We are a long way from actual peace--assuming Putin is desperate enough to agree to only partially digest Ukraine--but it is close enough to think about how NATO states can prevent Russia from thinking of "peace" as a chance to reload and have another go at victory in a few years. Can the Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF) provide the model for a Joint Reassurance Force (JRF)?
On the battlefield, The Russians continue to push forward even as Ukraine has mounted some effective local counter-attacks. It is reported that Russian casualties are down as Russia scales back attacks. Which makes the slow advances by Russia rather disturbing. Yet Russia is running out of summer for their summer offensive to achieve something decisive.
In the air, Ukraine is focusing on Russian oil infrastructure. Ukraine has new weapons with greater reach. Can its campaign be sustained and will it affect Russian battlefield capabilities?
Away from the mud and blood, leadership looks past achieving the end of shooting--even at the price of allowing Russia to keep much or all of its ill-gotten gain--to how NATO can prevent Russia from resuming its invasion. Realistically, Ukrainians increasingly are unwilling to die to recover that territory.
And at least for the Russian-occupied Donbas region, reintegrating people who have fought and died for Russia for over a decade now would be difficult to say the least.
I can dream of a Ukrainian operation that puts Ukraine back in control of its territory north of Crimea that at least restores Ukraine's access to the Sea of Azov. But unless Ukraine with NATO's help has been preparing for such a counteroffensive the last two years, it will remain a dream. Ukrainian support for continuing the war until everything is liberated is gone. Defend? Sure. But ending the war even if Russia is deeper inside Ukraine is clearly a rising hope despite the dangers of that outcome.
But at the very least, nobody should recognize the legality of Russia's conquest even if the reality of that occupation is accepted for the time being.
The immediate task is to design and field a force of NATO troops that can reassure Ukraine that it will get help from the West even in the absence of Article V NATO guarantees. The hope is that the prospect of killing NATO troops in a non-NATO role will deter Russia from attacking.
Of course, you know my view on the weakness of designing a deterrent force rather than a force that can win. And if the European force is limited to deploying in western Ukraine, it is worthless. It is not worth putting that force into Ukraine unless the idea is that in response to Russian violations of the ceasefire the force is repeatedly moved east and given a more robust role. But since it seems equally likely European governments would ignore Russian violations in order to avoid doing that, I would not want a pretend deterrence in western Ukraine.
Still, if the force goes into eastern Ukraine and has a role in making the Russians hesitate to attack again, NATO must think about the force.
First, what authority should the force be under? I suggest that the Joint Expeditionary Force now entirely composed of NATO members should be the model. Britain is the driving force of the JEF sub-alliance:
There are ten JEF Participant Nations (all of which are NATO members). These nations are sovereign states that come together to respond quickly and decisively to an emerging crisis. Development is enabled through political and strategic engagement, specialist working groups, collective training opportunities and interactions with Defence Attaches, Liaison Officers, the JEF Secretariat and front-line personnel.
With NATO doctrine as its baseline, the JEF has strong working relationships with partners and provides a gearing between nations and NATO, where issues can be discussed regionally and quickly reacted to without the requirement for lengthy decision-making processes.
What countries should be in a new Joint Reassurance Force? I think that it should be a European force but not the European Union. I would include in JRF all the NATO states bordering Russia and the
Black Sea, plus Germany and France. Ideally, Ukraine should be a member
or at least have a solid legal foundation for integrating JRF and
Ukrainian military capabilities to present Russia with a force too tough
to defeat.
One major European power taking the lead. Britain is already the leader of JEF with a Baltic and Nordic focus (and I anticipate Britain would be better employed preparing for Russian little green men in Estonia, as I discussed in Army magazine), so I rule Britain out; and I'd like Italy to take the lead in the Mediterranean Sea.
Practically speaking, either France or Germany should have the job. Although Germany might have too much baggage that far east. Russian propaganda writes itself, no? But France is ... well, France. And because Russia will spout propaganda no matter who is in charge, I'd go with Germany. Russia earned that choice.
Putting border states in JRF prevents Russia from targeting JRF as if it is completely unrelated to NATO. Perhaps Russia could restrict a renewed war to Ukraine's territory even if it fights JRF units. But if Russia tried to expand the war to punish JRF states directly, it would run into a NATO Article V wall.
JRF should have a close working relationship with NATO in order to reinforce the indirect Article V guarantee worry for Russia should it resume its war against Ukraine. And that relationship would allow America to provide advanced air power; intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR); logistics; and command and control functions to JRF through NATO. Indeed, it was reported that America is willing to support Europeans along those lines:
The Financial Times (FT) reported on August 26 that official Ukrainian and European sources stated that senior US officials told European officials recently that the United States would be prepared to contribute "strategic enablers," such as intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR); command and control (C2); and air defense assets, to support a future European-led deployment on the ground in postwar Ukraine as part of security guarantees for Ukraine.
I would not want JRF ground units in eastern Ukraine manning the front. Russians would eventually attack them to sap Western will to maintain their positions. I have doubts Western states would allow their forces to engage in combat so why make them shooting gallery targets? Anyone remember NATO state Afghanistan campaign caveats notwithstanding invoking Article V?
