Kneeling in a "combat hole" dug in the snow and covered with heat-shielding netting to conceal their thermal footprint, two French Alpine hunters scanned the grayish horizon above Suolovuopmi, a Norwegian hamlet close to the Arctic Circle. Their mission was to slow down the advance of enemy armored vehicles so that the Italian Alpinis accompanying them could prepare the defense of Masi, a village of 350 inhabitants located a little further south.

"We have Eryx anti-tank missiles, but their range is only 600 meters. We have to remain invisible right up to the last moment if we don't want to come under fire ourselves," said Corporal Guillaume of the Seventh Bataillon of Alpine Hunters (BCA) from Varces in southeastern France. The position, located on a snow-covered hill battered by a polar wind, would be held all night by the French section, using night vision goggles, in temperatures approaching what feels like -25°C.

While Finland's accession to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in April 2023, after 70 years of neutrality, was a blow to Moscow, it also poses a number of challenges for the Atlantic alliance, which must now secure a further 1,300 kilometers of border with Russia. In particular, NATO has to relearn how to deal with what the military calls "extreme cold," the kind found in Arctic regions, where the wind and temperature make military maneuvers hazardous if extreme weather conditions are not mastered.

"Extreme cold is the Russians' natural playground. We have to be up to par," said Colonel Vincent Lazerges, commanding officer of the Seventh BCA, who is in charge of the 450 French soldiers sent to Norway at the beginning of March to take part in the Nordic Response 24 exercise, one of the main sequences of Steadfast Defender 24, NATO's largest exercise since the end of the Cold War.

More than 20,000 soldiers from 13 nations

This NATO maneuver, scheduled to run until March 14 in the far north of Finland and Norway, simulates an attack on an Arctic country that is a member of the alliance. In total, more than 20,000 soldiers from 13 nations are involved, half of them in land operations – a maritime and air component is also planned.

For the first time, Finland is taking part, sending 4,100 troops. Helsinki has also lent 68 tracked articulated vehicles, renowned for their snow-crossing qualities, and eight snowmobiles to the French alpine hunters, who transported them 400 kilometers to the powdery expanses of Suolovuopmi. "This was the first time the Finns had been involved in one of our exercises, and they were outstanding. We managed to deploy our entire battle group with their vehicles in less than a week," said Colonel Lazerges.

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