NATO revising its response to Russian aggression in Ukraine
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For NATO, the calculus is changing. Russian military might has been exposed as far weaker than thought, and the Ukrainians have shown themselves to be fierce and committed fighters. This has emboldened western powers to provide a laundry list of armaments and other support to Kyiv.
Even more importantly, the European and American public has now seen two weeks of fighting, suffering, and dying in Ukraine. While Ukraine was perceived as a far away, dispensable country before the war, it has now become the staple of the nightly news. The public is growing familiar with the country and, in particular, with the bravery and determination of Ukrainian forces and the suffering of its civilians.
The stakes are also becoming more apparent. President Putin is increasingly seen as a mad dictator waving nuclear weapons and hell-bent on taking over eastern Europe. He is viewed as threatening the global security order and the war is morphing in the public mind from something happening to ‘them’ into one happening to ‘us.’ Losing in Ukraine is beginning to look like an unaffordable luxury. As Gerard Baker writes in a Wall Street Journal editorial: “We cannot let Mr. Putin win.”
Nevertheless, Baker cautions: “We can’t risk pushing him to the brink.”
This, then, is the context of NATO’s emerging strategy. Ukraine cannot fall, but we cannot push Putin over the edge. Part of this strategy is already apparent in the provision of defensive weapons like the anti-tank Javelin and NLAW missiles, the Stinger shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles which gave the Soviets endless heartburn in Afghanistan, and garden-variety infantry weapons like guns and RPGs. The assortment and lethality of these weapons are likely to increase over time. Similarly, a No-Fly Zone has been rejected over and over again, but it keeps popping up on the agenda.
Most important is the view that Ukraine must not fall. If this belief fully takes root, NATO will stand in the background but lean on the scales if events in the field turn against the Ukrainians.
NATO’s passive-aggressive strategy augers a war of attrition, one reminiscent of Soviet strategy in the Vietnam war against the Americans. NATO and Ukraine do not need to win outright, at least in the medium term. They can simply hold the Russians in the field and bleed them out.
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Under the circumstances, Putin lacks good options. Russia can fight and possibly win, but if the European and American public is willing to sacrifice to prevent that outcome, the odds of success become more remote.
Alternatively, the Russians can stop fighting and try to hold their current lines, just as they did in Donbas and Crimea. Will the Ukrainians stop in return or will NATO stop arming them? Given the public mood, that would seem unlikely.
Finally, the Russians could withdraw to their pre-war lines and continue to hold Donbas and Crimea. This would mean that Putin had lost the war. Nor would it end sanctions on the regime.
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It looks like Putin is going to persist for a while longer, but I doubt his mercenaries are going to turn the tide at this point. That means his weakened army will face further losses and his troops are likely to become more timid. He is also losing much more in the way of equipment that will be difficult for him to replace. The equipment he has also appears to be overrated in large part. This is especially true of his aircraft and his tanks and other armor.
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