COLUMN-NATO’s plans come up against messy US, French and German politics

At the Warsaw Security Forum last month, NATO's top commander, US Air Force General Alexus Grynkewich, ​took to the podium to reassure US allies that NATO had a plan in the event of war in Europe. "My 'theory ‌of victory' ​is simple," he told the assembled audience. "We will block the initial attack. If the attack persists, we will blunt it and prevent any enemy advance. And if required, we will break the enemy's forces and the operational war-fighting system arrayed against us."

The message appeared aimed squarely at the Kremlin and other potential foes – but is now also increasingly complicated by Washington’s recent actions on Ukraine and the Middle East. National elections next year in France, and 2029 in Germany, could also hand power to more Kremlin-friendly right-wing parties openly sceptical of the alliance. Western analysts and officials say that if ‌it came to a major conflict, NATO’s aerial dominance in particular would likely enable it to inflict heavy damage on Russian military facilities in key centres including the northern port of Murmansk, the Baltic enclave of Kaliningrad and President Vladimir Putin’s own hometown, St Petersburg.

Those capabilities, though, are heavily US-dependent. MIDTERM ELECTIONS COULD BRING CHANGE OF EMPHASIS IN US

The results of this week’s US midterm elections are widely seen as punishment for President Donald Trump’s so-far inconclusive war against Iran. A newly elected batch of Democratic lawmakers in both the Senate and House of Representatives now hold wildly diverging views on Washington’s position in the world and support for US allies. At the Berlin Security Conference on Wednesday, shortly after the results came out, US Ambassador to NATO Matthew Whitaker was keen to suggest nothing much would shift.

“The foreign policy of the ‌United States has not changed and I don't expect it to change with the midterm election," he said, adding that Washington remained committed to NATO's "entire treaty" including Article 5, its mutual self-defence clause. Others, though, are much less relaxed, both about the remainder of Trump’s second term and the longer-term trajectory of politics in both the US and other allied nations.

"Trump ... wants to leave ‌his mark on world history in the final two years of his presidency," former Estonian diplomat and defence official Liis Mure told Estonian radio. "He wants to tear things down." Much remains in flux and unpredictable. Trump has alarmed US allies east and west with his enthusiasm for a three-way meeting with his Chinese and Russian counterparts, first suggested by Putin in a call on October 9.

Along with his abrupt decision to abandon sanctions on Russian diesel, and widespread perceptions in the Pacific that the US came off worse in last year’s trade war with Beijing, that has fed yet more concern in foreign capitals. So have reported efforts to persuade Europe to resume purchases of Russian gas and to get Ukraine to do a peace deal largely on Russian terms. A quiet withdrawal of US combat units from the most exposed Baltic states shortly before July’s NATO summit in Ankara sent a shiver through much of the alliance – followed by considerable relief after more recent announcements that two armoured ⁠units would spend the winter ​in Lithuania while a detachment of US tanks returned to eastern Estonia.

MESSY PUBLIC SIGNALLING In European capitals, concerns ⁠about a potential major conflict on the continent are already at their greatest by far since the end of the Cold War — although both Grynkewich and officials in several of the most exposed nations have also said there is no direct intelligence that a conventional attack is imminent.

This year has also seen a further increase in what European officials say is Russian-backed sabotage and associated “hybrid warfare”. This includes suspected cyber attacks, arson at the facilities of a major Estonian defence contractor and ⁠the incursion of numerous drones and occasional other aircraft into eastern NATO airspace, as far as Leipzig airport in Germany. Those efforts, many analysts believe, are aimed not just at demoralising and splitting the alliance but also prompting European nations to reduce support for Kyiv and give the Kremlin a much freer hand when it comes to the future of Ukraine.

Publicly discussing more elements of the NATO war plan, NATO’s top commander said, was part of pushing ​back against that process, also talking down worries that US operations in the Middle East had diminished tactical weapons stocks. “With the amount of activity that is going on in terms of sabotage and arson, I think our populations around the alliance are ... a bit nervous," said Grynkewich. “And what I want to do is assure one billion citizens of our ⁠alliance that we got this. We know what we need to do. It's going to take all of us working together, but we've got this."

Still, when pressed by the Polish host to say for certain whether US combat troops would be fighting alongside European NATO counterparts in the event of a Russian invasion, he was unable to give particularly solid reassurance. "Ultimately, it's a political decision about who is providing troops where," he said, although he noted that US forces were at present "arrayed across the eastern flank".

A ⁠rapidly ​growing high-tech European defence industry should fill some of any gaps left by the US with long-range strike and air defence missiles by later in the decade — but those in the most exposed countries are now also increasingly concerned about the trajectories of French and German politics. Under current president Emmanuel Macron, France has been increasingly assertive in signalling its commitment to defending Eastern European allies, in extremis with its small but potent sea- and air-launched nuclear missiles. That era, though, might soon be at an end.

In September, French far-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen, riding high in opinion polls ahead of next year's election, repeated prior comments that Paris should withdraw from NATO’s coordinated military command structures, although she said this should not happen while the Ukraine war continued. COMPLICATED POLITICS

Far-left presidential candidate Jean-Luc Melenchon ⁠is also anti-NATO, and it is unclear where that leaves existing French commitments to NATO battle groups in Estonia and Romania, as well as any post-ceasefire European military mission in Ukraine. Germany’s race to rearm to be ready for any conflict by 2029 could yet be derailed by the Alternative for Germany (AfD), which leads opinion polls and hopes to enter government in that year's ⁠federal election. The AfD is deeply divided on its approach to defending Europe, but with significant supporters of Russian interests ⁠among its officials.

Poland – which has received plaudits from other allies for its determination to be prepared for any conflict – is largely united about the threat from Russia. But its politicians and military alike still have little clarity on long-term discussions about the US basing thousands more troops in Poland, an idea first put forward in Trump’s first term.

More immediately, there is much speculation about whether or not Trump plans another round of heavy military strikes against Iran. US forces in Europe have at any rate stepped up preparations for any Iranian response. On Monday, US European Command – also led by Grynkewich – ‌launched a campaign to persuade US personnel and their families to vary ‌their routines and report any suspicious behaviour in the vicinity of their bases.

Washington's routine for Iran has already shifted several times between negotiations and war since Trump returned to office in January last ​year. US allies should not expect policy shifts to end any time soon. (Editing by Kevin Liffey)