ANTS LAANEOTS
City of Tartu Electoral District
16 January 1948 Kilingi-Nõmme, Estonia
Married, one son and one daughter, four grandchildren
Education: Kilingi-Nõmme Secondary School 1965; Kharkiv Guards Higher Tank Command School, tank officer 1970, cars, tractors and armoured vehicles exploitation engineer; Malinovsky Military Armored Forces Academy (Moscow, Russian Federation) 1978–1981; NATO Defense College (Rome, Italy) 1997–1998; National Defence University of Finland (Helsinki) 1999–2000
Career: Pääsküla railway station, railway automatics assembler 1965–1966;
Soviet Army: 48th Guards Tank Division, 300th Tank Regiment, commander of tank platoon, commander of training company, commander of tank battalion 1970–1978 (Ukraine), 155th Motor Rifle Division, 76th Tank Regiment, Chief of Staff 1981–1982, 78th Tank Division, 180th Tank Regiment, Commander 1982–1983, 78th Tank Division, first vice-commander / division chief of staff 1982–1987 (Kazakhstan), Ethiopian Infantry Division, Adviser to Commander, Adviser to Army Corps Commander 1987–1989, participation in combat; Tartu Regional Department of Defence, Chief 1989–1991; Chief of the General Staff of Estonian Defence Forces 1991–1994, 1997–1999; Security company “AS ESS Lõuna”, Director 1994–1996; Baltic Centre for Defence Studies, Director 1999–2001; Commandant of Estonian National Defence College 2001–2006; Defence Attaché of the Republic of Estonia in the Russian Federation and the Ukrainian Republic 2001–2006; Commander of the Defence Forces 2006–2011; Adviser to the Prime Minister on security and national defence issues 2011–2014
Party affiliation: Estonian Reform Party 2014–
Membership in representative bodies: 13th and 14th Riigikogu; Tartu City Council 1996–1997, 2013–2015, 2017–
Awards: Order of the Cross of the Eagle, 2nd Class 2000; Order of the Cross of the Eagle, 1st Class 2012; Grand Cross of the Order of the Lion of Finland 2007; Commander 1st class of the Order of the Polar Star 2011; Commander Degree of the Legion of Merit of the United States of America 2012. White Cross of the Estonian Defence League, 1st Class 2011; Medal of Merit of the Estonian Defence League; Border Guard Cross of Merit; Badges of Merit of the Estonian Defence Forces, the Rescue Board, the Ministry of Defence and the Ministry of the Interior; Memorial Medal “10 Years of the Re-Established Defence Forces”. Order of the Red Star (USSR)
Ranks: Soviet Army: Lieutenant 1970; Senior Lieutenant 1973; Captain 1975; Major 1979; Lieutenant Colonel 1982; Colonel 1987. Estonian Defence Forces: Colonel 1992; Major General 1998; Lieutenant General 2008; General 2011
Other activities: Estonian Defence League, Chairman of the Board of Elders 2013–2019;
Estonian Defence League, Tartu District; Tartu Toome Rotary Club
Articles on security and national defence in the Estonian press, book “Vene-Gruusia 2008. aasta sõda – põhjused ja tagajärjed” (“The Russian-Georgian War of 2008: Causes and Implication”) 2014 (in English 2016)
Hobbies: politics, history, militarism, Russia and former USSR Republics, security of the Baltic states, sports
Additional information: deported to Siberia from March 1949 to August 1958.
24.05.2019
