The shaping and quelling of international conflicts can feel like the exclusive province of the powerful. Consider, this week, the U.S. president’s suggestion that he could (and just might) add long-range Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine’s arsenal to change a war’s calculus.

Ordinary citizens have fewer levers and must play a longer game. But with citizenry comes purpose and solidarity. That, too, lends power. Like Finns, Estonians have an uneasy proximity to an expansionist Russia. And, as with Finns , readiness is a rallying cry. It’s less about militancy than about a collective resolve, as Isabelle de Pommereau reports , to make foreign occupation of Estonia unthinkable.