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# 									NATO’s Eastern Front							

FPC Briefing

Michal Baranowski, Managing Director German Marshall Fund (GMF) East and Regional Director 

Thursday, June 6, 2024, 10:00 a.m. ET

Washington, D.C.

June 6, 2024

## 								Summary							

        -  In the lead-up to the upcoming NATO Summit, this on-the-record briefing explores the issues on NATO’s Eastern flank with the German Marshall Fund’s expert on the ground in Poland Michal Baranowski.    

**THE WASHINGTON FOREIGN PRESS CENTER, WASHINGTON, D.C.**

**MODERATOR:**  Good morning, and welcome to the Washington Foreign Press Center’s latest briefing in the lead-up to the NATO summit.  My name is Zina Wolfington and I’m the moderator this morning.  This briefing is on the record.  We will post a transcript and the video of this briefing on our website, which is fpc.state.gov.  Journalists joining us, please take a moment now to rename yourself with your name and outlet.  And our briefer today is Michael Barnowski, managing director of German Marshall Fund East.  

Before Mr. Baranowski’s opening remarks, one quick reminder: He is an independent subject matter expert, and the views expressed by briefers not affiliated with the Department of State are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of the department of the U.S. Government.  Their participation in Foreign Press Center programming does not imply endorsement, approval, or recommendation of their views.  And with that, I’m going to turn it over to Michael Baranowski.

**MR BARANOWSKI:**   Thank you very much.  As you know, it’s wonderful to be with you.  I’m joining you from Warsaw, where we have beautiful weather today, so I decided to join you from outside. 

I’m really very much open to having a back-and-forth and conversation with you about the critical summit that is coming up in July.  But just to open it up with – perhaps with a few thoughts, and I don’t want to go into the speaking points that normally I’m sure you’ve heard many times about the agenda of the summit, but what I would say is the summit comes really at a critical moment of the war.  I’m here 600 kilometers from the – well, actually 300 kilometers from the border with Ukraine, and I know that there are only 600 to the front line.  And we are seeing that the front line is, unfortunately, not going well for the Ukrainian side. 

So even though Ukraine’s membership in NATO will not be the outstanding, big subject of the summit – there is unlikely to be a huge movement in this direction – the fate of Ukraine, the situation on the front, will be very much front and center both in terms of the military aid, in terms of the rules of engagement – including the recent changes by U.S. administration to allow Ukraine to strike inside Russia, which many of the analysts welcomed as an ability for Ukraine to defend itself. 

But it’s – this is the – this is going to be one of the big elephants in the room.  And I’m sure we’ll talk about it, also, the way that the war is impacting not only Ukraine but countries of the Alliance directly.  We are seeing sabotage.  We are seeing under-the-threshold attacks.  And we are seeing also threats to – more hybrid threats, especially to eastern flank members.  So that’s one big topic. 

The other topic that will not be at all on the agenda – but I think will be on everyone’s mind and I’m more free to talk about it than officials, of course – is the U.S. presidential election and possibility of Donald Trump’s presidency.  That’s something that we here on the eastern flank think a lot about, given the importance of the Alliance with the United States.  But of course that’s not going to be on the NATO summit, at least not on the official – in the official part, but probably in the – certainly in the corridors. 

So besides the celebration, the very important celebrations of the 75 years, those two big issues will be dominating while the Alliance goes through very important adaptation.  And perhaps from the perspective – and I will close with this – of the countries of the eastern flank will be looking at what we can accomplish when it comes to defense and deterrence.  Basically, how do we make sure that the pledge of NATO leaders, that not a single inch or single centimeters of NATO territory will be every conquered?  How we can ensure it.  And the way to ensure it is through the ability to have enough forces to implement the regional plans.  And I’m happy to talk about that aspect as well. 

Let me pause here, and again, very much happy to have a conversation with you, learning also about how the summit is viewed in your capitals, and what are the key issues, key debates, that are driving political and security debates in your countries.  Thank you. 

**MODERATOR:**  Thank you for those remarks.  And now I would like to open it up for questions.  And journalists, please click on the hand icon at the bottom of the screen, and when called on, we will ask you to unmute yourself and turn your camera on, if possible, to ask your question. 

We’ll start with Alex. 

**QUESTION:**  Good morning, Zina.  Thank you so much for doing this, and I appreciate the speaker for his time this morning.  I have a couple of questions, if you don’t mind, and will throw all of them at you, and please feel free to start with any one of them. 

