AKIPRESS.COM - At the height of the Cold War, NATO generals lost sleep over the "Fulda Gap", a flat lowland area they identified as the easiest way for Warsaw Pact tanks to roll into Western Germany, Reuters reports.

As NATO's borders have shifted east, they now worry about a new flashpoint of potential conflict with Russia: a 40-mile sliver of land dubbed the Suwalki Gap, whose seizure by Moscow's troops could leave the three Baltic states, former Soviet republics, isolated and helpless.

Weeks before a key summit in Warsaw, Poland is pushing its allies to use some of NATO's planned new multinational forces to secure the gap, a move experts say is aimed at rebalancing what Warsaw sees as a 'second class' status within the alliance.

NATO insists it is taking necessary measures to deter any Russian aggressive thinking, but without turning Suwalki itself into a source of tension near Russian borders.

”NATO has already changed its military posture to be able to respond militarily in that area," NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said. "What we have done is increase the readiness of our forces...We are not doing this to create a conflict, but to avoid one.”

Moscow denies territorial ambitions in the north but has expressed concern at any NATO build-up near its borders.

Poland says a direct presence of NATO troops in the gap area, the only overland route linking Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia with their allies, could change the political calculus and deter a potential aggressor.

Analysts say Poland's push to secure the area with NATO units is part of its wider strategy, driven partly by its suspicion of Western allies and aimed at ensuring NATO does not hesitate to defend its easternmost members.

Deployment of alliance troops directly in this potential flashpoint area could mean Poland's allies immediately find themselves facing hostile forces, even in a surprise attack, Deputy Defence Minister Tomasz Szatkowski told Reuters.

Michal Baranowski, Director of the German Marshall Fund of the United States in Warsaw said: "In reality, this is Poland's strategy aimed at automatically involving key NATO countries in a potential conflict."