New rules unclear as Nato and Russia resume an old game

Nato defence chiefs meet today as the alliance changes its strategic posture to counter a combative Russia, and amid fears that rising military activity and nuclear rhetoric are increasing the danger of a disastrous misjudgment by either side.

US secretary of defence Ashton Carter emphasised ahead of today's talks in Brussels that Nato was recalibrating its options for the long term, "specifically in anticipation that Russia might not change under Vladimir Putin, or even thereafter".

Analysts say Nato states have been reluctant to respond to Putin's drive to restore his country's military might, and only Russia's aggression in Ukraine has convinced them that counter measures must be taken – and they are still dwarfed by moves made by Moscow's forces.

Annexing Crimea

As well as annexing Crimea and assisting separatist militia in eastern Ukraine, Russia’s military now frequently conducts war games all over the country involving tens of thousands of personnel.

Only 2,100 Nato troops and relatively little weaponry were deployed for the alliance's much-vaunted manoeuvres in Poland this month, but the exercises were notable for the signal they sent to the world about prospects for security in Europe.

"This time of decades of peace after the cold war is over," said Poland's defence minister Tomasz Siemoniak. "We will not defend our European welfare if we don't do more for our own security."

The exercises served as a showcase for Nato’s new Very High Readiness Joint Task Force (VJTF), and featured soldiers from nine nations tackling insurgents in a scenario that was uncannily reminiscent of the conflict in Ukraine’s Donbas region.

The US has pledged warplanes, sea-launched missiles, special forces units and intelligence-gathering systems to the VJTF, which is intended to comprise some 5,000 soldiers and be able to deploy to a trouble spot within 48 hours.

The Pentagon does not intend to provide much manpower to the new unit, but noted that any deployment in an emergency could add to the 65,000 US soldiers now stationed in Europe. In the early 1990s, some 300,000 US troops were based in Europe.

Washington has also raised the possibility of stationing heavy weaponry in eastern Europe, including tanks and howitzers, for use in exercises and any security emergency that may arise; the three Baltic states and Poland, Romania and Bulgaria are seen as the most likely countries to host such US equipment, and the matter is expected to be discussed today.

Nato secretary general Jens Stoltenberg declared that the alliance was "implementing the biggest reinforcement of our collective defences since the end of the cold war".

Analysts said, however, that Nato was only acting in a limited way to reassure worried eastern members.

“What Nato is doing is a very small-scale and belated reaction to what has been happening in Russia for a long time,” said Keir Giles, an expert in Russian military and security issues at Chatham House in London.

“In terms of a strategic shift, this reduces the number of easy targets for Russian intervention, and shows Nato is willing and able to protect countries on Russia’s borders from hostile Russian intent,” he told The Irish Times.

The Kremlin sees the Nato and US plans very differently – as a direct menace to its security and a strengthening of decades of military pressure from the West. "If someone threatens our territories, we will have to aim our armed forces accordingly at the territories from where the threat comes . . . It is Nato that approaches our borders, it's not like we are moving anywhere," Putin said on a recent visit to Finland.

“As soon as some threat comes from an adjoining state, Russia must react appropriately and . . . neutralise the threat,” Putin added, in words unlikely to reassure Russian neighbours like the Baltic states or, indeed, Finland.

Foreign invasion

The fear of foreign invasion runs deep in Russia, after nearly 250 years under Mongol rule and invasion by Napoleon and Hitler, and the defensive buffer zone it enjoyed after the second World War has shrivelled with Nato’s expansion.

From the Baltic to the Black Sea, reluctant communist-era allies of Moscow have willingly joined Nato, leaving Russia to prop up separatist rebel regions to maintain a military foothold beyond its borders: South Ossetia and Abkhazia in Georgia, Transdniestria in Moldova and now Crimea and parts of eastern Ukraine.

That reduced international influence perhaps prompts the Kremlin to fall back on one of its remaining superpower attributes – a vast nuclear arsenal.

Opening a military theme park near Moscow this month, Putin responded to Nato’s eastern European plans by announcing that Russia’s military would this year receive “over 40 new intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of penetrating even the most technologically advanced missile defence systems”.

Carter, the US defence chief, criticised Putin for using “loose rhetoric” and “posturing” about nuclear weapons.

For Giles, the Chatham House analyst, Putin’s nuclear threats serve to whip up patriotic fervour at home and elicit the desired alarm abroad – even though all the missile developments announced recently have long been in the pipeline.

“Russia knows that when it make these [nuclear] statements it pushes Nato’s and the West’s buttons, and it gets the kind of response they want,” Giles said.

“The nuclear messaging from Moscow is a product of a cold war mindset, but because the West has moved on into the 21st century, these messages are received but not understood.”

Nato defence ministers are likely to insist today that we are not witnessing the start of another cold war, but the alliance must adapt and invest to counter a new kind of “hybrid” war unleashed by Russia in Ukraine, involving troops masquerading as local militia, cyber attacks and massive propaganda campaigns.

Nato must also learn how to properly read certain cold war-era features that have returned to its relationship with Moscow – particularly Russia’s nuclear threats and sharply increased air force and naval activity near Nato states.

“The potential for miscalculation and accident with dangerous consequences is much higher now,” said Giles.

“Air activity is nowhere near cold war levels, but the difference is that in the cold war, what both sides were doing was much better understood . . . It’s incredibly dangerous for Russia to send aircraft through the middle of controlled airspace with their transponders turned off and without contact with air traffic control.”

Nato neighbours

Alongside the

United States

, Russia’s closest Nato neighbours – chiefly Poland and the Baltic states – are striving to convince members further west that the Ukraine crisis is not a mere blip in relations with Moscow but the clearest indicator since the 2008 war in Georgia that Europe faces a new security paradigm.

Though the slump in oil prices and the rouble have combined with western sanctions to weaken Putin’s spending power, his plan to invest some €360 billion on new weapons for his 770,000 active-service troops through 2020 still officially stands.

According to Igor Sutyagin of Britain’s Royal United Services Institute, only by the West responding firmly to Russian moves can Europe’s security be strengthened.

“They [Russians] are like water. If they see a gap they go forward, if they see concrete they just stop,” he said. “America is just telling them, ‘We are serious’. . . On a psychological level that reduces the risk of confrontation and clash.”