Deliberate drone incursions into sovereign NATO airspace. Suspicious damage to undersea cables. Calculated attacks that test the West's cybersecurity. All these actions by Russia have just been a prelude to the latest effort to intimidate the West from aiding the embattled Ukrainian nation.
Of late there has also been a deliberate effort to sabotage the Polish railway system. No surprise: the gateway had become a crucial gateway for sending military aid to Ukraine. That attack signals Russia's willingness to escalate warfare beyond Ukraine's borders and into NATO territory. This "anonymous" incident, however, reveals an extremely calculated strategy to intimidate European nations while Russia maintains plausible deniability.
The latest sabotage reflects surprisingly sophisticated strategic thinking by the Kremlin: Seek to inflict damage significant enough to complicate operations supporting Ukraine's military, but still avoid an actual NATO military response.
Nevertheless, it is a dangerous escalation. It reveals Russia testing Western resolve as to where the West's "red line" is. Russia appears to be probing how far it can push military operations into democratic territory before facing any meaningful consequence.
By threatening critical infrastructure in NATO countries, Moscow is also apparently seeking to make supporting Ukraine costly and dangerous for European nations. One can imagine that it creates public anxiety about involvement in the conflict, and potentially weakens political support for continued aid to Ukraine. The Russians are essentially taking a page out of the Soviet Union's Cold War playbook, when they infiltrated Western peace groups that then marched for disarmament.
The Western response to this latest escalation needs to be real, immediate and serious. NATO needs to send an unmistakable message. They have the skill, the resources and the ability to do so. What they need is the will.
The sabotage of the Polish railway line appears to be a test of whether NATO has the backbone to defend itself not just from tanks, but from shadows where Russia currently prefers to hide.
Lawrence Kadish serves on the Board of Governors of Gatestone Institute.
