.jpeg?itok=hBPW-1aF&v=1788411073)
Nato must answer Russian air provocations with action, not ambiguity
For all the defence budget increases, European political will is uneven. However, issuing threats that are not enforced is dangerous
There is a taxonomy of weakness. At the bottom lies bad policy and worse rhetoric. Above that sits a particular kind of failure that is quietly corrosive: the proclamation of a “red line” that is never enforced. That is what we are now witnessing in Europe.
Asked about the drones at the Valdai Discussion Club in Sochi, Putin mockingly said, “OK, I won’t do it any more.” But these are all calibrated tests of will. A fighter that lingers where it has no right to be must be shot down – after warnings.
Russia’s incremental pattern is not novel: Georgia in 2008, Crimea in 2014, Donbas in 2022. Aggression does not so much explode as seep, and President Vladimir Putin doesn’t advance because he is endowed with irresistible strength. He advances because he calculates Western weakness.