Russia may not start an all-out war with NATO, but already has plans to destroy it from within
Some politicians say Russia poses the gravest threat to European security since World War II.
But Russia has been weakened by the Ukraine war and is in no position to attack NATO, experts say.
Instead, they say Putin wants to weaken and undermine NATO from within.
The era of relative peace and prosperity the West has enjoyed since the end of World War II may be coming to an end.
In March, Donald Tusk, Poland's prime minister, said Europe was in a "prewar" era and that if Russia defeated Ukraine, it could spell trouble for the security of the continent.
"I don't want to scare anyone, but war is no longer a concept from the past," Tusk said in an interview with several European media outlets. "It is real. In fact, it already started more than two years ago," referring to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
It's one of a series of increasingly stark warnings that the war in Ukraine could be a prelude to a much bigger conflict.
German military-planning documents that leaked in January laid out a scenario where Russia launched a massive 2024 offensive to take advantage of waning Western support in Ukraine.
The documents, obtained by Bild, said Russia could then turn its sights on NATO members in Eastern Europe as it seeks to destabilize its enemies through cyberattacks and internal chaos.
Late last year, Poland's national-security agency said Russia could launch attacks on NATO countries within three years.
Article 5 of NATO's charter treaty stipulates that NATO nations must protect each other from attack, which means a Russian attack on one member could spark a war involving several nuclear-armed states.
But whether Putin really intends to attack a NATO country — and what an attack might look like — remains unclear.
In March, Putin said he doesn't intend to attack any NATO members, describing such claims as "complete nonsense."
However, Western military chiefs are not convinced. A month earlier, Putin threatened NATO with the prospect of a nuclear attack over its support for Ukraine.
He alluded to a suggestion by France's president Emmanuel Macron that NATO could send troops to Ukraine to support its fight against Russia.
Geopolitical analysts told Business Insider that Russia has been weakened by the war in Ukraine and is in no position to attack a NATO state.
But Putin is playing a long game, and the outcome of the Ukraine war and Russia's long-standing bid to corrode NATO will be key factors in determining whether Russia wants to attack.
Putin plots to corrode NATO
Philip Ingram, a former UK military intelligence officer, told BI that Putin has one key advantage over many of his enemies.
Democratically elected Western leaders often make plans that are mindful of elections that take place around every four years; Putin is an authoritarian with no serious challengers to his power — that means he can look decades ahead
"He does not want, at this moment, a direct confrontation with NATO," Ingram said. "But he thinks in a different way and plans in a different way to we do in the West, and therefore the way NATO countries do."
"So, his ambition in growing is not going to be that he will attack NATO and NATO countries next year, but he will set the conditions to be able to," he added.
Analysts like Ingram think Putin realizes that attacking a NATO member now would exact a punishing cost on Russia. Instead, Putin could seek to weaken NATO from within to create soft spots he can strike in the future.
To do this, Putin will likely intensify Russia's so-called "hybrid warfare" against NATO countries.
Hybrid warfare "often plays out in gray zones below the threshold of a conventional war," an article on NATO's website said.
"The instruments or tools employed and fused together to unleash hybrid warfare are often difficult to discern, attribute, and corroborate," it added.
These tools can include spreading conspiracy theories and disinformation, boosting extremist parties in certain countries, stoking terror threats, and launching cyberattacks to undermine the foundations of NATO countries.
"The threat posed by Russia to NATO is unlikely to be an invasion, it's more likely to come from a range of other military and nonmilitary threats — what are often called hybrid threats," Ruth Deyermond, an expert on the Russian military at King's College London, told BI.
A core Russian aim is to prise away the US from its commitment to defend its European allies, either by hoping it gets embroiled in another costly military campaign elsewhere or it gets tired of NATO.
"For this reason, I expect we'll see Russia using all of the tricks and capabilities in its cupboard to undermine Western unity over the years to come," Bryden Spurling, an analyst with the RAND Corporation, told BI.
A covert war is already underway
Some analysts say that Russia is already engaged in war with NATO — albeit covertly.
Last Friday, a group of men in the UK were charged with conducting an arson attack on a Ukraine-linked business on behalf of Russian intelligence.
And in recent months, Russia has also been accused of scrambling GPS airplane-navigation systems in northern Europe and the Baltic states. Both of these are examples of hybrid warfare.
Robert Dover, a professor of international security at the University of Hull, said the question of whether Russia will attack a NATO country is already redundant. "Russia is already engaged in a meaningful conflict with NATO countries and their allies," he said.
The Ukraine war exposed serious limits to NATO's military power, as the alliance has struggled to produce enough artillery shells and ammunition for Ukraine.
While Congress stalled on providing more military aid, European NATO countries were unable to make up the shortfall, and Ukraine's forces were significantly outgunned on parts of the frontline, which were close to collapse.
The US recently sent more aid, but Spurling said the situation exposed deep problems with NATO that Russia could exploit.
"This conflict has exposed how underprepared Western militaries are for war that's not on their terms," he added. "While we maintain that fragility, there is a greater risk that Russia thinks it could chance its arm."
Russia has been weakened by the war with Ukraine
But Russia also faces problems of its own. Its military has been depleted by the Ukraine invasion. According to some US estimates, 300,000 soldiers have been killed or wounded, its stock of armored vehicles has been decimated, and its commanders have made consistently bad decisions.
"It's hard to imagine a near- or medium-term scenario in which the Russian government has the resources to engage in another war on anything like the scale of Ukraine," Deyermond told BI.
An attack on a NATO country would come at such a devastating cost that it could imperil Putin's grip on power.
"War with NATO would destroy Russia — as Putin will know very well — and even if he thinks there's a possibility that the US might not step up to defend a fellow NATO member from a Russian invasion, he shows no sign of wanting to find out by playing nuclear Russian roulette," she added.
Ingram said Putin is determined to achieve some form of victory in Ukraine — however long it takes — so that he can use it as a platform to plan Russia's next campaign.
After Ukraine, Putin will survey the field and could be keen to exploit further opportunities to expand Russian power.
"He wants the Soviet Union back in the hands of a Russian leader — and that's his ultimate goal," he added.
Correction: May 2, 2024 — An earlier version of this story misstated information about arson charges against a group of men in the UK. There was only one arson attack, not multiple attacks.
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