A reinvigorated NATO will help the US re-posture to the Asia-Pacific

While news of Russia’s recent withdrawal from the outskirts of Kyiv has come as a breath of fresh air, analysts have presented little evidence that the war will come to an end anytime soon.

In the aftermath of Russia’s disengagement to the north of the Ukrainian capital, many are now just learning of the true nature of the occupation and the horrors faced by those civilians under Russian control.

A recent intelligence report from the Institute for the Study of War has shown that Russia is likely to restart several engagements over the coming days as they attempt to take Slovyansk and cut off Ukrainian forces in the east of the country.

Nevertheless, overt Russian aggression in the face of economic and military deterrents have prompted governments around the world to rethink their foreign policy and defence strategies.

This not only kicked many of America’s allies into gear and re-evaluate their defence spending, but it also prompted military experts to reassess Russia and China’s real military capabilities.

These were the assessments of Robert Murphy, former special assistant to the Commanding General, US Army Europe in the Small Wars Journal this week, who suggested that the invasion may bolster the US-led world order as NATO allies increase defence spending and enable the US to pivot to the Asia-Pacific.

“Putin’s ill-conceived invasion of Ukraine has not only bared the depths of Russia’s incompetence, it has shaken America’s normally ambivalent European allies back into acquiescence with NATO’s defense spending guidelines,” Murphy argued.

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“The US is presented with the opportunity to disencumber itself from forward deployed forces and shift European security back to Europeans, while simultaneously reallocating resources to more valid security concerns. Russia is depleted, Europe is invigorated, and America can refocus.”

In his analysis, Murphy referenced a 2016 submission he wrote, where the strategist argued that Russian military power is a relative concept – “Russia is strong because Europe is weak.”

With a renewed sense of urgency for Britain and the major European nations to reinvigorate their defence spending, Russia’s relative threat decreases and enables the United States to re-posture to address more pressing matters.

The analyst further suggested that the recent invasion has shown that the Russian military machine simply isn’t as powerful as many Western strategists projected.

“A consistently accurate image of Russia’s culture of warfare is a starving, bedraggled and unmotivated conscript unsure of where he is or what he’s really fighting for.”

In fact, much of Murphy’s analysis was reflected by Major General (Ret’d) Mick Ryan in a recent opinion piece published on the ABC in mid-March, analysing the Russian military’s modernisation efforts over recent decades.

“New equipment, new ideas about future war, a more professional force at higher readiness and lessons from recent combat in Syria” informed Russian military doctrine, according to the retired Major General.

However, in seeking new equipment, the Russian military failed to address correct technology integration to get the full use of such capabilities in contested modern environments.

“They certainly overlooked developing the basics of land combat: Combined arms, air-ground integration, close combat and good leadership are foundational capabilities that have been conspicuously absent in the Russian forces in Ukraine,” he explained.

While Russia will be left to lick its social, economic and military wounds for the coming years, Murphy assessed whether the West’s overestimation of Russian military capabilities could be extended to China.

“However, China may not be the competent adversary we’ve been led to believe they are, and the solution in the Pacific, like in Europe, likely lies with a network of allies capable of defending themselves,” Murphy noted.

“Despotic strategic leadership, generals carping for political favor, disdain for the welfare of individual troops, no experience in the conduct of combined arms warfare, a penchant for and history of throwing masses of ill equipped, ill-led and largely ignorant members of its lower classes against a more competent adversary.”

To evidence this line of questioning, Murphy cited examples where the Chinese military bungled the deployment of troops to support humanitarian efforts as well as their inability to support their troops on the Indian border.

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