Russia: Battles in Kaliningrad
Are they isolating Kaliningrad? Russian authorities claim that NATO is preparing to isolate the Kaliningrad region and the country's northwestern ports, and Vladimir Putin warns of the possibility of using "all weapons" in case of a direct attack. NATO has rejected Moscow's accusations and condemned Russia's nuclear rhetoric. They emphasized that the alliance is defensive in nature and will continue to support Ukraine. Kaliningrad receives and sends cargo by land through Lithuania and by the Baltic Sea. After the start of the full-scale war, the ratio between them changed sharply: rail transport decreased by about two-thirds, there is no longer such a dependence on Lithuanian transit, and the sea has become the region's main cargo channel. We are analyzing how dependent Kaliningrad is on Lithuanian transit and sea communication now, and what will happen if one of these routes becomes limited. Vladimir Putin, speaking at a plenary session of the "Valdai" discussion club on October 1, stated that in case of a direct attack on Russia, including on the Kaliningrad region, Moscow may raise the issue of using "all weapons" at its disposal. Speaking about the statements of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs regarding the possible isolation of the Kaliningrad region, Putin assured that Moscow is not trying to intimidate European countries, but is only responding to threats from their side. "We are not scaring anyone. And what you just said – the Foreign Ministry's statement and the letters that the Foreign Ministry sent to some countries – this is not intimidation, it is a response to an attempt to intimidate us," he assured. According to him, statements by European politicians about the need to prepare for a possible military conflict with Russia in 2029-2030, military exercises in the Baltic Sea, and attempts to detain Russian ships should be considered escalation. "And then we started hearing statements about the Kaliningrad region. Everything is written correctly in the Foreign Ministry's statement and in those letters that were sent out," he said. Vladimir Putin at the "Valdai" discussion club meeting. Moscow. October 1, 2026. Photo: Maxim Shipenkov / EPA NATO, in turn, condemned Russia's nuclear threats amid escalating rhetoric around Kaliningrad. Alliance representative Allison Hart stated that NATO is a defensive alliance, and its actions and exercises "do not pose a threat to any part of Russia." NATO emphasized that they will continue to support Ukraine: "Russia's use of hybrid tactics is a sign of desperation. We will not be forced to abandon support for Ukraine. We have everything we need to defend every inch of allied territory, and we remain strong, ready and capable of countering any threat," Hart said. Russian authorities speak of the possible "isolation" of Kaliningrad primarily in the context of a military threat, but the cessation or restriction of communication will also have economic consequences. The Kaliningrad region is separated from the main territory of Russia by Lithuania, so the region's economy depends on how goods and raw materials are delivered to and from there. Kaliningrad How has railway transit through Lithuania changed since 2022 Before the war, the railway was the main cargo channel for the Kaliningrad region. According to Rosmorport, in 2021, about 10.5 million tons, or 69% of the region's total cargo flow, were transported by rail. By 2025, the figure had decreased to about 3.4 million tons, and the share of the railway to 36%. Thus, the volume of transportation from 2021 to 2025 fell by about two-thirds, and the volume of rail transport fell by half. For 2026, Rosmorport predicted a further decrease to 2.7 million tons. In July 2022, the European Commission issued a separate clarification on Kaliningrad. According to it, rail transit between the main territory of Russia and the Kaliningrad region is not prohibited as such. For a number of sanctioned goods (iron, steel, cement, timber, coal, as well as crude oil and petroleum products), rail transit is allowed to meet the basic needs of Kaliningrad, but Lithuania must control its volumes. For military goods and dual-use goods, transit is completely prohibited. For sanctioned goods, road transit is not allowed. Lithuania itself does not set an arbitrary figure for how much Russia is allowed to transport: for sanctioned goods, historical transport volumes were specifically calculated. For 2022, the limit was approximately 3.1 million tons of sanctioned goods, but only about 1.8 million tons were actually transported. For 2023, the limit decreased to 2.89 million tons: from Russia to Kaliningrad - 2.47 million tons, and from Kaliningrad to Russia - 420 thousand tons. According to statistics from LTG Cargo (part of the Lithuanian railway group LTG), in 2023, Russia was allowed to transport coal and coal products (710 thousand tons), iron and steel (520 thousand tons), timber, cement, fertilizers, luxury items and other goods (420 thousand tons), as well as crude oil and petroleum products (78 thousand tons) and construction materials, chemicals and industrial products (50 thousand tons) from Russia to the Kaliningrad region through Lithuania. In the opposite direction - from the Kaliningrad region through Lithuania to the rest of Russia - the allowed volume was significantly less. Almost all of it was for timber, cement, fertilizers, luxury items and other goods (410 thousand tons). Another 17 thousand tons are construction materials, chemicals and industrial products, about 400 tons are oil and petroleum products, and 200 tons are iron and steel. At the same time, the utilization rate of quotas was low: according to statistics from Kaliningrad Railways for the end of 2023, only about 45.3% of the quotas for delivering goods to the region and 47% for transporting from the region were used. As the Minister of Infrastructure Development of the