Finland kicked off its largest international military exercise of the year on 9 March 2026, hosting some 7,500 of the 25,000 NATO personnel taking part in Cold Response 26 across northern Scandinavia. Most convoys are moving heavy equipment between Rovaniemi, Kajaani and Sodankylä, while allied transport aircraft circle through Helsinki and Oulu.
![25,000 NATO Troops Transit Finland as ‘Cold Response 26’ Starts, Bringing Temporary Road & Airspace Constraints]()
If your personnel rotations or project timelines hinge on quick entry to Finland or neighboring Schengen states during the exercise, VisaHQ can streamline the paperwork. Its dedicated Finland page (https://www.visahq.com/finland/) lets mobility managers secure visas, passport renewals, and invitation letters entirely online—an invaluable backstop when sudden route changes or added checkpoints threaten to upend travel plans.
Although the drill is defence-focused, the sheer volume of troop movements is already affecting civilian mobility. Local logistics managers report that heavy tracked vehicles damaged several regional roads during earlier iterations; the Finnish Defence Forces (FDF) have promised to finance any repairs, but temporary weight restrictions and rolling roadblocks are expected throughout Lapland. For companies moving staff or freight, alternate routings via Sweden’s E10 corridor may be necessary to avoid convoy queues. Airspace users face similar pinch points. Slots for business jets at Rovaniemi and Kuusamo are capped during peak sortie windows, driving up repositioning costs for charter operators flying in executives for the late-season ski rush. Finavia and the Border Guard recommend that corporate travellers carry printed invitation letters to expedite ID checks at pop-up military security posts. Cold Response 26 is the first major exercise to be commanded from NATO’s new operations centre in Mikkeli, underscoring Finland’s accelerated integration into Alliance structures since joining in 2023. For global mobility specialists, the lesson is that defence logistics can ripple quickly into commercial travel networks—especially in sparsely populated areas where civilian and military infrastructure overlap. Advance route planning and close monitoring of NOTAMs will be essential until the exercise ends on 20 March.
If your personnel rotations or project timelines hinge on quick entry to Finland or neighboring Schengen states during the exercise, VisaHQ can streamline the paperwork. Its dedicated Finland page (https://www.visahq.com/finland/) lets mobility managers secure visas, passport renewals, and invitation letters entirely online—an invaluable backstop when sudden route changes or added checkpoints threaten to upend travel plans.
Although the drill is defence-focused, the sheer volume of troop movements is already affecting civilian mobility. Local logistics managers report that heavy tracked vehicles damaged several regional roads during earlier iterations; the Finnish Defence Forces (FDF) have promised to finance any repairs, but temporary weight restrictions and rolling roadblocks are expected throughout Lapland. For companies moving staff or freight, alternate routings via Sweden’s E10 corridor may be necessary to avoid convoy queues. Airspace users face similar pinch points. Slots for business jets at Rovaniemi and Kuusamo are capped during peak sortie windows, driving up repositioning costs for charter operators flying in executives for the late-season ski rush. Finavia and the Border Guard recommend that corporate travellers carry printed invitation letters to expedite ID checks at pop-up military security posts. Cold Response 26 is the first major exercise to be commanded from NATO’s new operations centre in Mikkeli, underscoring Finland’s accelerated integration into Alliance structures since joining in 2023. For global mobility specialists, the lesson is that defence logistics can ripple quickly into commercial travel networks—especially in sparsely populated areas where civilian and military infrastructure overlap. Advance route planning and close monitoring of NOTAMs will be essential until the exercise ends on 20 March.
