It feels like we’ve stepped back into the Cold War. In the space of just a few weeks, Vladimir Putin has unleashed nuclear posturing, provocative drone flights, and military exercises with Belarus that are leaving NATO allies on edge.
On 10 September, just days before Moscow’s latest war games began, around 20 Russian drones strayed into Polish airspace. Poland’s Prime Minister, Donald Tusk, called it a deliberate “provocation” and warned that Europe is now “closer than ever since World War II” to open conflict.
NATO Pushes Back
NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte branded Moscow’s move “reckless” as he launched Eastern Sentry, a new initiative to strengthen air defences across the alliance’s eastern flank. Rutte also warned that drone incursions weren’t confined to Poland, pointing to violations in Romania, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania too.
His message was stark: “Within this alliance of 32 countries, we all live on the eastern flank.” In other words, nowhere in Europe is safe.
Zapad 2025: A Nuclear Showcase
The tension comes as Russia and Belarus hold sweeping military drills, codenamed Zapad 2025, or “West 2025”. These exercises, involving thousands of troops, nuclear-capable bombers, warships and combat vehicles, simulate a joint response to an enemy attack.
Worryingly for NATO, the drills explicitly include planning for the potential use of nuclear weapons, alongside Russia’s new intermediate-range ballistic missile, the Oreshnik.
Putin has bragged that Oreshnik’s warheads can plunge at speeds of Mach 10, making them virtually impossible to intercept. Russian state media even boasted that the missile could reach Poland in 11 minutes and NATO headquarters in Brussels in just 17. The unnerving detail? Nobody would know if the missile carried a conventional payload or a nuclear warhead until impact.
Belarus: A Nuclear “Balcony” Over the West
The Kremlin insists it has already deployed battlefield nuclear weapons to Belarus, with plans to station Oreshnik missiles there later this year. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko has claimed his country now hosts “several dozen” tactical nuclear weapons.
Military analysts warn that Belarus has once again become a nuclear forward base, echoing the Cold War era when it hosted much of the Soviet Union’s arsenal. Andrey Baklitskiy of the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research described the move as “a signal, even if there are no plans to use it.”
Another analyst, Alexander Alesin, went further, saying the deployment has effectively turned Belarus into a “balcony looming over the West,” threatening not only Ukraine but also NATO allies in the Baltics and Poland.
The Nuclear Doctrine Shift
The drills come against the backdrop of Putin’s updated nuclear doctrine, announced last year. It effectively lowers the threshold for using nuclear weapons by stating that any conventional attack on Russia, if backed by a nuclear power, could be treated as a joint nuclear strike.
In practice, this means Western nations arming Ukraine could find themselves caught in Russia’s nuclear crosshairs.
Back to the Brink
As Russia ramps up production of the Oreshnik and rehearses nuclear strike scenarios with Belarus, Europe is being forced to confront a reality many thought consigned to history: the return of battlefield nuclear weapons on its doorstep.
“The weapons’ deployment closer to the borders with the West sends a signal,” said Baklitskiy. For many across NATO, that signal is chillingly clear, the balance of power in Europe is shifting, and fast.
