NATO Boosts Forces in East to Deter Russian Menace

Russia’s aggression in Ukraine has radically changed NATO’s defence posture on its eastern periphery, resulting in a tenfold increase in troop deployments there.

As the war in Ukraine enters its fourth month, and as Russia continues to threaten NATO countries that support Ukraine’s fight, the alliance has radically boosted its defences on its eastern flank.

In an unprecedented move since the end of the Cold War, NATO allies have boosted their defence capabilities tenfold on their eastern and south-eastern flanks.

Since the establishment of the so-called forward presence in 2017, NATO has stationed four multinational battalion-size battlegroups in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland, totalling about 4,000 combat ready troops.

Four months into the Ukraine war, the alliance has doubled the number of its battlegroups from four to eight and has deployed them also in Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary and Slovakia.

The total number of battle-ready forces now comprises some 40,000 troops. The US on its own has also moved additional troops to these countries based on its own bilateral agreements with them.

BIRN looks at some of the recent NATO military deployments on its eastern flank, from Bulgaria to Poland, designed not only to boost the armed forces of these countries but also to send a clear message that NATO’s article 5 – which deems an attack on one member an attack on them all – is alive and kicking.

It has learned that more than half of these 40,000 troops have been deployed in Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary and Slovakia and Poland.

Designed to boost capabilities and deter

At a first glance, stretching 40,000 troops along NATO’s 2,500-kilometres-long eastern and south-eastern periphery may not sound that much.

But on closer inspection, it can be seen that these troops are not there to operate alone but as integrated with the host countries’ own national armed forces.

The five countries that BIRN looked at – Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary and Slovakia and Poland – already muster a considerable combined force of 259,000 troops.

NATO says these already show in practice the power of “interoperability”, and that the extra forces being sent there are being integrated and embedded within these countries’ national forces.

As such, most of these forces do not operate from a single base but in different detachments, operating in synergy with the home forces in different parts of the countries, using the existing base infrastructure there.

Poland is the strongest of the five with some 120,000 troops in its armed forces. Slovakia has only 13,000 soldiers, Hungary 24,000, Romania 76,000 and Bulgaria 26,000.

Poland alone has received at least 10,500 extra allied troops, the bulk of them, some 8,000, from the US.

Slovakia hosts some 3,000 allied NATO troops, while Hungary has seen some 800 NATO troops deployed.

Romania has seen the deployment of some 4,300 allied troops, about 1,000 of which are US forces. Bulgaria is host to some 2,000 NATO troops.

At the Bucharest 9 Summit held on Friday last week in Romania, a summit of the nine countries forming NATO’s eastern flank, participants again said they wanted a consolidated NATO presence there.

This presence should be “unitary and coherent, robust, credible and sustainable, especially on the Black Sea,” Romanian President Klaus Iohannis said after the summit that he co-chaired with his Polish counterpart, Andrzej Duda.

Duda added that this NATO presence should comprise of units formed from tactical groups to brigades with over 3,000 soldiers, and that the particular focus would be boosting NATO’s presence in the Black Sea area.

The B9 format, established at the initiative of Duda and Iohannis soon after Russia’s first invasion of Ukraine in 2014, includes NATO’s eastern flank allies, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania and Slovakia.

NATO’s Patriot missile air defense system is placed at the Sliac airbase in Slovakia, May 6, 2022. Photo by: EPA-EFE/MARTIN DIVISEK

Tailor-made to fill gaps and mend weaknesses

A closer inspection of the available data for the five countries by BIRN reveals that the NATO assets sent to these five countries seem tailored to fill perceived gaps and weaknesses in each of the national defence systems.

For example, in Bulgaria, which has struggled to modernise its air force and acquire modern fighter jets, NATO allies have put an emphasis on that.

To supplement Bulgaria’s aging fleet of Soviet-made MIG-29 jet interceptors, Spain has sent some of its Eurofighter Typhoons, the Netherlands has sent eight state-of-the-art stealth F-35 fighters, and additional French and US fighter jets are said to be arriving as well.

Slovakia, which recently handed some of its Soviet-made but still very capable S-300 air defence system to Ukraine, has received additional air defence coverage from US Patriot air defence systems.

Along the same line, Romania’s air defences have been boosted by French systems.

Poland, which recently revealed donating hundreds of battle tanks and infantry fighting vehicles to Ukraine, has obtained air defence coverage by US Patriot missiles as well as additional armoured and mechanised infantry forces designed to fill the gap left by the donated equipment.

Commander of the Royal Netherlands Air Force, Lieutenant General Denis Luyt stands in front of the Lockheed Martin F-35 Lightning jet, in ‘Graf Ignatievo’ Aviation Base in Plovdiv, Bulgaria, April 14, 2022. Photo by EPA-EFE/VASSIL DONEV

Not just combat-ready forces

Moreover, the ground forces sent to these five countries under NATO’s so-called forward presence, while being the first line of defence and ready to engage in combat at a moment’s notice, are not all of it.

The US and other countries have also increased their activities in the region and sent additional forces, and while some of these US troops are not formally part of NATO’s forward presence, they are also a contributing factor.

Even more resources are standing at the ready in the neighbouring countries, deeper into NATO territory, and at sea, to offer additional firepower, logistical support, air power and recognisance, if need be.

In total, NATO has declared that in order to protect its eastern flank, besides the 40,000 troops, it has now also deployed some 130 allied aircraft on high alert as well as some 140 allied ships at sea. A significant boost to this force is the deployment of 100,000 US troops in Europe.