The British counterterrorism has started to investigate Russia for putting an incendiary device on a plane. This plane then later caught fire at a British warehouse in July at Birmingham. There have been similar reports all across the European continent recently. For example in Leipzig, there was another package that went up in flames. This also happened in July. 9 months ago, Poland arrested 9 people who were suspected of arson and physical assault on the behalf of Russia. Lithuania also had an incident where an Ikea warehouse was burned down. This attack was also connected back to Russia. The most dangerous thing that Russia was suspected to have planned is an attack on the C.E.O. of Rheinmetall. Rheinmetall is an arm dealer that has shown explicit support to Ukraine. Luckily, American and German agents were able to foil the attempted assassination.
Why has Russia started to commit these attacks?
While the Russian-Ukraine war rages on, Russia is also having a shadow war with NATO. This shadow war consists of trying to destabilize NATO through terroristic actions. Russia has been engaging in cyberattacks, attempted assassination attempts , and terrorism plots. There have been an estimated 150 attacks across NATO territory since the outbreak of the Russia-Ukraine war. The NATO website states that the allyship of countries does not want to start conflict with Russia ,but will continue to defend themselves against Russian attacks. It explicitly states that it will counter Russian disinformation. Putin also declared his right to attack countries that continue to supply Ukraine with defensive weapons. This shadow war has caused many catastrophes in NATO territories like the ones listed above. However, NATO has taken a few steps to try to stop these attacks. They first improved their cyber-defense to stop Russian cyberattacks. They have started to crack down against Russia’s covert oil exportation. More defensive actions they have done are protecting key infrastructure. They have also started increasing military exercises as a way to warn Russia about what they are doing.
Could this lead to a future war between NATO and Russia?
There is the possibility that this shadow war turns into a real one. Vladmir Putin has recently warned NATO that “Western help in Russia has reached a red line.” The Russian defense minister has also implied that Russia must be ready to engage in conflict with NATO. With the possible threat of war on the horizon, people want to know who would win a war. Dues to Ukraine being able to stall Russia, the Telegraph predicted that NATO would be able to beat Russia even without their biggest player the United States. Russia has demonstrated various military weaknesses in the war with Ukraine. Ukraine with its small force having been able to push Russia back in most areas. These weaknesses included logistical and hardware issues within the Russian military. NATO also has a vast amount of resources that would combat Russia. NATO possesses thousands of main battle tanks, and many advanced jet fighters. This means that NATO possesses many aerial and armored advantages, as well as next generation US weapons like the F-35 fifth generation aircraft. They also have a numerical advantage over Russia. NATO has 1.5 million active personnel not including the United States compared to Russia’s one million. With the United States, they have 3.3 million active personnel. NATO’s biggest advantages are combined arm operation. As an alliance of multiple countries, these operations combined strengths while mitigating weaknesses. It is reasonable to estimate that NATO would be able to defeat Russia if it works in unity. With a unified NATO, Russia would not be able to defeat them unless they started rapidly advancing their military capabilities.
Written by Samarth Irani
