BRUSSELS – The Dutch are sending missiles for air defense. Estonians send Javelin anti-tank missiles. Poles and Latvians send Stinger surface-to-air missiles. The Czechs send machine guns, sniper rifles, pistols and ammunition.
Even former neutrals such as Sweden and Finland are sending weapons. And Germany, long allergic to sending weapons to conflict zones, is sending Stingers and other missiles fired from the shoulder.
In all, about 20 countries – most of them NATO and the European Union, but not all – are sending weapons to Ukraine to fight Russian invaders and arm a riot if the war gets that far.
At the same time, NATO is moving military equipment and another 22,000 troops to member countries bordering Russia and Belarus to calm them down and increase deterrence.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has brought European countries together, as never before, minds concentrated on the greater threat to European security posed by Russia to President Vladimir Putin.
“European security and defense have developed more in the last six days than in the last two decades,” Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Union’s executive branch, told the European Parliament on Tuesday. Brussels has focused on “Europeanising” Member States’ efforts to help Ukraine with arms and money, and has highlighted the bloc as an important military player.
But whether European weapons will continue to reach the Ukrainian battlefield in time to change things is far from certain. As much as Brussels is proud of its efforts, it is a strategy that risks encouraging wider war and possible revenge by Mr Putin. The influx of deadly military aid to Ukraine from Poland, a NATO member, aims to eventually kill Russian soldiers.
Mr Putin already sees NATO as committed to threatening or even destroying Russia by supporting Ukraine, as he reiterated in recent speeches, even as he raised the nuclear alarm of his own forces to warn Europe and the United States of the risks of interference. .
World wars have started because of smaller conflicts, and the war’s proximity to NATO allies carries the danger that it could attract other countries in unexpected ways.
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg struck back on his regular topics on Tuesday when he visited a Polish air base. “Putin’s war affects us all, and NATO allies will always stand together to defend and defend each other,” he said. “Our commitment to Article 5, our collective defense clause, is ironclad.
“There should be no room for miscalculations or misunderstandings,” Mr Stoltenberg said last week. “We will do everything we can to protect every inch of NATO territory.
But for now, the battle is in Ukraine, and while NATO and the European Union have made it clear that their troops will not fight Russia there, they are actively committed to helping Ukrainians defend themselves.
Western weapons have entered Ukraine in relatively large but undiscovered quantities in the last few days. If it can be deployed quickly, it will have an impact.
Speed is essential as long as the Russian invasion of Ukraine continues and as long as Ukraine’s border with Poland remains open. Russian troops are trying to encircle cities and cut off most of the Ukrainian army east of the Dnieper River, making it much more difficult to supply.
While 21 of the 27 European Union countries are also members of NATO, efforts to rapidly move equipment and weapons to Ukraine from Poland are made by individual countries and are formally neither a NATO nor an EU operation.
The French say the EU military headquarters is trying to coordinate the pressure. Britain and the United States are doing the same, creating something called, deliberately soft and neutral, the International Donor Coordination Center. It is doubtful that Mr Putin will be misled by the name.
In fact, even if no NATO troops ever cross into Ukraine, and even if convoys of materials are driven to the border by non-uniformed personnel or contractors in ordinary trucks, European arms supplies are likely to be seen in Moscow as less … covert. NATO intervention.
Delivering Ukraine to allow resistance to Russia’s bloody nose is a good idea, “but the more it intensifies, the more you wonder how Putin will react,” said Malcolm Chalmers, deputy director of the Royal United Services Institute. defense. “What if he attacks from the other side of the border?” We chase terrorists across borders, why not him? “
From Russia’s point of view, NATO military veterans, who are now executors helping and training Ukrainians, Mr Chalmers said, “can be seen by Moscow as the western equivalent of the Little Green Men”, Russian soldiers without identify the distinctive signs that first moved to the annexation of Crimea.
