The soviet union took advantage of the location of the baltic nations by

The answer is: establishing naval bases there.

The baltic nations refers to the nations in Northern Europe that bordered by the Baltic Sea (such as  Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania.).

These regions is really close to the western Europe which notoriously formed an alliance with united states. By establishing naval bases on the baltic nations, soviet union hope to be able to stop the upcoming attacks to their territories because all attacks from western Europe will had to pass through these Baltic regions.

answerformal;