reach roughly one million by 2031. The change enlarges the pool from which the wartime army is drawn; it does not train anyone new, and the value of older reservists depends on refresher training that the budget must also fund.

Sweden's role is now structural

Sweden's commitment is on a similar scale. In March 2025 Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson announced a target of 3.5 per cent of GDP for defence by 2030, backed by about SEK 300bn of loan-financed investment, the Barents Observer reported. One of two mechanised brigades being built for subarctic warfare is based in Boden, the same garrison that hosts the NATO battlegroup. Sweden's north is becoming the rear area and staging ground for Finnish Lapland.

What to watch

Three things will show whether this posture holds. The first is the parliamentary vote on extending the Border Security Act, and any legal challenge to the practice of refusing asylum applications at the land border. The second is whether the NATO battlegroup grows from its initial 600 towards 1,200, and whether more of it is stationed on Finnish soil. The third is the fiscal plan the next Finnish government writes in 2027. The border arrangements are built for the long term. Whether the budget can carry them for as long is the less certain part.

Sources

• Finnish Government — Situation at Finland's eastern border
• Finnish Border Guard — The eastern border fence is completed
• Euronews — Russia closes railway border crossings with Finland, Estonia and Latvia
• The Barents Observer — NATO activates forward land forces presence in Lapland
• Finnish Government — Finland to raise defence spending to at least three percent of GDP
• Yle — Orpo's government agrees final state budget, emphasis on defence and economic growth
• Finnish Ministry of Defence (via GlobalSecurity) — Finland to raise reservist age limit to 65 years as of 2026
• The Barents Observer — Sweden unveils historical military rearmament plan