It’s a strategy built on contradictions. Russia’s attacks on Europe are aimed not at starting a war, but at bringing the war closer to home. To provoke without forcing a reaction. Issue a warning without causing actual behavior change.
The Russian government has clearly escalated its “gray zone” conflict with NATO in Europe over the past week. Since late Sunday, a train carrying former Western officials has been attacked by a Russian drone, another drone believed to be of Russian origin was shot down in Lithuania, a third washed up on a Polish coast, a Danish helicopter was narrowly stranded by a Russian flare, and a train in the Netherlands has been crippled by vandalism that remains unclaimed.
None of this is a coincidence. And it comes after weeks of warnings that Moscow would seek escalation with NATO, but perhaps not because Russia seeks or can afford an all-out confrontation with the largest military alliance in history.
Instead, Russian President Vladimir Putin has two goals. It was facilitated by the Trump administration, which did not want to upset President Putin, who had six months left in his term, and because Ukraine was in severe short supply of air defense equipment.
First, it makes the costs of supporting Ukraine seem real and growing, weighing heavily on the minds of European voters as right-wing pro-Russian parties contest elections in several countries in the region. The second is to test Article 5, the bedrock of the NATO alliance (an attack on one member is an attack on all), a longtime thorn in President Putin’s side. Undoubtedly, Russia is getting away with sabotage, border violations, and assassination plots that would have caused existential anxiety during the Cold War. Now that seems like common sense.
“What is happening now would have triggered the triggering of NATO Article IV just a few months ago,” one European diplomat told me, referring to the alliance treaty’s clause calling for emergency meetings in times of crisis. “Now it has become an almost daily occurrence,” the diplomat said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive issues, adding that Russia’s aim was to “scare Europe away from supporting Ukraine” and “toy with fears of escalation.”
The main problem for NATO is that this is likely not the peak of Russia’s malicious intent, but the beginning of a salvo.
With US pressure ineffective, a peace agreement appears to be quite far away, and Putin has clearly set his sights on occupying the Donbass region and possibly even more of Ukraine. And while Russia’s appalling waste of human capital in front-line “meat wave” infantry attacks has somewhat curtailed its ambitions, the Kremlin’s military-industrial complex is offering new viable options. It is cheap, highly effective air power that the enemy is struggling with and that can be produced in ever-increasing quantities.
Russian Guerin 4 and 5 drones are equipped with Chinese-made turbojet engines and cost about $40,000, with each device retailing for about $70,000, according to Ukrainian authorities and media reports. Their Banderor cruise missile can reach speeds of 375 miles per hour and reportedly costs just $100,000. What these weapons lack in sophistication and precision they make up for in sheer volume. Then again, Moscow is just getting started, and Alabuga’s drone factory is rapidly adapting as this new threat spills onto the front lines and beyond.
Production is key. Dr Marina Miron, from King’s College London’s School of Defense, said that “adaptations around production, supply chains, logistics and doctrine” are an important part of any strategy, even if they don’t garner as much headlines as the integration of AI into battlefield reconnaissance and attack in Ukraine or Russia. “And both sides are trying to adapt and innovate in order to benefit from the short time frame…while their adversaries are devising countermeasures to stop new advances,” she told me.
“NATO is far behind when it comes to preparing to deal with these changes,” Miron added. “It’s not just about building drone defenses… (but also) rethinking the whole doctrine.” Ideally, he said, NATO would adapt to “lessons from both sides” rather than copying Ukraine or Russia.
Miron said the likelihood of conventional war was “low” but instead NATO would face “sub-threshold ‘events’ like the ones we’ve seen in Poland, Romania, Denmark, etc.”
As this crisis unfolds, one of the challenges for NATO members is how to communicate to their populations the seriousness of the ongoing threat they face without causing panic or giving Russia a psychological victory. Threading the needle is nearly impossible. A near-miss attack by a drone at an airport in Germany, the landing of a ballistic missile on an open field in Poland, and an assassination plot alleged in an indictment in the Southern District of New York. Starting in late summer, that list grows, and so does its potential lethality and geographic spread.
Moscow may be suitable for this kind of volatile dance. A senior European official said Russia’s thinking is better suited to extreme escalation than NATO. “Russians have theorized flexible arrangements of power and aggression since Soviet times,” he noted. “For NATO, this kind of escalation management is rather new. So NATO has something to learn.”
He added: “Overreacting doesn’t help, but turning the other cheek doesn’t help either.”
At some point, the Russian government will misfire, overreach, and oblige NATO members to respond with some form of force. This is not unprecedented: in Syria, an attack on U.S. military positions by Russian Wagner mercenaries in 2018 prompted a furious response from the U.S. military. It should also be remembered that NATO military and intelligence services in Europe support Ukraine’s attacks on Russia every day. This is often a weapon purchased and supplied by NATO, but it is the Ukrainians who pull the trigger. Moscow probably feels like it is pushing back from a distorted perspective as an aggressor.
But should Russia’s misstep occur, the quantum leap in conflict it would result in is one for which NATO’s military and public are unprepared. Perhaps that day is near.
