Outside the Russian embassy in Tallinn, about 400 kilometres south of St Petersburg, the sentiments couldn’t be clearer. The entire embassy sits behind a metal fence that ever since the Russian invasion of Ukraine has had the words ‘Putin Killed Navalny’, ‘For victims of wars started by Russia’ and ‘End the genocide’ scrawled all over it in paint and thick black texta. The animosity here towards Putin is palpable, and the threat from this ‘bad neighbour’ is never far from the minds of peace-loving Estonians. NATO troops are permanently stationed in the small central Estonian town of Tapa, ready to deploy if Russian troops dare cross the border.
The Ukraine war has certainly increased tensions in the Baltics, including the fear that a Russian victory in Ukraine would embolden Putin to look further afield to reclaim other former Soviet territories. Europe appears to take this threat seriously enough: Germany will move 5000 soldiers to Lithuania by 2027, the first full-time military deployment from Berlin since the Second World War. The three Baltic states of Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia have been NATO members since 2004 and are considered by some to be the most likely next fronts for Putin’s expansionist agenda—an agenda being openly discussed in Russian media and blogger news sites as ‘preparation for WWIII’.
But in Estonia, the population seems mostly relaxed and comfortable, more concerned with improving their own lot than second-guessing Putin’s warmongering intentions. In fact, the population’s resilience seems remarkable in the face of shifting geopolitical winds, and it speaks volumes about their resilience.
For a country of less than 1.5 million, Estonia punches above its weight as a fiercely independent, pro-democratic and progressive Baltic nation, known for its blend of medieval charm, nature and high-tech innovation. Estonia became ‘E-stonia’ in the mid-1990s, just a couple of years after it regained its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, when the government realised that for a tiny country in north-east Europe with few natural resources to draw on, massive technical innovation and investment (dubbed the Tiger Leap) were its best bets. It subsequently invested heavily in tech infrastructure early, which saw all Estonian schools online by the late 1990s. Rejecting the offer of old redundant technology—essentially digital waste—from other Western nations, Estonia chose to purchase its own cutting edge computers and software.
This meant Estonia embraced e-voting early, and most government and business transactions are conducted online—but with the caveat that the population are able to monitor any time their personal details are accessed through a portal at eesti.ee, meaning there is a strong sense of transparency and accountability.
There was an added incentive. The tiny nation needed to defend its e-democracy from cyber-attacks from Russia that continue to this day. The world’s first serious cyber-attacks started in 2007, targeting the Estonian parliament, banks, newspapers and broadcasters, and led to NATO setting up its cyber-warfare headquarters in Tallinn in May 2008. Even in the city I’m currently writing from—Tartu, the verdant second major city in Estonia’s south that’s currently basking in its elevated status as a 2024 European Capital of Culture—the airport was closed in May this year when Russian hackers scrambled the aircraft signals, making it unsafe for planes to land here.
Perhaps that goes some way to explaining why Estonia seems so relaxed today, even as Putin’s rhetoric on the world stage becomes increasingly bellicose: because the Estonians have heard it all before. But despite the strong anti-Russian rhetoric from its young female former prime minister Kaja Kallas, there’s no doubt that Estonia remains always vulnerable to its aggressive and unpredictable neighbour just across the border.
One woman I spoke with who has left Estonia for Ireland, where she works as a psychologist, told me that although Estonians rarely admit it, the threat that everything could change in half an hour if Russia decided to attempt to reclaim the Baltics sits front of mind for most of them. There’s also the reality that around 25 per cent of the Estonian population is of Russian descent, and many of these are no doubt unhappy that Estonia has become such a critic of their former homeland. Estonia has taken to removing all Russian-era war monuments, including in the Eastern border town Narva, where Russia is just metres away across the Narva River. ‘No one wants to see our militant and hostile neighbour foment tensions in our home’, Kaja Kallas said at the time.
But that doesn’t mean they are ignorant or deluded. Estonia remains a country that is acutely aware of how it might be impacted by the shifting winds of global politics. In the Baltics, a second Trump presidency could take on an extra sting. Trump has openly said he trusts the Russian president more than the US intelligence agencies, and has encouraged Putin to invade NATO countries that haven’t paid their debts. As I write, Kallas has just resigned as Estonian prime minister to take on the role of the EU’s foreign policy chief. It’s easy to understand why the EU would look fondly on such an articulate and forthright leader, but trouble may lie ahead.
For Kallas, taking on the EU role meant resigning from the Estonian parliament, and giving up her stately office that sits above the medieval Toompea Hill in Tallinn’s otherworldly old town, where you could be excused for thinking you had time-travelled back to the Middle Ages, if you ignored the scooters, street art and free wi-fi. Like many Estonians, Kallas is sharp tongued, multilingual and not afraid to say what she thinks based on her own lived experience and family history—which includes her mother Kristi and grandmother having been deported to Siberia in 1949.