I’ll start with Ukraine.  I was with the Secretary last week, following his trip in Prague, in which I heard him talking a lot about some robust package on Ukraine at the summit, linking to its NATO membership.  Are you in a position to unpack it?  What are you hearing from the administration officials on that package? 

Secondly, there are arguments now among NATO members that most of the fire that comes in from Russia is drones, it’s rockets that actually, perhaps, NATO members sitting in – surrounding countries should be shooting down that because it’s not the sort of, like, direct act of war on Russia – it’s protective, and you are not shooting down Russian fighters and people, it is just munitions.  Is there any debate, any discussion about that?  Is it something you feel like there’s an appetite to discuss in Washington?  

Another topic I want to ask about:  Georgia.  That – it is my understanding that it’s not – there is no decision yet to invite Georgia to the summit.  Will you be surprised if it is not invited?  And what implications will that have if that’s the final, ultimate decision?  

And finally, how much do you think the U.S. administration will need to sort of future-proof for whatever happens in November in the summit when it hosts Allies in Washington?  Thank you so much.

**MR BARANOWSKI:**Great, Alex, thank you very much for all very good, thoughtful question.  Let me go ahead and start answering maybe with the second one first, if you don’t mind, because it’s very actionable as well.  So you asked about NATO countries extending air and missile defense into Ukraine.  And that is a robust debate both in my country, in other countries of the eastern flank, in especially Poland and Romania that also border Ukraine.  And the debate that is predicated not only on the question about security of Ukraine, but security – security of the Alliance itself.  We have now had number of situation, number of – well, yeah, let’s call it situations where Russian rockets or Ukrainian rockets go into our territory.  The most recent one was just a few weeks ago, where a Russian rocket attacking Ukraine flew through Polish space to then attack an area near Lviv.  

So we are directly threatened by those attacks that Russia aims at Ukraine.  There is already behind-a-closed-door conversation about it.  Can NATO shoot those missiles, those drones that are aimed at Ukraine but are coming very dangerously close to our borders?  The government is a little bit less open about it, but I can confirm that the debate here – the strategic community is very supportive of this, of extending the missile defense into Ukraine, because again, it impacts our security directly.  Of course, it would have additional benefits for Ukrainian civilian population as well.  

So I – what I can say is I’m keeping my fingers very – very much holding my fingers and crossing my – holding my thumbs and crossing my fingers that this will be addressed and we’ll be able to agree on extending this, even though I’m aware that this is issue that causes controversy in some capitals.  

A few other questions.  You ask about Ukraine.  There are a couple things that we can expect and a few things that hopefully Secretary Blinken will unveil and that will surprise us with robustness of the package.  We know that the so-called Ramstein group will now move toward to bring the support within NATO, provide the institutional framework for the military aid to Ukraine.  And that’s a very strong, very good move, because this will be something that provides institutional stability. 

It also, by the way, connects to your last question about future-proofing of NATO.  The more we can put it in institutions, the harder it is to just undo with one or two – or two moves.  There will be a conversation about moving deeper on the language from Vilnius that talked about Ukraine becoming a member sometime in the future if the conditions are met and if there is a consensus.  I hear the rhetorics of providing a bridge to invitation.  I’m yet to be convinced that this is going to be something that makes a real big difference, but we are still very much waiting also for the U.S. administration to provide their answer in their package on bilateral U.S.-Ukrainian defense cooperation.  So perhaps that’s the thing, that’s the – the – what Secretary (inaudible) had in mind.  

Perhaps the last question on Georgia.  I do not expect there to be any significant move beyond what we had in Bucharest and then in Vilnius.  Georgia is on top of that – of sort of not being on the top of their agenda – is going also through a very questionable, problematic, disturbing, or frankly unacceptable changes in laws that remind many of us Russian laws against NGO community.  So I think this will be a very unlikely time to provide Georgia with further steps when it comes to Euro-Atlantic integration.  Let me pause here.  Thanks.  

**QUESTION:**  Thank you.  

**MODERATOR:**  Thanks.  We’ll go next to Martin.  

**QUESTION:**  Yes.  (In Polish.)  I am the U.S. correspondent for a newspaper in Denmark, but I spent years in Poland, so I speak your language.  But I’m curious – I mean, this briefing is set up to talk about the situation on the – on NATO’s eastern flank.  So I’d like you to talk to us a bit about Poland and also Slovakia and Hungary, and in particularly about the Polish situation.  