Kaliningrad Region Evgenia Kukushkina said in December 2023, the authorities urged companies to use available railway quotas, but carriers preferred to send part of the cargo by sea, as such transportation was subsidized by the state (more on this below). As a result, since 2024, the authorities have required priority to be given to sanctioned goods that cannot be freely transported through Lithuania on ferries on the Ust-Luga - Baltiysk line, and other goods to be sent by land if possible. In 2026, the transit regime continues to operate. The volume of limits is calculated based on the average volume of transportation over the previous three years. For 2025-2026, the quota for transit of sanctioned goods is about 1.5 million tons. A train traveling to Kaliningrad at the Kena railway station near the Lithuanian-Belarusian border. Lithuania. September 9, 2023. Photo: Darius Mataitis / Scanpix Baltics / LETA What Russia transports by rail through Lithuania After the start of the full-scale war, the structure of railway transit through Lithuania to the Kaliningrad region also changed. According to LTG Cargo, in 2024, compared to 2021, the transport of timber, chips and paper to Kaliningrad decreased by 88%, solid mineral fuel - by 85%, ferrous metals - by 77%, oil and petroleum products - by 56%, chemicals and mineral fertilizers - by 39%. At the same time, the volume of containers transported to Kaliningrad increased by 6%, products of plant origin - by 24%, mineral products - by 26%. Deliveries of food industry products increased significantly - by 3.8 times. The volume of goods that LTG Cargo classified as "other" increased by 765%. The flow in the opposite direction also decreased. In 2024, 971 thousand tons of goods were transported from the Kaliningrad region through Lithuania - 44% less than in 2021. The transport of products of plant origin decreased the most - by 98%. The volume of "other goods" decreased by 88%, container transport - by 46%, food industry products - by 31%, timber, chips and paper - by 20%. The reduction in railway transit, however, does not mean that Kaliningrad has lost all this cargo volume. After 2022, Russia began to shift part of the transportation to the sea. As a result, over several years, sea transport has transformed from an additional route into the main communication channel. Sea Commercial Port of Kaliningrad. July 28, 2026. Photo: Alexander Melekhov / TASS / ZUMA Press / Scanpix / LETA The sea is now the main cargo communication channel for Kaliningrad with Russia After the introduction of restrictions on the transit of sanctioned goods, Russia began to accelerate the reorientation of Kaliningrad cargo to the sea. The main route was the Ust-Luga - Baltiysk ferry crossing. On it, ferries can carry cars and containers, as well as railway wagons and rolling stock. In 2021, according to the specialized agency PortNews, about 1.2 million tons of cargo, more than 13.6 thousand loaded railway wagons, and about 9 thousand units of rolling stock passed through the Ust-Luga ferry complex. Already in January-March 2022, about 360 thousand tons were transported on the line - this is 85% more than in the same period of 2021. Of these, more than 4.1 thousand wagons and about 2.2 thousand units of rolling stock. By the end of 2022, the sea route was expanded even further: in January, two ships were constantly operating on the line, but by December, eight ships were already operating on the Ust-Luga - Baltiysk and Bronka - Baltiysk routes, making seven to eight calls per week. As a result, by 2025, the sea was already transporting more Kaliningrad cargo than the railway. As we mentioned above, by 2025, the share of rail transport in transportation had decreased by two-thirds to 36%. By sea in the same year, 4.9 million tons of cargo were transported, or 52% of the total volume. In 2026, the Ust-Luga - Baltiysk line remains the main sea route, carrying railway wagons, cars, rolling stock and other cargo. It is served, in particular, by Rosmorport ferries "Marshal Rokossovsky", "General Chernyakhovsky" and "Baltiysk". The Russian Ministry of Transport planned in January 2026 to further increase the capacity of this direction: after the construction of new ferries and shore infrastructure, the line's throughput, according to the authorities' plans, should double to 4 million tons of cargo per year. The second sea direction connects Kaliningrad with St. Petersburg. It is used primarily for the transportation of containers and general cargo. In particular, the container line between the two cities is serviced by FESCO, controlled by Rosatom: in 2025, the company transported more than 40 thousand TEU along it, which is 2.2 times more than a year earlier. As predicted by Alexey Tkachenko, managing director of the region's port assets, by the end of 2026, the container turnover of the ports of the Kaliningrad region may reach a record 200 thousand TEU. The growth of sea transportation between the Kaliningrad region and Russia is largely supported by federal funding. The state began to compensate carriers for part of the costs after the introduction of transit restrictions through Lithuania in 2022, and the funding volume gradually increased. In 2022, more than 1.3 billion rubles were allocated for subsidizing sea transportation, in 2023 - about 2.2 billion, and in 2024 - already 4.6 billion rubles. In 2025, 4 billion rubles were allocated for these purposes. However, the business's needs were significantly higher: the Kaliningrad Chamber of Commerce and Industry estimated them at 17 billion rubles for 2025. In 2026, 5 billion rubles were allocated for subsidizing sea transportation from the federal budget. However, even the money allocated by the state is not fully used by the carriers. In 2026, the money was distributed among 107 companies, but as of October 1, only 54.5% of the allocated funds out of 5 billion rubles were utilized. At the same time, the