From the Telegraph / Yahoo!News:
"We can singe Putin’s beard, and do it without starting World War Three
Last night, Poland reported a significant violation of its airspace by Russian drones during a large-scale Russian attack on Ukraine. Exact numbers are yet to be determined but Poland is saying at least 19 objects were tracked and those that were deemed to be a threat – perhaps three or four – were neutralised. President Zelensky stated that “at least eight were aimed towards Poland” before adding a little perspective by saying that 415 drones and 40 missiles were fired at Ukraine.
Polish and other Nato fighter jets, including Dutch F-35s, were scrambled to intercept, resulting in several drones being shot down. One report indicates that a drone struck a house in Poland. The incident led to temporary closures of several Polish airports, including Warsaw’s Chopin and Modlin, as well as Lublin and Rzeszów-Jasionka, to ensure safety during the military response.
Diplomatically and politically, for now, we are in the “fist shaking” phase where the alliance’s solidarity is proclaimed, extra air sorties are ordered and everyone works out what to do next. The great risk is that, basically, nothing further will be done. We have been here before – fear of escalation leading to inaction. Indeed it’s what led to this war in the first place. How many times does Putin have to show that he doesn’t care about words or sanctions, and that the only language he understands is bombs and bullets? How many times do we need to watch exceptional behaviour become normal through repetition followed by inaction?
What’s needed is a strong response, but not one that could be deemed an escalation. In fact what would be best is if it was actually de-escalatory. Putin has violated Nato airspace with drones clearly aimed into Poland, regardless of Belarussian suggestions that they were jammed.
Nato attacking into Russian airspace would be no more than a tit-for-tat response, and would make sense given that the drones aimed at Poland appear to have come from Russia, but it would not be de-escalatory. On the other hand, action against targets outside Russia would be less aggressive than what Russia has done – and could also be very damaging for Putin.
Striking targets in Ukrainian territory would probably involve an element of what’s called Suppression of Enemy Air Defences (SEAD), as most of Ukraine lies under the footprint of powerful Russian S-400 anti-air missiles. There are Nato weapons which can penetrate this envelope, such as the ATACMS ballistic missile which has already been used against S-400 sites to good effect by the Ukrainians. There’s also the stealthy JASSM cruise missile, which Poland has in its armoury. It’s also worth noting that the S-400 is no more than an upgrade of the preceding S-300, which recently proved completely useless in Iranian service against Israel and the US, so it seems clear that Nato (certainly if backed by US intelligence and electronic warfare) need not be overly concerned by it.
Indeed a SEAD or partial SEAD operation would seem like an end in itself. If Russian S-400 coverage were degraded or suppressed altogether, while Ukraine still retained its dangerous US Patriots and other defences, that would offer a huge battlefield advantage. If Ukrainian jets could operate above Russia’s army, and Russia’s planes remained reluctant to get too near the front (as is the case today) the stalemate on the ground could be broken.
Proper SEAD would probably mean hitting some targets, such as S-400 radars, which were actually in Russia and Belarus. It would be quite possible to arrange for this to be done by the Ukrainians with Western supplied weapons, however – this has in fact already happened on several occasions. It would be important to focus on radars and largely ignore the actual missile launchers: Russia has established massive S-400 missile production and can replace these fairly easily.
A SEAD campaign involving no Nato action against Russia would be de-escalatory and yet would hurt Putin a lot. This is a question of escalation tolerance: and we should not tolerate any more. This was a deliberate attack on a Nato country, not to cause damage but to test our response. That the diplomatic rhetoric is already moving away from this being an Article 5 moment suggests that Putin will get what he wants: no response.
We’ve tried diplomatic, economic and limited military support responses so far and it hasn’t worked. To repeat, 415 drones and 40 missiles were fired into Ukraine last night alone. To avoid conforming to the definition of insanity we now need to try something else. I spent my whole career in a service whose role is to prevent conflict, but sometimes it comes to you anyway, and you need to be ready to act when it does.
It therefore seems to me that today’s response options are clear: a precision kinetic response fully enabled by Nato forces, or more pointless hand wringing. One of them creates a serious downside for Putin, the other sends a clear message that we’re still scared and he can keep on pushing.
Sadly, I swear I can hear John Cleese in Monty Python’s Life of Brian saying, “right, this calls for immediate discussion…”"
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While I agree with many of the author's points, particularly that his statement that this war is the result of inaction, I think we must emphasize that using the words "escalation" (deescalation) and "World War III" by itself means that we are cowering in fear in front of Putin, and he lives rent-free in our heads. To defeat him, and to survive, we must stop fearing him, as the Ukrainians did.
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