It’s not as if Poland is a unified country when it comes to the war in Ukraine.  The refugees – the refugee question is something that came up in the election campaign repeatedly, and the issue of peace, the former government somehow not being as pro-EU and as pro-Ukrainian as (inaudible).  I mean, these issues – when you’re on the outside, it seems Poland is all unified, but actually, it is not, entirely.  And looking at Slovakia, it’s a different issue, but still one wonders how compact Eastern European nation member-states of NATO are in their view of the war in Ukraine.  First question.  

Second – sorry to go on for a long time.  Second, I had actually written into the website, and it’s about the intelligence that came out earlier this year and that was referred to in several Western media that there is now intelligence that Russia would, if it wins the war in Ukraine, plan to attack NATO member-states.  And the supposition was it was one of the Baltic countries, not really Poland, on realistic scenarios, both –  I don’t know whether this intelligence is correct or whether it – but it certainly serves as a way to remind citizens of NATO member-states that they should spend more on defense.  What was your reaction to that intelligence?  

**MR BARANOWSKI:**Right.  Thank you, Martin, for two great questions, and we’ll keep it in English just for the sake of our colleagues.  Maybe I – I’ll start with the second one, on intelligence and the threat to NATO territory directly.  

There is, I would say, broad agreement that the threat is – that Russia is a serious threat, but not imminent when it comes to NATO countries directly.  But I would not – I don’t see that conversations about threat to Alliance as sort of being designed to just get the societies focused enough on defense spending because we are – so we are seeing – where does this assessment come from?  

We are seeing Russia being able to turn into a – pretty much a war economy.  We are seeing Russia focus on reconstituting its forces in areas and at levels that are beyond the need for the war in Ukraine.  So that – that’s when it – we are not there yet.  Fortunately, they are not there yet.  And there is this dangerous window of opportunity that both we are speeding up our production – perhaps not fast enough – military production of shells, of hard equipment, but also of dealing with hybrid.  And they are doing this in the same – the same time, really, with the – with Ukraine standing between us and fighting, in that sense, also not only for their own security but also for security of NATO.  

So given the speed of reconstitution, given that also if we look back to just a few months before the full-scale invasion, there was a clear communication from the Russia in what did they want from the Alliance, and they want NATO to pull back also from the Baltic states, from Poland, and from others.  These are the documents that were passed in the November or December – to December 2021.  So that’s why the – that’s why I’m not – I would – the threats are being taken seriously.  The countries are getting ready.  This is why Poland is now spending 4 percent on defense.  This is why we are implementing, as an Alliance, the defense plans, but it’s a bit of a race with time.  We need to get ready so we do not have to fight this war.  So deterrence is credible.  And I would – there is no question to me that this is taken very seriously at the highest levels in – of government in my country, but also in the Baltic States, fortunately almost all in Finland and Sweden and throughout the eastern flank with perhaps few exceptions.  So I would look to this – to this – to this as a future but very serious issue.

You asked about unity, both in Poland but also across the eastern flank.  I’m – there are – well, let me start with Poland.  The place where there is absolutely clear unity is when it comes to the security threat and what to do about it.  That’s why no one is questioning the 4 percent that Poland is spending on defense.  Government has just changed, and the programs and the level of spending has just increased.  

When it comes to Ukrainian refugees, that’s – even that is – even though it’s, of course, more polarizing issue, but the test I would – the way I would answer is that if I look at parties that were running on this issue, especially in the October 15th election – but right now they will have a second chance to run on the – in the European Parliament election – they have not done very, very well.  So yes, there was a – there’s some level of tiredness, but it’s really not benefitting those who want to go after Ukrainian war refugees in Poland.  

And across the eastern flank, I mean, look, it’s pretty out in the open there that there are country – that if you look at the whole of the eastern flank – and we are now looking at Sweden, Finland, through the Baltic states, Poland, all the way to Romania – there is one country in particular, and that’s Hungary, that is breaking out from the line.  There are questions all about Slovakia, but Hungary has been very outspoken and unhelpful.  And therefore, our regional cooperation has moved in a different direction.  That’s why Visegrád Four is a very much unused format.  And I just can say that I hope that that changes because, of course, we are all facing these threats.  Just for domestic reasons; and perhaps some other reasons some of the leaders choose not to see it.  Thanks. 