Then there is always the possibility of Russian planes diverting into NATO airspace while trying to hold convoys or chase Ukrainian planes. Something similar happened the only time a NATO country shot down a Russian Su-24 fighter near the Turkish-Syrian border in 2020.
More supplies of surface-to-air missiles like the Stingers and anti-tank weapons like the Javelin are crucial, as is secure communications equipment so the Ukrainian government can continue to keep in touch with its military and its people if the Russians shut down the Internet, Douglas Lut said. , former lieutenant general and US ambassador to NATO.
“We must be Pakistan in NATO territory,” he said, supplying Ukrainians as Pakistan supplied the Taliban to Afghanistan, storing materials in Poland and setting up supply lines.
The European fund used to buy deadly weapons is called the European Peace Facility.
The fund is two years old and is intended at least to prevent conflicts and strengthen international security. It has a financial ceiling of 5.7 billion euros – about $ 6.4 billion – for the seven-year budget from 2021 to 2027. If Ukraine needs more money, the EU official said, it can be provided.
The war between Russia and Ukraine: key things you need to know
According to NATO, Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Estonia, France, Germany, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Britain and the United States have already sent or approved significant supplies of military equipment to Ukraine and millions dollars, while other Member States provide humanitarian assistance and welcome refugees.
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki has promised Ukraine tens of thousands of shells and artillery ammunition, anti-aircraft missiles, light mortars, reconnaissance drones and other reconnaissance weapons. Poland, Hungary and Moldova also welcome thousands of Ukrainians fleeing the war.
Sweden, a non-NATO member, has said it will send 5,000 anti-tank weapons, 5,000 helmets, 5,000 armor and 135,000 field rations to Ukraine, plus about $ 52 million for the Ukrainian military. Finland has also said it will supply 2,500 assault rifles and 150,000 rounds of ammunition, 1,500 anti-tank weapons and 70,000 combat rations.
But NATO has also stepped up its deterrence in its eastern flank member states to ensure that Russia does not test NATO’s commitment to collective defense.
The United States alone has deployed 15,000 additional troops in Europe – 5,000 in Poland, 1,000 in Romania and 1,000 in the Baltic states – while providing another 12,000 troops, if needed, to the NATO Response Force, which is used. for the first time in collective defense.
Washington has also deployed more fighter jets and attack helicopters in Romania, Poland and the Baltic states.
In other examples of NATO’s swift efforts to strengthen its eastern borders, France sent its first tranche of troops to Romania on Monday to lead a new NATO battalion there, and provided Rafale fighters to Poland.
Germany, now a leading nation in a NATO battalion in Lithuania, has sent another 350 troops and howitzers, six fighter jets to Romania, some troops in Slovakia and two more ships for NATO naval patrols. Berlin also said it would send a Patriot missile battery and 300 troops to fly it to NATO’s eastern flank, but did not specify where.
Britain, the leading nation of the NATO battalion in Estonia, has sent another 850 troops and more Challenger tanks, plus another 350 troops to Poland. He also put another 1,000 on standby to help with refugees, and sent four more fighter jets to Cyprus, while sending two ships to the eastern Mediterranean.
Canada has sent about 1,200 troops, artillery and electronic warfare units to Latvia, as well as another frigate and reconnaissance aircraft, while putting 3,400 troops on alert for the Response Force.
Italy sent eight fighter jets to Romania and put 3,400 troops on standby, while the Dutch sent 100 troops to Lithuania and 125 to Romania and deployed eight fighter jets for NATO’s duties.
Denmark is sending a frigate to the Baltic Sea and will send 200 troops and four fighter jets to Lithuania and some to Poland in support of the NATO air police mission, while Spain has sent four fighter jets to Bulgaria and naval patrol ships.
This is hardly a complete list, but it gives an indication of the seriousness with which NATO accepts the threat of further Russian aggression or the transfer of war to NATO territory.
Monica Pronchuk contributed to the reporting.