Comparison - including the US, Nato has “overwhelming advantage”. Conflict “breathed new life” into NATO. Likely outcome? It’s “like a soccer match”.
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Nato vs. Russia: who would win a war?Tensions between Moscow and Kiev have breathed new life into the military alliance
When Russian troops crossed into Ukraine and illegally annexed Crimea in 2014, Nato was caught flat-footed by Moscow’s sudden and unorthodox military campaign.
Now, with Russian troops once again massing at the Ukrainian border, the international military alliance is keen to avoid a repeat performance.
The two sides are negotiating, with the stated aim of avoiding an armed escalation that would pull in many of the world’s most powerful military forces. But if a conflict cannot be avoided, who stands to lose if Nato and Russian go head-to-head on the battlefield?
The latestRussia now has “well over 100,000 troops with enabling capabilities” stationed on Ukraine’s easter border, according to Nato Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, including “medical units, command and control and logistics”.
Addressing reporters after a meeting with Polish President Andrzej Duda at Nato’s headquarters in Brussels, Stoltenberg said the alliance also expects “30,000 Russian troops to be deployed in Belarus” in “the largest build-up there since the Cold War”.
Asked about a joint statement by Russia and China in which both called on Nato to stop admitting new members, Stoltenberg said: “This is an attempt to deny sovereign nations the right to make their own choices, a right enshrined in key international documents.
“We are ready to listen to their concerns, to discuss Nato-Russia relations, risk reduction and transparency, arms control, disarmament and non-proliferation, and other issues that affect our security. But Nato will not compromise on core principles. Our ability to protect and defend all Allies, and the right of each nation to choose its own path.”
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Tensions between Russia and Ukraine have served to bring Nato “back to life”, according to the Financial Times’ European diplomatic correspondent Henry Foy. The alliance has led the “response to the Russian threat” by sending troops to eastern Europe.
After “talk of Nato irrelevance”, he said, the crisis “reinvigorated support for the alliance’s original concept: as a defensive collective to deter a possible attack from Moscow”.
What is Nato’s capability?The core principle of Nato’s international military alliance is its system of collective defence, meaning if any member state is attacked by a third party, then every member state must step in to defend it.
Fortunately for countries such as Montenegro, which spends just £67m a year on defence, there are some military big hitters in the alliance.
The US spends more on defence than double the rest of Nato combined, with 2021 spending estimated at $705bn (£516bn), according to the Department of Defense.
As well as being the biggest defence spender in the world, the US has a powerful arsenal and a huge amount of manpower – 1.3 million active troops, with another 865,000 in reserve, said The New York Times in 2017. The UK is the second biggest overall spender in Nato, putting nearly £50bn into defence annually compared to Germany’s £45bn, France’s £42bn and Italy’s £20bn.
What is Russia’s capability?Russia’s military capability is not to be sniffed at, easily ranking among the world’s most powerful.
According to the Washington-based Heritage Foundation, its inventory includes “336 intercontinental ballistic missiles, 2,840 battle tanks, 5,220 armored infantry fighting vehicles, over 6,100 armored personnel carriers and more than 4,684 pieces of artillery”.
But it is lacking in some areas of modern military technology, including drone capability, electronic components, and radar and satellite reconnaissance, Russian journalist and military analyst Pavel Felgenhauer told Deutsche Welle.
“That’s what the Russian military is talking about: yes, we have weapons, including long-range weapons, but our reconnaissance capabilities are weaker than our attack capabilities,” Felgenhauer said. “So we have-long range, sometimes precision guided weapons, but we don’t always know where the target is.”
Who would win?Research published in 2019 by the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) found that British forces would be “comprehensively outgunned” in any conflict with Russia in eastern Europe.
The RUSI found that the British Army and its Nato allies have a “critical shortage” of artillery and ammunition, meaning they would struggle to maintain a credible defence position if Russia were to opt for all-out aggression.
“At present, there is a risk that the UK – unable to credibly fight – can be dominated lower down the escalation ladder by powers threatening escalation,” said RUSI’s report.
But the UK wouldn’t need to stand alone against Russia. And Nato’s biggest player, the US, has an overwhelming advantage over Russia in conventional forces, Russian military analyst Aleksandr Golts told Deutsche Welle.
While Felgenhauer agreed with Golt’s assessment of the US’s military advantage, he warned that open warfare often comes down to far more than the inventories that each side of the conflict can call upon.
He told DW that “it’s like predicting the result of a soccer match”, adding: “Yes, basically, Brazil should beat America in soccer, but I have seen Americans beat Brazil in South Africa, at the Confederations Cup. You never know the result until the game is played.”
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