Strategic Insights: The Coming Perfect Storm of Europe

US Army War College Press

Lieutenant Colonel Michael A. Adelberg A collection of social and security trends are at play in Europe that may threaten the peace and stability of the continent. The array of challenges, threats, and frictions could converge at such a point that an unintentional spark could ignite a major crisis or even a regional war of some type. The most obvious security threat to Europe is Russia and its evident willingness to employ force, including proxy forces, like it did to reshape national borders in Ukraine. Russia does not, of course, view this operation as expeditionary expansionism, but rather as a necessity to stabilize a crisis on its border. Russia sees the Ukraine annexation as not of its own making, but rather like that of a tornado that drew in Russia against its desires.1 This narrative conveniently overlooks the fact that Russian economic warfare, to prevent Ukraine from entering into an Association Agreement with the EU, was the catalyst for the eventual Euromaidan protests and subsequent violence. Russia’s basic national security strategy is to keep its "neighboring belt stable," NATO weak, China close, and the United States focused elsewhere.2 A weak NATO is hardly anything new, but it is the stable neighboring belt goal that is the most challenging to Europe, since stability is in the eye of the beholder. Ukraine was stable, right up to the point when Russian actions led to the Euromaidan crisis and started a war. It should come as no surprise to Russia observers that the Ukraine crisis illustrates that Russia sees stability in its neighboring belt as being loyal to Russia. Following this line of reasoning, the Baltic States, as NATO members, might be at risk of being viewed by Moscow as an unstable region. It is by no means a certainty, or even a high probability, that Russia will conduct a Ukraine-style hybrid operation to destabilize and seize any or all of the Baltics. However, there is enough of a possibility that NATO cannot ignore the risk; otherwise, the very legitimacy of NATO itself would be threatened should Russia act and NATO be unprepared and unable to protect an alliance state. Additionally, since budgets and military forces are finite resources, then every euro spent toward strengthening NATO’s Russian flank against the possibility of Russian aggression is one less euro spent elsewhere; for example, toward counter-terrorism, refugee and immigrant programs, and domestic law enforcement among others. This is not necessarily an argument against spending for enhanced NATO defense against Russian aggression, it is simply a fact that causes friction. However, among the general European Union (EU) population, terrorism is viewed as the one of greatest threats to European security, and Russian aggression is not even mentioned.3 Obviously there is very good reason for Europeans to be concerned with terrorism. Besides the Charlie Hebdo/Jewish Market attacks and the Bataclan Theater and associated attacks in Paris in 2015, London witnessed a gruesome public beheading of a soldier in May 2013 and a foiled ISIS-motivated stabbing in a subway station in December 2015. There was also the thwarted Paris train attack in August 2015, foiled by three American passengers. In February, 2015, two victims died in a terrorist shooting in Copenhagen. Overall, Europol reports that the EU regularly experiences a triple-digit number of terror attacks each year (2009 – 316; 2010 – 249; 2011 – 174; 2012 – 219; 2013 – 152; 2014 – 199),4 and there are no indications this trend will change. In addition to terrorism, immigration is a major concern of the general population. In March 2015, 19% of EU citizens identified immigration as one of the greatest threats to European security.5 In November 2015 the response were drastically different, 58% identified immigration as the most important issue facing the EU.6 1,046,599 migrants and refugees reportedly arrived in Europe in 2015, and nearly 150,000 have already arrived in 2016.