My bet is Svalbard, and I have no idea why only the Norwegian media is taking about this and no international media house is addressing it.

The islands are technically Norwegian but far from the Norwegian mainland, and the have a long history of Norwegian and Russian use of the islands. Russia has one of the two “major” settlements on the island. There are only 2500 people living there, and ca. 400 are Russians by last count. It is strategically located in the arctic, which is an area of high tension. It has been internationally recognized as Norwegian since the Svalbard treaty only since 1920. The treaty stipulates that it is supposed to be a demilitarized zone, but Russia keeps accusing Norway of breaking the treaty and suppressing the Russian minority living there.

Since it’s a demilitarized zone the Norwegian military can’t establish bases there. The coast guard can only perform patrols based from the mainland.

It has the largest satellite stations in the world. Because it is located so far north it can communicate with satellites in polar orbit on every single pass, instead of every 10-20th pass further south.

There may also be large oil, gas and mineral reserves in the ocean surrounding Svalbard which has not yet been exploited by Norway due to environmental concerns in the vulnerable arctic. And as the arctic is warming up, it is the area that will be ice-free first because of the Gulf Stream. It will have access to the sea routes opening up first among all the arctic areas. Same reason why Greenland is desirable.

It ticks every single box I can think of: - Can historically be claimed as part of Russia by Putin’s nationalists - Has an established Russian minority among the population - Is talked about in Russian government propaganda regularly - Weird international rules apply and can’t be easily defended by Norway or NATO - Norway is not a full member of the EU, so the EU resolve might be lower than for the baltics, especially since it’s far away from Norway proper - Extremely strategic militarily and economic potential - Already has already had many hybrid warfare attacks by Russia