And just as bad, Western forces on the front would serve to restrain Ukrainian units from fighting back as Russia began the process of eroding Ukraine's JRF protection. Recall the constant mutual gnawing on the Donbas front from 2015 to 2021--which Ukraine was slowly winning (and note my prediction should Russia escalate--as it did in 2022).
European ability to provide ground combat units is limited so let's just admit that rather than pretend there will be more. The JRF would include in its land component the French-German brigade and two composite maneuver brigades built around one French and one German brigade headquarters and fires assets. Other JRF countries would contribute battalions and companies to fill out those composite brigades in the manner of the Cadre Brigade Combat Teams that I recommended (see my Army magazine article) the United States Army form to gather scattered NATO maneuver battalions into more capable brigades that could be easily integrated into American divisions.
Ukrainian maneuver and support brigades would fill out that JRF-commanded division-sized "corps" in the pattern of Ukraine's expanded corps organization. This force would function as a reserve unit in Ukraine's defense plans.
Separate JRF battalions would man key portions of the frontline in a local reserve capacity, using aerial drones to monitor the Russians on the other side of the line of control. NATO ISR assets would of course support this mission.
I know the Poles, Baltic nations, and Finland are loath--if not actually terrified--to part with any of their troops. But other NATO--including American and Canadian--ground units should replace Norwegian, Finnish, Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian, or Polish units dispatched to staff the JRF in order to maintain a constant level of forces in those NATO frontline states. And bonus for spreading the risk of defying Russia, no?
Yet right now, a robust if small land force is not planned for what is being called Multinational Force Ukraine (MFU):
Immediately, one can see that the MFU deployment has been scaled down from initial estimates, and is probably not going to be a large divisional-sized land force for actively deterring the Russians, nor even really a small ‘tripwire’ force focused on dying heroically so that NATO would be dragged into conflict.3 ‘NATO Forward Land Force Ukraine’ it is not.4
That lack of land forces will not reassure Ukraine in any way. So I will stand by my minimal proposal. Do read all of Palmer's piece (I wrote this before reading his excellent piece), which also suggests JEF as a model. Which reassures me on my view on that. But Palmer rightly argues that regardless of European ability to staff such a reassurance force, we really need to nail down what the objective is for the force. Sending a force designed to simulate Western resolve will be Task Force Smithed if we later imagine/hope it is a robust force with more capabilities than we actually gave it.
Obviously, NATO should help modernize, organize, train, and equip Ukraine's military to be the primary force for resisting Russia. That's reassurance.
The air policing missions would be NATO-led (rather than JRF), including the United States in a leading role, and have the benefit of NATO experience in the Baltic States to provide alliance reassurance in the air. Obviously, tight cooperation would be needed with Ukrainian air defenses to deconflict missions and avoid friendly fire. Which would also promote wartime integration should Russia not be serious about peace. Equally obviously, the Ukraine mission would be far larger than the Baltic mission. So that's a challenge. But if NATO can't manage that, we have bigger problems than reassuring Ukraine.
Romania, Bulgaria, and Turkey would provide the core of JRF naval power with others able to join for the air missions over the Black Sea, including non-JRF NATO forces. Other JRF nations might participate with modularized auxiliary cruisers (which I called The Black Sea Queen) flagged by those Black Sea NATO states to avoid Montreaux Convention restrictions on non-Black Sea powers operating in the Black Sea.
Or am I huffing my own fumes to think that might work?
And in an interesting twist, the United States is discussing with European allies the possibility of sending armed American private military companies to build fortifications for Ukraine.
With such a force Ukraine might actually be reassured and Russia might have a moment of lucidity to pivot to face China, which is the real threat to Russian territorial integrity.
But first Putin has to have a moment of lucidity and agree to actual peace in Ukraine. Thus far he displays no signs of that:
The Kremlin is demanding that Russia have a veto over any Western security guarantees for Ukraine in an effort to undermine ongoing US, European, and Ukrainian efforts to establish conditions for lasting peace in Ukraine. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov stated on August 20 that any serious discussions on Western security guarantees for Ukraine without Russian input are a “road to nowhere” and that Russia “cannot agree” that now-proposed "collective security issues" can be resolved without Russia, effectively demanding a Russian veto over Western security guarantees for Ukraine.
We'll see what American weapons Ukraine will get to hit Putin with a clue bat--as Trump suggested after Russia threw up more obstacles--and make him see reason. Or alternatively to hurt Russia badly enough that Russia's opinion is worthless.
In the meantime, NATO should continue its "candid discussions" to formulate a plan for what the force will look like and what it will do. Without asking for Russia's permission.
NOTE: ISW updates continue here. Also, I put war-related links and commentary in the Weekend Data Dump.
NOTE: You may also read my posts on Substack, at The Dignified Rant: Evolved.
NOTE: I finally tried MapChart that I've had bookmarked for ages to make the map at the top.