From the start of the Ukraine war, Kallas has argued that it was foolish to trust Putin or talk him out of a full-out attack on Kyiv, despite more conciliatory language from other European leaders, including Emmanuel Macron in France. From the outset she spoke of Putin as an ‘aggressor’ who is ‘very good at sowing fear into Western countries’. Estonia has always warned Germany against trusting Putin, even as Angela Merkel fostered a close relationship on the back of cheap Russian oil. Putin even endeared himself to the German population, who seemed suckered by his rugged charm and command of the German language—another adventure that hasn’t ended well for Europe. Kallas’s unwavering and consistent criticism of Putin as an aggressive anti-democratic despot has landed her on Russia’s Most Wanted list—not a list anyone would covet a place on, given the trail of dead from Russia’s recent opposition and strongest critical voices among the press.
Against this geopolitical and historical backdrop, to an outsider like me from down under, Estonia often feels breath-taking in its bold independence, open democracy and ability to hold onto its Old-World, nature-based spirit. This nature love goes beyond the esoteric: Estonia is one of the most forested countries in the world, with forest covering over 50 per cent of the country and enabling sixty-five mammal species able to survive here, including brown bears, wolves, lynxes, beavers, deer and other wild animals.
Estonia has been named the least Christian-identifying country in the world, with only around 16 per cent of the country identifying as Christian. They don’t take kindly to being called ‘pagan’ due to its derogatory Christian overtones, but there is an open celebration of nature, spirits and mythology evident here, in everything from the herb-slapping in saunas to the mythological creatures signposted in nature reserves I’ve visited.
No wonder I’ve seen so many squeaky-clean Christian proselytisers on the streets of Tartu being laughed off or ignored by locals. Religion isn’t part of school education here—Estonia is a secular nation, with the largest Lutheran church only attracting about 13 per cent of the population. Perhaps this can be partly explained by the fact that religious worship was discouraged under Soviet rule, but Estonians are also wary of large institutions, including organised religion. Most young people I’ve met seem more interested in encouraging me to visit one of Tallinn’s famous rave parties—often held outside the city in forest gatherings—or participate in Tartu’s street art parties where entire old Soviet factories are turned into graffiti canvases and playgrounds for techno-lovers. This is a population that wants to celebrate its independence and never look back to the dark days of Soviet occupation. They recently legalised gay marriage here, which is remarkable given that one can still be persecuted, beaten and imprisoned for being queer just across the border.
But one thing that has endeared me to this country more than anything else is the quality and transparency of its democracy, which seems to be genuinely serving the people. Despite Estonia not being a rich country by European standards, public transport is free for residents of Tallinn, and—as I’ve discovered through unfortunate circumstance—it boasts a top-notch public health system. Two months into my stay I had a pretty serious scooter accident that left me with three fractures in my jaw, a broken wrist, stitches across my chin and a scarred body. When it happened and I was sprawled on the side of the road with blood pouring from my nose, chin and ears, two saintly Estonian women came to my aid and said they would call an ambulance. At first I protested and said it would cost too much.
‘No it won’t,’ one of them said, ‘you’re in Estonia’.
And it was true. Under Estonia’s aptly named ‘solidarity’ health care system, all emergency health care is free to everyone—including non-citizens like me. Through a month of treatment and hospital visits, I felt like I wouldn’t receive better health care anywhere—and everything was free. That’s a huge gift to non-residents. Even in Australia I’d have had to pay for the ambulance ride.
Of course not everything is perfect in Estonia. It currently has one of the worst inflation rates in Europe, with the average cost of living having increased by 40 per cent in the past three years from a pretty low base. That means a latte costs more here than in a Fitzroy coffee shop. By contrast, booze is so cheap that Estonians boast the title of the largest alcohol consumers per capita in the OECD.
But the freedom and quality of life I feel here are of an altogether different order because they feel hard-won—this is a country that has been colonised by the Danes, the Swedes, the Russians and even Nazi Germany in the 1940s (over 5000 Estonians died in concentration camps)—and cherished. There is both pride in what Estonia has been able to achieve as an independent tech powerhouse, but also a return to the old woo-woo mythology that Estonians can claim as their own.
I took a sauna one weekend at an Estonian wedding in the countryside outside of Tartu, where I met a guy who had provided the photo machine for wedding guests to snap Polaroids of themselves with at the wedding. Over Passion Collins cocktails he asked me if I was afraid to be here in Estonia. ‘Our business and lots of others are suffering because a lot of people from around Europe are too afraid to come here since the Ukraine invasion’, he tells me. I tell him I’m not afraid at all and don’t want to buy into Putin’s fear-mongering rhetoric. ‘We need more like you then’, he says. ‘Until the world can stop seeing us as somehow connected to Russia—we’ll continue to struggle’, he says, before returning to the bar for another gin cocktail.
james norman 