Is the U.S. Ready for a Russian Invasion of Eastern Europe?

T he Baltic nations of Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia, along with Poland, Slovakia, Romania, and Bulgaria, are all watching Vladimir Putin’s military buildup in eastern Europe with great unease. Each of them was controlled by Russia during its previous incarnation as the Soviet Union, and none of them wishes to return to that subjugation. That’s why they originally sought membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and have increased their own defense spending to meet, and in some cases surpass, the 2-percent-of-GDP goal that the alliance first agreed upon in 2014. NATO membership brings with it the guarantee of security that the U.S. has provided to Europe for 70 years, and with an aggressive Russia looming to the East, security is very much a concern.

There are, however, several problems with this calculation. First, the botched withdrawal of American forces from Afghanistan and the abandonment of American citizens and loyal allies there have dealt a significant blow to the U.S.’s credibility everywhere else. Second, the U.S. Army, the linchpin of security in Europe, largely returned to the United States years ago. Finally, due to Russia’s investments in anti-access area-denial weapons at its enclave in Kaliningrad, the U.S. Navy can no longer get Army units to Europe in time to blunt a Russian onslaught should one occur. Russia has amassed a force of over 100,000 troops along its border with Ukraine, including formations of heavy artillery, armored troop carriers, and main battle tanks. It has also already initiated cyber-attacks against critical infrastructure in Ukraine. If Russian forces should suddenly roll over Ukraine and then position themselves to threaten the Baltic nations, Poland, Romania, and Bulgaria, NATO will find it difficult to respond quickly.

As part of the European Defense Initiative, the U.S. has built a cache of pre-positioned ordnance, including enough equipment for an armored brigade, in Poland. The men needed to make use of that equipment and man the tanks and armored personnel carriers would be flown in from the United States at the first sign of trouble. Additionally, NATO has established a response-force brigade (5,000 personnel) and enhanced forward-presence battalions (400 personnel), but it must be admitted that these will serve as nothing more than a speed bump if Russia initiates a rolling start and then sprints across Ukraine, a nation that is just under 800 miles wide and possesses modern road and rail systems. Should they meet with minimal resistance, Russia’s armored forces, with adequate logistical support, could cross Ukraine and be on NATO’s doorstep in ten days or less. They would confront a NATO ill-prepared for the threat they posed.

Over the past 20 years, NATO nations have decreased their investments in mobile armor and artillery, by far the most expensive of the ground forces, and the United States has not only followed this path but also pulled its last permanently based armored unit out of Europe. The U.S. Army, which once fielded numerous armored divisions of up to 12,000 to 16,000 men each, now retains but one, although there are smaller armored brigade combat teams (BCTs) incorporated into the six standing infantry divisions and one mountain division that remain in the active force. The simple truth that few wish to reckon with is that, aside from air-power assets — the F-35 would most certainly get its baptism-by-fire against Russia’s fighters and its advanced S-400 missiles — under the best circumstances only one or two U.S. armored brigades would be available during the first 72 hours. Thus, only 10,000 men, some transported by air to join up with pre-positioned equipment and others previously assigned to the region as part of a rotational force, would be available to aid our European allies and blunt a rolling Russian assault.

Such an understanding emerges from an acknowledgement that armored units cannot be flown to Europe. The men, their equipment, and their vehicles are too heavy and must travel by sea. It would take a minimum of three days to onload tanks and other armored vehicles in the United States, whether in Texas or any of the available ports on the east coast. The ships that would carry them, purpose-designed roll-on/roll-off cargo vessels, would then take four to five days to cross an Atlantic Ocean that is no longer controlled by the United States and its NATO allies. Russia has spent ten years designing and building the new Severodvinsk class attack submarine. A derivative of Russia’s previous highly effective Akula and Alfa class fast-attack designs, the Severodvinsk has allowed Putin to challenge allied supremacy over, on, and under the Atlantic at the same time as NATO has divested of its own subs and submarine-hunting frigates.

If the transports survived their Atlantic crossing, they would not be able to traverse the Baltic Sea to their preferred offloading ports in Poland or one of the Baltic nations; the Kaliningrad-based S-400 surface-to-air missile (250-mile range) and Iskander surface-to-surface missile (175-mile range) give Russia the ability to control the surface of the Baltic Sea east of Denmark. (It should also be noted that the Baltic is too shallow and dangerous for large, missile-laden U.S. nuclear submarines to operate safely within its waters without being quickly detected.)

These facts would render it necessary for the ships carrying American Army units to offload their cargos in Belgium or France, and then load their vehicles onto railcars for transport to eastern Europe. This process would take another seven to ten days, and would be complicated by the fact that eastern and western European rail networks, as an artifact of the Cold War, lack uniform railroad gauges. The net result is that it would take nearly three weeks for American armored forces to travel from the U.S. to the front lines of a conflict which by then would almost certainly be over.

NATO and the United States need to understand that for the moment, a massive return of forces to Europe will not be the answer to the Russian threat, simply because there are not a massive number of appropriate, armored forces available for transport. Europe must take steps not only to increase its defense spending, but to also grow its forces, supplementing them with the types of platforms needed to confront the Russian threat at their doorstep. Additionally, the U.S. Army must return its strategic focus to Europe rather than aimlessly casting about for a role in the Pacific. It should rebuild its armored elements, and advocate for a return to a forward-base model, perhaps establishing new bases in eastern European nations rather than returning to its previous garrisons in Germany. While this might run counter to agreements made during the 1990s between Presidents Yeltsin and Clinton, the simple fact is that Russia’s annexation of Crimea, occupation of parts of Georgia and the Donbass, and persistent threats against Ukraine have rendered such agreements moot.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Navy and its NATO allies must confront the threat of Russia’s naval units in the Atlantic and in particular its new generation of submarines. They need more attack submarines, towed-array-sonar-equipped surveillance ships, and frigates, and they need them soon. Because without them, Europe could soon be rendered a continent the United States cannot reach or aid.