Lithuania celebrated the topping-out ceremony on Wednesday for the staff building at the future site that will house a German brigade exactly one year after the first groundbreaking.
Defence Minister Robertas Kaunas and the commander of the 45th Armoured Brigade of the Bundeswehr, General Christoph Huber, attended the ceremony at the construction site for the barracks in the Baltic EU and NATO country. The site is in RÅ«dninkai near the border with Belarus.
“This is a huge step forward for our country and for the deterrence of our region. We are very grateful to Germany for taking the lead and responsibility for regional security,” Kaunas told dpa on the sidelines of the ceremony.
Germany is responding to the growing threat to NATO from Russia by setting up the combat unit, he said.
Huber also spoke of a “tremendous progress.”
“Wow. I am deeply impressed by what I have seen here today,” Germany’s highest-ranking soldier in Lithuania said and thanked the construction companies.
“These works are of great importance because it will be our home, my home, the home of my soldiers,” Huber said.
Largest military infrastructure project in Lithuania
The Bundeswehr is building the 45th Armoured Brigade in Lithuania, which is intended to serve the enhanced protection of NATO’s eastern flank. It was formally commissioned in April.
The brigade is expected to be fully operational by 2027 with a total strength of 4,800 soldiers and 200 civilian employees.
The construction of the military facility is the largest military infrastructure project in Lithuania’s history and is being carried out in phases.
In the first construction phase, administrative buildings, accommodation for 600 soldiers, halls for the accommodation and maintenance of combat vehicles and other buildings are being erected on an area of just under 56,000 square metres.
According to Kaunas, Lithuania is about 10 months ahead of schedule.
In the second construction phase, the remaining infrastructure of the military town is to be built on an area of 170 hectares. The contracts with the construction companies are to be signed shortly.