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there is still much to reflect on”. 451 Lithuania had a very early experience with
such “traditional methods”. When Lithuanian independence was re-established,
the country had to deal with a total economic and energy blockade imposed in an
attempt to generate second thoughts in Lithuania about its historic decision. This
long experience of Russian power tactics in the non-military realm has made
Lithuania more immune to and less naive with respect to traditional Russian
arguments: the Druzhba pipeline was closed because it needed repairs;
Lithuanian trucks were lined-up at the border due to new customs procedures;
Lithuanian milk was not good enough for the Russian market, and so on. Russian
non-military pressure on Lithuania reached its peak during the Lithuanian
Presidency of the Council of the European Union. It shows how important
modern foreign policy tools are to the Kremlin and how high it perceived the
stakes before the Vilnius Summit. The pressure on Lithuania was a show of
strength meant to provoke fear not so much in Lithuania as in the Eastern
Partnership countries – especially Ukraine – which were considering their
strategic Western choices.
451 See Soveshchaniye poslov i postoyannykh predstaviteley Rossii. (2012-07-09),
http://kremlin.ru/transcripts/15902.
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