I well recall early commercial diesel engines and how difficult they could be to start. Diesel fuel was cheap; repairs were expensive and so drivers left their rigs idling — sometimes for hours — while they sat at loading docks or they went into truck stops for a meal. Certainly, some trucks needed to idle because they had temperature-controlled cargo but generally, they were wasting fuel and polluting unnecessarily.
Old habits die hard and some of these myths live on:
- Idling is more efficient and uses less fuel than turning the engine off and on again. Wrong.
- Turning the engine off and on is hard on the starter. Wrong.
- Idling is the best way to warm up the engine, especially in cold weather. Wrong.
- Idling does not cause damage to a vehicle’s engine. Wrong.
Idling is unavoidable, but most idling is unnecessary and can be eliminated through conscious effort. When I commanded my tank regiment I would always ask the driver why he was idling his vehicle. It didn’t take long before all the regiment’s drivers stopped this wasteful practice.
What does this have to do with military theory or strategy? One word answer: Russia. Hang on; I’ll get there.
I spent all of my career in the Regular Force listening to how the USSR (shorthand: Russia) was an existential threat to our way of life. Even after the wall came down, the risk assessments continued to warn that the Russians would attack us. Then they took Crimea and I was puzzled. What stopped us from giving them a bloody nose? (hint, the US president lost his nerve). Then they invaded Ukraine and the drums began pounding: the Russians have the second-strongest Army in the world! Ukraine is doomed to fall within days, weeks at the longest. An attack on NATO is next!
But wait. It’s been over four years and Ukraine stands firm. The cost to their infrastructure mirrors London in 1944. (Remember what happened in 1945?) And now the drumbeat grows anew in Europe.
Many generals, from the German Chief of Defence to the Commander of US Army Europe have stated that Russia poses a serious and immediate threat to NATO. I find this curious and by no means am I implying that these commanders are scaremongering, but their comments leave me wondering if they aren’t perhaps trapped by what they studied as young majors when they were at staff colleges.
General Carsten Breuer, Germany’s Chief of Defence, stated that Russia is building up forces that could be in preparation of a large-scale attack on NATO by 2029. General Fabien Mandon, head of the French Armed Forces, warned in December of last year of the possibility of a conflict with Russia by 2030. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte recently emphasized that Russia is preparing for a prolonged confrontation and could launch a limited campaign against a NATO member within a year of the war in Ukraine ending.
Really? With what? Will they sidestep Ukraine, say “excuse us” as they swing north to Poland and attack the Baltics with an army that is shedding combat power like a deer sheds its winter coat in May? Seriously. Russia cannot beat Ukraine, so how will it destroy Poland, then take on Germany and then France? I do not doubt that Putin would love to do all of that, just like Hitler had his heart set on using the 6th Army to defend Berlin. But there was a problem. The 6th Army in the Führer’s fevered brain, the force of almost 400,000 soldiers, didn’t exist beyond being a map symbol. The current Russian Army has suffered casualties that are double if not triple the above numbers. Apart from size, they have killed off most of their capable commanders. I question whether Russia could seize a Walmart Superstore, let alone be an existential threat to any NATO country, let alone all of NATO.
Let me be clear. Russia remains a threat to world peace and security* and NATO is rebuilding and retraining, as it should. But is Russia really an existential threat to NATO?
I think not.
*To be honest, so does the United States under its current leadership.
The Enlightened Soldier 
I’ve found this recent discourse curious for exactly the same reasons you describe – any move on NATO by Russia is essentially zero sum for them, meaning they’d have to divert resources from Ukraine to do so and they’re already struggling to make gains despite the preponderance of Russian military ground combat power currently dedicated to the Ukraine fight. And from my Russia SME colleagues, for Putin winning in Ukraine is existential for him as well – it is an object he’s striven for his entire life, he sees it as the correction of a wrong suffered by Russia after the fall of the USSR, and at this point he’s sunk so much into it – to include internal messaging to his own people on the necessity of conquering Ukraine – that any diversions could prove fatal to the stability of his rule in ways that even huge manpower losses and economic ruin have not.
And yet – just because by any rational assessment Putin is highly unlikely to make inroads against any NATO country doesn’t mean he won’t talk himself into trying. He lives in an echo chamber, one he built deliberately to coup-proof regime over decades. There is no one in his circle of subordinates who will tell him “no;” those people fall out of windows.
And should he try, again, while it’s highly unlikely he makes much if any progress on the ground – frankly from my interactions with the Polish military, I feel like the Polish army would not only relish the chance to stack Russian bodies but that they’d probably drive on Moscow before stopping – Putin can still cause damage. Have European NATO militaries built up sufficient air defenses to effectively intercept the drone and missile barrages regularly suffered by Ukraine? Bluntly, I don’t think they have despite having over four years now to prepare.
It may also be that the only damage Putin would really care about with a NATO incursion would be the fracturing of NATO itself. Would the US answer an Article 5 call, especially in the next six months before a new Congress is seated? The fact that in my own mind, I can’t automatically answer “yes” is terrifying, and could be exactly what Putin would want to achieve irrespective of what gains on the ground the remnants of his military can achieve (probably little to none).
A Russian incursion into NATO would be irrational, highly unlikely to achieve noteworthy material gains on the ground, and place further strains on the stability of Putin’s regime in its consumption of whatever scant resources the Russian economy and population have left to offer. I don’t think that means he won’t try because he talked himself into invading Ukraine despite all of the above caveats applying to that endeavor, and he remains detached from the reality of conditions on the ground because he’s deliberately shaped his subordinates to tell him only what he wants to hear. I can see a world where he talks himself into it, one in which the single actually rational assumption he might be able to make is a lack of US response given current political conditions, exacerbated by the recent strategic impotence (and weapon expenditures) of Operation EPIC FURY.
Is that an existential threat to the European way of life? Probably not. But it could still cause material destruction and shatter generational security frameworks that would take additional generations to reestablish, if they ever could be.
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Ian, all good points and yes, Putin could do something irrational. I don’t think he will for the simple reason that he is not working ab initio. His losses so far have been staggering and he simply cannot go full bore somewhere else without crossing an existential line for himself.
Thanks for the comment!
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