Finland and Sweden scrambled fighter jets on 24 September 2026 to intercept Russian military aircraft over the Gulf of Finland in international airspace, marking the two countries' first joint operational identification mission. The aircraft identified included a Tu-134 transport plane and MiG-31 and Su-30 fighter jets; no airspace violation was recorded, but the exercise was designed to demonstrate rapid-response capability in a region of growing strategic tension. Both Nordic nations abandoned decades of military non-alignment and joined NATO following Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, and the Baltic Sea has since become a major flashpoint, with Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson noting that while the sea "has never been so vulnerable," it has also "never been so well protected."