Putin has crossed a line – the west must show an iron fist

Our first task is to ensure President Putin’s tactical advance ends quickly in strategic defeat

It has often been said that we live in an era of change. But Putin’s putsch into Ukraine now makes clear we’re witness to a change of era. And in this new era, our first task is to ensure President Putin’s tactical advance ends quickly in strategic defeat. The brutal truth is that our strategy of deterrence, waving rather vague threats of sanctions, has now failed. The velvet glove has been pushed aside and we need to offer Putin the proverbial iron fist.

Three steps are now needed.

Step one is to ensure Nato helps reinforce security across the border zone that Putin now threatens. Russia’s greatest strategic weakness has always been its 20,000 kilometres of border – 10 of which are in Europe. Bringing Nato’s partnerships closer to Moscow is now something many countries will want to discuss. That means detailed discussions about partnership with Finland and Sweden in the north, Georgia in the south and an accelerated plan for supporting military modernisation in Bosnia Herzegovina in the Balkans.

Finland has always maintained a strong military and could be reinforced at minimal cost. Georgia is harder to defend but could be protected with a full, multinational Nato brigade and a battalion-sized air and missile defense task force, plus a permanent US division. Though the current political crisis in Bosnia Hercegovina makes outright membership hard, we could accelerate progress by stepping up training exercises and renewing a deal with the EU to allow the UK to redeploy forces into the peacekeeping force, EUFOR. Moreover, equipping forces to push back against Russia in “frozen conflicts” in Abkhazia, Ossetia and Transnistria would up the pressure in vulnerable spaces that are not part of Russia.

Second, Nato modernisation has to accelerate fast. This should be the most important strategic result of President Putin’s gamble. Since Nato’s Wales summit, Nato allies have increased defence spending but the alliance’s capability to deploy large-scale strength at pace is too weak.

Nato’s non-US active personnel have declined by 40 per cent since the Cold War and reliance is heavy on UK, French, and German capabilities. During the Cold War, Nato could field 360 combat battalions in Europe. More recently it was a challenge to stand up four battalions in the Baltic. Nato is punching below its weight and that’s simply not something we can afford any more.

Third, we need to consider rapid deployment of non-nuclear intermediate range missiles to deter any further roll forward of Russia’s SSC-8 missiles, which were deployed in breach of the Intermediate Nuclear Force treaty signed by Presidents Gorbachev and Reagan in 1987.

That treaty was ground-breaking. It required both sides to eliminate their ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with a range of 500 and 5,500 kilometres from Europe and eliminated thousands of weapons from Europe.

But Russia’s violation of the treaty ultimately triggered President Trump’s withdrawal from the Treaty in February 2019 without a robust process for renegotiating.

Today, Russia has in place a comprehensive system of what is called “access to area denial” systems. That provides defences against air attack and sea attack on the Russian homeland. It is far harder for Russia to defend itself against ground launched cruise missiles. Hence, Putin’s concern that Nato might deploy intermediate-range missiles once again.

None of these advances need be permanent. Russia is a nation that has been repeatedly invaded throughout history from the Mongols to Hitler, and has the same right to security as everyone else. But these steps should only be unwound in return for Russia restoring the sovereignty of its neighbours.

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We have to ensure this is a defining moment in drawing a hard stop to Russia’s attempt to “re-imperialise” its old dominions in Eastern Europe, a project that proceeded apace in recent years without much challenge. The invasion of Georgia in 2008, the seizure of Crimea in 2014, support for separatists in Eastern Ukraine, the support for an attempted coup in Montenegro – along with a host of offensive “active measures” against the west, from murders in the UK to what Robert Mueller described as “sweeping and systemic” interference in the 2016 US presidential election – all point to a larger trend which has got to be stopped.

Even if we agree with Henry Kissinger’s argument made back in 2014 that Ukraine should ultimately live outside Nato, a strong western response is vital now to ensure President Putin understands he has crossed a line.

The post-1989 era has now come to an end. At the height of his power, Mikhail Gorbachev came to Strasbourg to speak to the Council of Europe, founded by Churchill to ensure there was never a return to the totalitarian monstrosities of the Nazis. Gorbachev offered a vision of a new unity of Christendom and Central Europe, stretching from Ireland’s Atlantic Coast to Siberia, “a common legal space” for Europeans to call home. If we genuinely believe in a world that is a “rules-based order”, this is the moment to make sure that dream isn’t lost forever.

Liam Byrne is the Labour MP for Birmingham, Hodge Hill