**MODERATOR:**  Thank you.  John Ford, please unmute yourself.  

**QUESTION:**  Thank you, Michael, for being here today.  I’ve got a couple of questions.  Looking at the arc of the history of the region over – just since the Second World War, what’s your view on the following thesis: that in some ways this current war is playing out George Patton’s vision in 1945, that the Allied troops should have pushed harder against the Soviets, that in the – 40 years ago that the Reagan administration is widely credited with having spent the communists into oblivion, basically, and that these events are setting the scene for what’s going on now.  Do these sorts of thoughts inform interior NATO discussions? 

**MR BARANOWSKI:**  Thank you, John.  It’s – for this question.  I need to think about it for a second.  Well, let me — 

**QUESTION:**  And Martin, let me introduce once – another element, and that is, again, historically Germany has been central to this whole issue.  We read about Germany episodically, but where are the Germans on all of this?  And isn’t that critical to how this is going to be resolved, ultimately? 

**MR BARANOWSKI:**  Sure, sure.  Thank you, John.  So on one hand, we are clearly in a totally new era.  We are in what I would describe – what many describe as a post-Cold War era, both when it comes to Russia, but also we are focused so much on NATO, we are focused on the eastern flank, but this is a broader competition.  We understood it – we understand it very, very clearly where we have the democratic West that includes not only NATO but also Japan, Australia, Republic of Korea, New Zealand.  And on the other hand, we have something that’s some people call – I don’t know – axis of upheaval, and that includes not only Russia but also China, North Korea, and Iran.  

So there is a clear sense of new era of confrontation that has started.  Not to – at a recent panel, I had a chance to talk to – to speak with Estonian prime minister, who’s very thoughtful on this.  And we were talking about how perhaps historians in few years will look back and they will be able to say, well this is – the beginning of the full-scale invasion in February 2022 is, in a way, a beginning of world conflict.  Right?  So we are – there is a lot of newness.

At the same time, of course there are elements that – history does not repeat itself, but it rhymes, and we are seeing this again.  On one hand, it’s very clear Russia behaves as a colonial power, that it has – and it’s been behaving this way, really, for the last about 400 years, when it’s trying to rebuild its sphere of influence that extends beyond – far beyond its border, and it’s trying to – this is why they’re trying to also push NATO away from its borders, really beyond Ukraine.  And those elements that you mentioned – you mentioned President Reagan, you mentioned, of course, World War II – we are back at a moment where history is playing out on a battlefield, at a front line, and that’s I think very much been everyone’s – on everyone’s mind, on leaders’ mind as they meet in Washington next – this July.  

And I think one of the key lessons that we should take from the history is that we succeeded when we were both unified – very important – but also clear-eyed about the threat and strong in our response.  And I would say we are unified, but we are still yet to get to a full understanding of what we are facing in this war, how it connects with other conflicts, and really the level of ambition that the West, that Alliance has to have to deal with what is, as you pointed out, beginning of a confrontational era.  Hopefully that begins to answer very thoughtful question you asked.

**MODERATOR:**  Thanks.  We’ll go next to Liepa.

**QUESTION:**  Yeah, thank you.  Thank you for doing this.  I’m Liepa Zeromskaite from Lithuanian (inaudible) IQ Magazine.  In recent weeks we’ve seen certain diversions or acts of sabotage against Poland, Lithuania, now in Estonia which were more or less clearly described as with Russians behind them.  I believe this will be one of the topics that our countries will raise at the summit, but what, in your opinion, could NATO do in these instances?  Where is that red line after which the Allies could and should intervene?  And I’m not talking about, like, Article 5, of course, but maybe Article 4, for instance.  Thank you.

**MR BARANOWSKI:**  Thank you very much for this question, Liepa.  So this is in a way new.  It’s something that is very important in countries – the populations already are talking about it in your country, in my country, but more and more NATO Allies are being affected, not only the frontline states.  There have been also incidents in Germany, in other Western European countries, so this is in many ways, fortunately, a problem that is not localized only.  It’s – we are – this is – this is further evidence that Russia sees itself in the form of a hybrid conflict, hybrid war with us, and is active already in – on our territories.

Now, the way – the Alliance has just begun discussing how to address it.  Of – and it’s easy to say of course we cannot do the same to Russia the way that they are, for example, targeting civilian infrastructure in – step one, as in other hybrid tactics, will be attribution, unity, and a response that will show Russia costs to – that will then lead to resuming and rebuilding deterrence vis-a-vis these actions.  On attribution, sometimes it’s easier, sometimes it’s a little bit harder, because Russia begun engaging with also criminal organizations and sort of trying to get to be step removed.  But I think the more we have this on the agenda, the more we – the – all the Allies are on the same page, the more we can say, okay, this is something that we can trace to Russia.  That’s part of the answer, deterrence answer.