situation varied greatly among carriers: 41 companies used from 75 to 100% of their allocated limit, while 44 companies used less than 20%. Kaliningrad How Rosatom gained control of the Kaliningrad port After the start of the full-scale war, who owns the Kaliningrad Sea Commercial Port also changed. Before that, it was privately owned, but in 2023, courts, following lawsuits from the Prosecutor General's Office, transferred almost all of its shares to the state. Initially, the port was controlled by Rosimushchestvo, and at the end of 2025, the management was taken over by the transport group FESCO, part of Rosatom. In May 2026, Rosatom became the sole shareholder of the port. In 2021, about 2.2 million tons of cargo passed through the port, and in 2022 - only about 1.2 million tons. The port has not recovered its former volumes, but after the war began, cargo between Kaliningrad and the main territory of Russia began to be transported much more actively through it. In 2022, the volume of such transportation was only 159 thousand tons, and then by 2025 it had increased almost tenfold to almost 1.4 million tons. As a result, by 2025, transportation between Russian ports accounted for about 85% of KMPT's cargo turnover. Less international cargo passes through the port, but it is increasingly used for delivering goods between Kaliningrad and the rest of Russia by sea, bypassing Lithuania. Governor of the Kaliningrad Region Alexey Besprozvannykh stated in an interview with "Vedomosti" that restrictions on land transit are an opportunity for the region's authorities to develop sea transport. According to him, FESCO, part of Rosatom, will continue to develop port infrastructure. In addition, as Besprozvannykh stated, two new ferries are under construction and the possibility of purchasing two more is being considered. "As for refusing road or rail transit, that's not the point. Although we are preparing for absolutely any scenario. But I don't think that European countries themselves will introduce such restrictions, as the economy of these states is also linked to our transit," he said. What Kaliningrad exports to the rest of Russia Transport routes are also needed for Kaliningrad to export products from local enterprises. In particular, FESCO transports industrial and agricultural products by sea from Kaliningrad to St. Petersburg. For the first nine months of 2025, according to the company's press service, the volume of such transportation exceeded 8.5 thousand TEU (20-foot container) - 3.5 times more than a year earlier. Part of the cargo is then sent through St. Petersburg for export to China and other Asian countries. More than 90% of Kaliningrad's agro-industrial exports come from the Sodruzhestvo group. A significant part of Sodruzhestvo's cargo is still transported by rail: in 2026, Rosmorport estimated their share at more than 50% of the total railway transit of the Kaliningrad region. The return sea cargo flow, which is logical for an exclave, remains less than the incoming one. In 2025, carriers reported that ships going from Kaliningrad were less than half full of their technical capacity. Svetlogorsk How enterprises of the Kaliningrad region operate The existence of a sea route does not mean that Kaliningrad's economy is now completely protected from probable land transport isolation. Railway transportation continues to serve millions of tons of cargo, although it has decreased by two-thirds. To completely reorient this flow to the sea, Russia will need additional vessels, expansion of port infrastructure, and further subsidization of sea transportation. However, if possible railway isolation complicates the life of the exclave, it will not be much, given the tenfold increase in maritime transport through the Kaliningrad port. First of all, possible isolation could hit the region's largest industrial enterprises. One of the most striking examples is "Autotor". Before the start of the full-scale war, the plant assembled BMW, Hyundai, and Kia cars, but after the companies left, it switched mainly to Chinese brands. At the same time, production volumes sharply decreased: from approximately 177 thousand cars in 2021 to 54.1 thousand in 2022 and 29.1 thousand in 2023. In 2025, the enterprise produced 33.4 thousand cars, and the plant remained loaded at only 10% of its capacity. Currently, "Autotor" is trying to establish its own production of some components, but it still depends on the supply of components for car assembly. Another major industry in the region is fish processing. In 2024, according to Rosstat, enterprises of the Kaliningrad region produced 288.5 thousand tons of processed and canned fish, crustaceans and mollusks, and in the first ten months of 2025 - already 282.2 thousand tons. In 2023, this figure was 305 thousand tons, in 2022 - 281 thousand tons. More than 40% of the region's fish processing falls on the "For" group of companies, and about 27% on "Vichi-Rus". The operation of such enterprises is also related to external logistics: raw materials come to the region, including from other fishing areas, and finished products must be exported from the region. A special case is oil production in the region. Lukoil is developing the Kravtsovskoye (D6) and D41 fields on the Baltic Sea shelf. The platform at the Kravtsovskoye field is located about 22.5 kilometers from the shore and is connected to it by an underwater pipeline. Through it, the extracted oil goes to the onshore oil collection point "Romanovo", and after preparation - to the oil terminal in the Kaliningrad Bay, from where it can be exported by tankers. Therefore, the cessation of railway transit itself should not stop production at the platform. However, if sea communication is sharply limited or stopped, the final link in the chain - the export of oil by tankers from the terminal - may be disrupted. With the participation of Denis Morokhin
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