For Europe and NATO, a Russian invasion is no longer unthinkable

President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia once declared the dissolution of the Soviet empire “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century.” At the time, in 2005, few expected him to do anything about it.

But then came Russia's occupation of Abkhazia and South Ossetia from Georgia in 2008, support for Ukrainian separatists and annexation of Crimea in 2014 and, most resoundingly, the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Now, with the rise of former President Donald J. Trump, who has vowed in the past to leave NATO, and recently threatened never to come to the aid of his alliesThere is growing concern among European countries that Mr Putin could invade a NATO country in the next decade and that they might have to face his forces without US support.

That could happen within five years of the end of the war in Ukraine, according to some officials and experts who believe that would be enough time for Moscow to rebuild and rearm its military.

“We've always kind of suspected that this is the only existential threat we have,” Major General Veiko-Vello Palm, commander of the Estonian army's main land combat division, said of a possible Russian invasion.

“The past few years have also made it very, very clear that as a military alliance, many countries are not ready to conduct large-scale operations – which in simple layman's terms means that many NATO militaries are not ready. to fight Russia,” General Palm said during an interview in December. “So it's not very reassuring.”

Concerns about what experts describe as Putin's imperial ambitions have long been part of the psyche of states bordering or uncomfortably close to Russia. “I think for Estonia it was 1991” when his country's alarm bells started ringing, General Palm said wryly, referring to the year Estonia declared independence from the crumbling Soviet Union.

Just as Putin downplayed the Biden administration's warnings that he was planning to invade Ukraine, Moscow has dismissed concerns that Russia is planning to attack NATO. The head of Russia's foreign intelligence service, Sergei Naryshkin, said this in a statement job interview last week with the state news agency RIA Novosti that they are part of a Western disinformation campaign to stoke dissatisfaction with Moscow.

European concerns have been further fueled in recent months by Putin's militarization of the Russian economy and massive increases in military and arms spending, while at the same time some Republicans in Congress are seeking to limit U.S. aid to Ukraine.

“If anyone thinks this is only about Ukraine, he is fundamentally mistaken,” said President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine. warned this month at the World Economic Forum. “Possible directions and even a timeline of new Russian aggression outside Ukraine are becoming increasingly clear.”

NATO insists it is ready to defend the borders of all 31 member states that have jointly increased national defense spending through a estimated at $190 billion since 2014, when Russia first invaded Ukraine. But that was the start of rebuilding what had become a hollowed-out military network across Europe in the decades after the end of the Cold War, a process that could take years, analysts say.

That “peace dividend,” as the shift was called, diverted trillions of dollars from military budgets to increase spending on health care, education and housing. Europe's defense industry also shrank as demand for battle tanks, fighter jets and submarines plummeted.

In 2006, the top defense officials of every NATO country worried that they would be unprepared for conflict agreed to spend spend at least 2 percent of their annual domestic production on their armies. But it was not a requirement, and when military spending hit a low in 2014, only three of NATO's 28 member states met the standard at the time. Last year, only 11 countries had reached the 2 percent threshold, although a Western diplomat said last week that about 20 member states are expected to reach the threshold by 2024.

The alliance will test its readiness during a months-long military exercise – involving 90,000 troops – that began last week and that officials say is the largest exercise NATO has organized since the end of the Cold War. That the exercise is a test of how NATO forces would respond to a Russian invasion has frayed nerves in border states, particularly the Baltic states and Scandinavian countries.

“I am not saying that things will go wrong tomorrow, but we must realize that it is not a given that we will have peace,” said Admiral Rob Bauer of the Netherlands, chairman of the NATO Military Committee. told reporters on January 18.

Noting NATO plans to respond to the two biggest threatshe added: “That is why we are preparing for a conflict with Russia,” as well as what NATO considers its other biggest threat, terrorism.

The NATO exercise known as Steadfast defender 2024According to Christopher Skaluba, the director of the Transatlantic Security Initiative at the Atlantic Council in Washington, this is just one reason why allies are approaching a “fever pitch” of concern that Russia could invade sooner rather than later.

He said Russia's resilience to Ukraine's Western-equipped counteroffensive last summer had shown that Putin could “hang in there for the long haul” and could reorient its economy and population to rebuild the military within three to five years. “Just because it's all been eaten in Ukraine doesn't mean they won't be on the board for 10 years or more,” Mr. Skaluba said.

And the prospect of Mr. Trump returning to the White House has forced Europeans to come to grips with the possibility that U.S. support for Ukraine, or even its leadership role in NATO, could be drastically reduced as soon as next year, Mr. Skaluba. .

Taken together, “that's an overestimation of these broader concerns about Russia,” Mr. Skaluba said. “It is precisely this unique mix of factors that makes this long-held fear of Russian reconstruction, or a Russian attack on NATO, just a little more tense than it has been in the past few years.”

Concerns have only increased in recent weeks.

In an interview from January 21Norway's top military commander warned that “we have little time” to build defenses against an unpredictable Russia. “There is now a period that will last maybe one, two, maybe three years, where we will have to invest even more in a secure defense,” said the commander, General Eirik Kristoffersen.

On the same day, President Sauli Niinistö of Finland attempted to allay concerns that had arisen reports that one Steadfast Defender scenario will test how NATO would respond to a Russian invasion of Finland. “None of the war games played in recent decades have played out in real terms, and I would not overreact here,” Mr Niinistö said on a national radio programme.

And this month, Sweden's top military commander, General Micael Byden, and the Minister of Civil Protection, Carl-Oskar Bohlin, each warned that Sweden must be prepared for war.

“Let me say it with the power of the office” and “with unadorned clarity: war could break out in Sweden,” Mr Bohlin said at a security conference.

The warnings sparked a storm of criticism from Sweden's opposition party and experts, who called the comments scaremongering and hyperbolic.

“Swedes are wondering what the government knows that they don't know,” said Magdalena Andersson, head of the opposition Social Democrats. wrote in a follow-up op-ed article. “Frightening the population will not make Sweden safer.”

Yet Sweden is poised to join NATO, following Finland's accession last year, as both countries set aside years of military non-alignment amid nervousness over Russian aggression. And even as he described the commotion as “exaggerated,” Sweden's Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson made it clear that Russia remains a top threat.

“There is nothing to indicate that war is now imminent, but it is clear that the risk of war has increased significantly,” Kristersson said in an interview with Sveriges Radio.

It has not escaped the notice of the Estonian government that the landmass that Russia seized in the first days of its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 – before being pushed back to the current frontlines in eastern Ukraine – is about the size of the Baltic states .

“Their ambition is to restore their power,” said Colonel Mati Tikerpuu, the commander of Estonia's 2nd Infantry Brigade, which is stationed about 30 kilometers from the Russian border.

“We don't think there is a question of whether or not Russia will try to invade,” Colonel Tikerpuu said last month from his command headquarters at the Taara Army Base. For many Estonians, he said, “It's just a matter of when.”

Johanna Lemola contributed reporting from Helsinki, Finland.