“Anti-access is not just an Asian affair,” Richard Fontaine and Julie Smith recently concluded.[1] “The capabilities that China and Russia are developing are similar,” notes General Martin Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.[2] A2/AD (anti-access/area denial) systems no longer represent a reality exclusively associated with the spaces adjacent to the South and East China Seas; rather, they form a paradigm embraced by almost all current revisionist powers (“an omnipresent grid for describing military developments in these regions,” says Stephen Blank). Moreover, they are becoming variables that affect Europe to an equal extent. The impact on NATO’s Eastern Flank is obvious. Is it really unimaginable to envision a scenario where, under a dense conventional curtain of anti-access and area denial weapons, Moscow orchestrates a sub-conventional, hybrid, and ambiguous campaign to test whether “the king (NATO) has no clothes”?

“America’s ability to project its overwhelming military power anywhere in the world, taken for granted since the end of the Cold War, is now threatened” (The Economist).[3] For years, potential adversaries of the United States have been investing in counter-systems meant to offset the technological and operational advantages that, until recently, gave Washington the ability to project its global presence. The internalized lessons of the “Revolution in Military Affairs” (RMA)—which underpinned memorable operational successes such as “Desert Storm” (1991, against Iraq), the air war against Serbia (1999), and “Shock and Awe” (2003, also against Iraq)—have created a boomerang effect. They offer adversaries the opportunity to challenge American military supremacy through massive investments in antidote systems designed to neutralize U.S. expeditionary advantages. For example, China is developing its own anti-access and area denial umbrella (submarines and attack aircraft equipped with anti-ship missiles, dense layers of land-based missiles, and electronic, cyber, and anti-satellite systems designed to paralyze competitors’ command and control systems) to keep America away from what it considers its own “near abroad.”

But what are the implications of these trends for other regions, and especially for the Black Sea?

Fundamentally, we are facing a crisis of the traditional expeditionary model of power projection. This generates consequences for NATO as well, especially regarding the strategic reassurance package for the Eastern Flank adopted last year at the Wales Summit. A2/AD systems can prevent an outside power, external to the region, from reaching the theater of operations; even if it succeeds, its freedom of maneuver could be drastically limited. In this interpretation, the geography of control changes dramatically. Read in this light, the guarantees assumed at the NATO Wales Summit—the promise to deploy a highly ready joint task force within 48 hours to reinforce the Eastern Flank—take on a completely different perspective. Practically, developing “counter-intervention capabilities” (to use Chinese terminology) that can delay and keep at bay NATO reinforcements destined for the Eastern Flank is “the fundamental objective of Russian military procurement and military strategy,” says Stephen Blank, Senior Fellow for Russia at the American Foreign Policy Council.[4]

On the other hand, since the 1990s, NATO has preserved a distribution that reflects the Cold War alignment, with a center of gravity still physically anchored predominantly in Old Europe. Some observers consider this the “original sin” of NATO enlargement. Certainly, the Wales Summit announced timid measures through which the Alliance is establishing bridgeheads (in the form of command and control centers and reception facilities for rapid reaction forces) on the Eastern Flank. Recently, some allies have also announced their willingness to pre-position heavy equipment in the Baltic states, Poland, or Romania. Fundamentally, however, the Alliance’s posture remains based on “defense in depth,” leaving the flanks exposed. Yet, in an era where A2/AD systems herald the new normal, such vulnerabilities only stimulate the opportunism of the Eastern empire, which seems to have learned a crucial lesson in Ukraine: when Russia controls a piece of territory, no one in the West will dare risk war to return to the status quo ante. In this context, is it really unimaginable to envision a scenario where, under a dense conventional curtain of anti-access and area denial weapons, Moscow orchestrates a sub-conventional, hybrid, ambiguous campaign to test whether “the king (NATO) has no clothes”? Ultimately, the A2/AD umbrella can provide an increased level of immunity under which a revisionist power can arbitrarily exercise its potential to sow regional disorder. Furthermore, this is something that has been seen before in not-so-distant military history. In 1973, “the Egyptians crossed the Suez Canal into the Sinai Peninsula under a massive defensive air umbrella that caused serious losses to Israeli forces. And for a time, they achieved tactical and operational success, which later led to the Camp David outcome. (…) the concept is there, in the sense that you can create anti-aircraft and anti-maritime barriers using conventional means, under the cover of which naval or ground forces can advance. In a way, this is what Beijing is doing in the South China Sea,” Stephen Blank tells us. The model can go even further. Revisionist powers can devise creative and efficient combinations to exploit existing gaps, mixing A2/AD systems with sub-conventional power projection formulas. Consequently, aggression—especially of a sub-conventional, hybrid, insidious, slow-motion nature, straddling the line between civilian and military—becomes much more likely. “These combinations can be applied differently depending on the circumstances and specific objectives at any given time, whether we are talking about Georgia, Ukraine, or perhaps the Baltic countries or Moldova in the future. A2/AD capabilities allow them to keep conventional military forces at bay while projecting an umbrella under which they can use their sub-conventional capabilities,” notes Jim Thomas, an analyst at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments (CSBA).[5]

Last but not least, the Black Sea and the Baltic Sea are entering the era of anti-access and area denial capabilities. The U.S. National Security Strategy published earlier this year reviewed the risks to the security environment: access to the “global commons” is in danger; Washington will ensure it has the capabilities to guarantee access to these spaces; it has an enduring interest in maintaining freedom of navigation and will maintain the capacity to deter those contemplating aggression; it rejects aggressive claims on the maritime domain.[6] The annexation of Crimea and the deployment of A2/AD capabilities are pushing the Black Sea in a similar direction, into an area where regional commons, maritime security, and access are becoming problematic. A recent European Parliament report mentioned the deployment of anti-ship missiles with a range that can reach the Bosphorus Strait, long-range bombers carrying cruise missiles, and fighter jets capable of controlling “approximately three-quarters of the airspace over the Black Sea basin.”[7] In Crimea, which after its annexation has become a veritable “Kaliningrad of the South” (as the EP report aptly suggested), Russia is consolidating its operational capacity to impose a no-fly zone, obstruct maritime traffic, and keep NATO at a distance. “It is obvious that the Russians want to turn the Black Sea into a Mare Nostrum and cut off our access to it,” Stephen Blank tells us.

On the other hand, this is a challenge the Alliance is aware of and does not intend to accept. “A2/AD strategies concern all nations because they impact freedom of navigation and the Law of the Sea Convention. It is relatively easy to build a system that restricts or denies access, considering how many items are available on the market today, including underwater drones, mines, submarines, and anti-ship cruise missiles. (…) All these concern us, but they will not deter us because we conduct exercises meant to maintain freedom of navigation, and we will sail in accordance with the rules, norms, and institutions that give us the right to navigate in international waters anywhere in the world,” stated Vice Admiral James G. Foggo III (Commander, Naval Striking and Support Forces NATO; Deputy Commander, U.S. Naval Forces Europe),[8] under whose command one of NATO’s most important exercises, BALTOPS 2015, just took place. Meanwhile, Alliance fleets are investing in high-end capabilities that “allow us to exercise our freedom of navigation and facilitate our access. There is no reason why we cannot or should not operate in these areas. They are certainly not closed zones to us,” assured Rear Admiral Tim Lowe.

The proliferation of A2/AD regions imposes new Euro-Atlantic imperatives. Romania, the other NATO states on the Eastern Flank, and the Alliance as a whole must develop their own strategies and means to counterbalance A2/AD systems. This is especially vital in a volatile geopolitical climate where Moscow’s capabilities[9] and revisionist intentions (particularly under the Putin doctrine) appear to be aligning.