the technologies of war developed since the end of the cold war and indeed in the last decade
of the cold war remain untested in high-intensity combat against sophisticated resourceful opponents
the nato alliance and its most powerful members in non-alliance conflicts have soundly beaten
foes with aging air defense systems non-existent air forces and trivial offensive capabilities
it remains to be seen however how effectively nato would fight against a determined well-trained
opponent with relatively modern technology like those in ukraine and syria have for the first
time since the cold war raised the specter of direct conflict with russia if diplomacy fails
and politics push the alliance into war these are the weapons nato will need to worry about the most
iskander ballistic missile
in the final years of the cold war the soviet union developed short-range conventional ballistic
missiles capable of striking with great precision air bases and staging areas well behind nato lines
the american answer to this was theater missile defense which as experience
in the gulf war demonstrated would not have stopped the opening soviet volleys
anti-ballistic missile systems have improved since the 1980s but so have russian missiles
the iskandaram has a range of 400 kilometers can carry a 700 kilograms warhead of several varieties
and has a circular error probability of around 5 meters this makes it deadly to
airfields logistics points and other stationary infrastructure along a broad front of conflict
the iskander has the capability to retarget in flight making it possible to engage mobile
targets including ships it also has a set of built-in evasive maneuver techniques
designed to make targeting from missile defenses difficult in short the iskander
can threaten to do to nato forces what nato forces typically do to everyone else
su-27 flanker family designed as the soviet answer to the f-15 the first flankers entered
service in 1985 but production troubles kept their numbers low until the early 1990s
at that point the collapse of the soviet union significantly reduced the overall production run
the aircraft of the flanker family combined size range speed and wicked maneuverability into a
single deadly platform with gaunt unforgiving lines the flanker is not a beautiful plane
but its appearance does suggest danger the russian air force continues to operate several hundred
flankers in various configurations the basic flanker frame has proven remarkably flexible
for upgrade and has become the platform of choice for discerning fighter customers
variants of the flanker include the su-30 multi-role fighter the su-33 carrier-based
fighter the s-34 fighter bomber the su-35 air superiority fighter and several chinese knockoffs
s-400 surface-to-air missile system
an s-400 battery has three kinds of missiles each intended to engage aerial targets at different
ranges the longest-ranged surface-to-air missile can engage at 400 kilometers with shorter-ranged
missiles compensating with enhanced capabilities for killing fast maneuverable targets the s-400
can also engage ballistic missiles although it's unlikely that nato would use such weapons
the sensor systems of the s-400 are thought to be extremely effective
especially as russia can layer s 400 defense zones in nearly every conceivable theater of conflict
positioning the s-400 at kaliningrad could endanger nato air operations deep into europe
in combination with the iskander and the flanker these missiles would make the job of nato air
forces in the early days of a conflict very difficult indeed russian sensor systems ground and
air exceed the capabilities of any opponent that nato countries have fought in the last 25 years
akula class submarines in the 1980s and 1990s the soviet union and russia built 15 akula
class submarines nine of which remain in service extremely stealthy for soviet subs of their period
the russian navy has upgraded the boats with the latest quieting technology perhaps most
importantly the akulas carry a massive array of weaponry including torpedoes and cruise missiles
the cruise missiles can strike both sea and land targets putting much of nato's coastline at risk
the best nato subs can still track and defeat the akulas
although the latter's high speed makes catching them an iffy proposition
spetsnaz
during the cold war both the united states and the soviet union conceived of special
operations forces primarily in terms of support of conventional operations
even at the time however the soviets interpreted this mission more broadly than nato spetsnaz an
umbrella term that has come to encompass special forces operators under several organizational
designations were expected to undertake offensive operations concentrating on the sabotage of
communications the preparation for conventional advance and even the wreaking of political havoc
although not a weapon in the technological sense russian special forces represent one of the most
effective tools in the russian arsenal they will have a major impact in any conflict with nato
possibly even before nato realizes the conflict has begun conclusion
there is little question that nato weaponry remains technologically ahead of russian
the existence of a gap was clear in the 1980s and the size of the gulf has grown since
however the russian military still commands sufficient resources and can harness enough
innovative thinking to hurt nato if a european dispute ever came to blows
we hope of course that these weapons and their equivalents on the nato side
fulfill their purpose as deterrence nevertheless it behooves nato to think hard about how to solve
the problems that these weapons present especially when used in conjunction with one another
oh
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