Putin may test NATO alliance with limited attack in coming years, US intelligence assesses- report
Russian President Vladimir Putin may launch a limited assault on a NATO country in order to test the alliance’s resolve in the next few years, The Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, citing new US intelligence reports.
While the US previously assessed that Putin wouldn’t attack a NATO country while at war with Ukraine, a new assessment earlier this year found that pressure within Russia to secure a victory may change Putin’s plans, US officials told WSJ.
Ukraine’s drones have inflicted growing damage on Russia’s army and oil industry while Russian forces continue to sustain heavy casualties.
Russia has also appeared to be conducting probing attacks to test NATO’s resolve, WSJ wrote, pointing towards drones flown into Romania and a Russian cruise missile that landed in Poland.
Putin may see the possibility of fracturing the NATO alliance as his chance for a victory.
Russia wants to reduce NATO’s credibility, says a foreign policy expert
“The question mark is how the United States would respond in that case,” Heather Conley, senior fellow with the American Enterprise Institute, told WSJ while speaking on a possible Russian incursion.
“It has always been a goal [of Russia’s] to challenge the credibility of NATO and to separate the United States from its allies,” Conley added.
A limited land incursion is the most extreme scenario, with reports rating its likelihood extremely low, at least initially. Such an action would trigger NATO’s Article Five, committing its members to collective defense.
However, Article Five is unclear about a mandated response to other threats Russia may employ, such as cyber or hybrid threats.
“This has always been NATO’s challenge to respond to a sub-Article Five attack, and it’s been very true that to this point, NATO allies have preferred not to escalate,” Conley told WSJ.
This comes as reports emerge over the US’s diminishing stockpile of weapons due to transfers to Ukraine and use in the war with Iran.
Long-range Precision Strike Missiles and Army Tactical Missile Systems, and short-range Stinger surface-to-air missiles, are included in the US’s at-risk stockpiles, WSJ cited US officials as saying.
In a potential conflict with Russia, these systems would be crucial to repel a land invasion, according to Tom Karako of the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
US President Donald Trump has pushed back on reports of diminished stockpiles in a post on Truth Social on Wednesday, writing that the US has “massive amounts of ‘munitions,'” and that additional munitions were being manufactured and shipped to the US as needed.
