Advisable:
(2) A base relocation of Polish land forces; more close to Warsaw, mostly east of Vistula, minimum 100 km distance from Kaliningrad Oblast
(3) A Military subsidy program by wealthy NATO countries to assist all three Baltic countries in equipping, paying and training their land forces including artillery, possibly tank battalions and substantial air defences. Much more reservists in Lithuania and Latvia (possible without conscription if there is enough money to pay a fair price for manpower in training). Essentially, they should together turn into something like Israel or Switzerland; disproportionally armed (at least regarding land power).
(4) A Polish land forces improvement program at the expense of the (largely useless) Polish air force and the (utterly useless) Polish navy
(5) The German Luftwaffe should redeploy its area air defence units and an additional Typhoon wing to Eastern Germany and ensure their high readiness
(6) The German Heer should shape up, shake off complacency and turn into a force that can deploy multiple combat-ready combined arms brigades to the area of Warsaw on road in very few days, including pontoon bridging engineers. The necessary expenses can be financed by raiding the useless navy's budget and cutting some other nonsense.
(7) The Czech army should ensure that at least one very high readiness combined arms brigade is available at any time
(8) The French Armée de l'air should train to deploy 80% of its Rafales (including the naval ones) and its SAMP/T batteries to East Germany in a day, with munitions and ground crews
(9) The French Armée de terre should be ready to deploy two all-wheeled brigades and pontoon bridging engineers to the area of Warsaw in very few days
(10) Establishment of NATO land forces training centre in SW Poland, with at all times 3-4 rotating NATO land manoeuvre brigades present
(11) Prepositioning of NATO standard munitions in Poland to ease supply and deployment challenges
(12) Preparation of additional airbases in East Germany and Czech Republic, possibly also addition of hardened (unoccupied) aircraft shelters on commercial airports
(13) The U.S.Army should change all of its currently in Germany based brigades into Armored Brigade Combat Teams with enough tank transporters. Currently here are the 173rd Airborne Brigade and the 2nd Cavalry Regiment, a Stryker (medium) Brigade Combat Team, instead. Both are much more flawed than Armored Brigade Combat teams are, and thus of little use in Europe. The U.S.Army should leave Central Europe once (10) is in full swing, especially since (3) is much, much more cost-efficient than forward-basing on a different continent. A few air-deployable brigades with 155 mm L/52 SPGs, powerful anti-MBT equipment and conventional warfare training based on the Eastern Coast would be a much more appropriate early intervention land forces contribution in the long term.*
(14) The Italian Aeronautica Militare should be prepared to deploy Typhoon units with munitions and ground crews to Hungary in very few days, protected by SAMP/T-equipped air defence units.
(15) Enlarged munition stocks of all relevant powers; More than ten high end air combat missiles per combat aircraft. More than 4,000 quality shells per artillery piece. More than 200 HE (or HESH) shells per MBT. Large quantities of surface-to-air missiles.
(16) Generally more robust (very) short range air defences and anti tank guided missile types available in quantity. The fashionable IR guidance is not reliable enough in face of countermeasures.
Still possible without endangering any ally:
(a) Huge military spending cuts in many NATO member countries, especially the United States, which have insane spending levels beyond what they can afford with their domestic politics.
(b) Huge cuts in naval spending and strength of European NATO / EU countries. There's hardly any threat in the Mediterranean, naval warfare in the Baltic Sea would be marginal and the Russian Northern fleet will in the long term only be capable in regard to SSBN and SSN patrols.
SSBNs should be left alone even in the event of war; never threaten the enemy's second strike capability, lest you provoke a first strike!
SSBNs should be left alone even in the event of war; never threaten the enemy's second strike capability, lest you provoke a first strike!
(c) Substantial cuts in air power strength in Europe. Transport aircraft are super expensive and of little use; the slowness isn't about speed of movement, but about readiness. Much of Europe's air power is in a competence maintenance mode, using obsolete combat aircraft. Typhoons, Rafales, Gripens and Tornado ECR are relevant. Hardly anything can still be expected from F-16A/Bs, Mirage 2000, AMX and F/A-18A/Bs against Russian air defences and fighters if Russia's leadership actually gained enough confidence in its forces to dare an aggression.
(d) No return to conscription
(e) Bulk of land forces can still be limited to modest readiness to deploy to Poland. Spanish brigades could arrive after 2-4 weeks, for example. The Bulk of European land power would not need to be available for defence in the first week; it would instead make aggression pointless in the longer run (overmatch of total European forces over Russia+Belarus).
(f) The bulk of the land forces in European NATO / the EU can even shrink, for European NATO and EU outnumber the Russian military almost 2:1 without any North American help. In several armies a combination of fewer better quality combined arms brigades with infantry-qualified reserves would be much more useful than the present quantity of low quality brigades and regiments.
Helpful, but doubtful:
(I) A plan for Baltic defence that threatens the Russian position in the Caucasus region in return to a Russian forces concentration near the Baltics, deterring the deployment of Southern Military District forces to the Western Military District. This requires Turkish political will.
(II) A Russia that's more busy with East Asian challenges; this could be provoked with something as simple as a blockbuster movie about a Chinese invasion of Siberia that pushes the idea that more Russian land power needs to be in the Far East. Follow up with pushing the narrative in social media.
related earlier posts (those not linked to above):
/2016/07/warsaw-summit-communique.html/2016/07/road-marches-in-eastern-europe.html
/2016/07/how-to-invade-baltic-countries-and-get.html
S O
P.S.: That link list looks as if I wasn't all that lazy after all.
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*: Keep in mind the U.S. would practically need to deploy at least one airborne brigade and one (USMC?) combat aircraft wing equivalent to Iceland to secure it whenever Russia seems to prepare a move against any NATO member. This reduces what air power and land power can be airlifted to Central and Eastern Europe.
later P.S.: I didn't write much about the UK here because I expect their withdrawal from Germany to go on till 2019 as planned, considering the political climate (Brexit). The continent-based unit most valuable for the security effort is likely the 23rd Amphibious Engineer Squadron (with its 38 M3 Amphibious Rigs), as described before. I consider deployment from the island to the continent as easily disrupted and thus too slow for first week intervention in force. The UK's land forces are thus rather comparable to the Spanish ones in their role; relevant for the force balance after the first two weeks (and additionally relevant for Norway).
later P.S.: I didn't write much about the UK here because I expect their withdrawal from Germany to go on till 2019 as planned, considering the political climate (Brexit). The continent-based unit most valuable for the security effort is likely the 23rd Amphibious Engineer Squadron (with its 38 M3 Amphibious Rigs), as described before. I consider deployment from the island to the continent as easily disrupted and thus too slow for first week intervention in force. The UK's land forces are thus rather comparable to the Spanish ones in their role; relevant for the force balance after the first two weeks (and additionally relevant for Norway).