We are facing less – because this is basically already a kinetic action, but we have faced these – the same tactics in many ways in the info sphere and in the cyber sphere, so there is – there’s some similarities.  Now, you ask about Article 5 – maybe not Article 5, Article 4 – the – this sabotage absolutely could lead to a situation where we are in a Article 5 territory.  It all depends on the impact on the real world, on the real life, on the real people.  The Alliance has been also very clear, without going into the details, that attack in cyberspace can create – can call – can create a situation that is necessary to discuss Article 5 because the impact in the real world is so big.  The – even more is true when it’s not a missile but, for example, a device that burns some – I don’t know – a building and people are hurt.

So anyways, we are in the beginning of designing response. The challenge we will have is that we cannot do a mirror answer to this, but there are certainly ways for the Alliance to basically push costs and provide – show Russia costs for their actions, including direct actions inside Russia and not – I’m not talking about military ones but other possible actions.  Thanks.

**MODERATOR:**  Thank you.  And I see John Ford has a follow-up question.  Please, go ahead.

**QUESTION:**  Michael, thanks again for your thoughtfulness.  I want to focus briefly on leadership, both in Washington and in Moscow.  And it appears that in Vladimir Putin and Joe Biden, you have two leaders who – whose grip on power may be different but who are both forged in the Cold War era.  You’ve mentioned that we’re in a post-Cold War period, but it seems to me for both of these men, the Cold War really informs their basic attitudes and their antagonism toward each other.  Assuming that Biden stays in after November, wouldn’t you see their continuation in power as leading, with some degree of inevitability, toward an actual armed conflict on the ground over time?

**MR****BARANOWSKI:**Thank you, John.  No, I don’t think there’s anything inevitable about armed conflict.  And there is really a very clear aggressor here, and I agree with you that Putin – Putin has – the formative experience for him was Soviet Union losing the Cold War.  Joe Biden was a Senator and obviously a President shaped during the Cold War but with a very different approach to the way that the world should look like after Cold War.  And I we are – some would say that we are already in a Cold War.  I’m not sure if that’s the best analogy.  We are certainly in a new period of confrontation that left behind a post-Cold War moment.  

But does it – now, Putin has been determined to rebuild or bring back the glory of Soviet Union the way he saw it, but he miserably failed in his first step even.  Let’s remember that the expectation were that Kyiv will fall and Ukraine will fall in the first days.  So I don’t think – so first of all, we have a leader that is brutal yet determined, but also miscalculates.  The – whether this will lead to direct confrontation, I think it’s entirely, frankly – well, to very large degree, it’s up to us when it comes to building up our defense and deterrence and the way we support Ukraine.  This is – I’m not trying to be flippant about it, but this is the why the war and our support, Western support, for Ukraine goes – is so critical beyond this conflict.  If Russia cannot win in Ukraine, it will be no threat to NATO territory.  It will be no threat to other neighbors.  So this is – it’s very easy, in a way, to answer this.  

Now, I do not have much faith in Putin changing his mind by himself.  He is right now the leader in Russia.  I very much hope that Russians will find a way to have another leader in the future, but I don’t think we are on a path of no return that we’ll have to – that we’ll see a direct confrontation between – especially between the – Russia and NATO countries, with United States including.  Thanks.

**MODERATOR:**  Thank you.  And with that, I don’t see any more questions, so this ends the Q&A session.  Michal, do you have any final thoughts to share?

**MR****BARANOWSKI:**Well, I just wanted to thank you all for both tuning in and for all the really thoughtful questions.  I would encourage you to follow what’s going on in the summit but also in the margins of the summit.  Summits themselves are just snapshots, but it is in such a critical time both when it comes to European history, but also American history with the November election around the corner.  So more will be – there will be more stories than just what’s in the communique, and I look forward to future conversations with you.  And I thank you very much, colleagues from the Foreign Press Center at the State Department, for organizing this briefing.  Thanks.

**MODERATOR:**  And thank you to our briefer, Michal Baranowski, for sharing your time with us today, and to all the journalists who participated.  Thank you.  This concludes today’s briefing.

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