WSJ: Putin could test NATO with a limited attack

US intelligence is reported to have changed its assessment of the possibility of a limited Russian attack on a NATO country. The Wall Street Journal reports that the scenario had until now been considered improbable.

The forms under consideration are not those of an invasion. What is described are cyberattacks and small-scale ground incursions, enough to test how the Alliance responds.

The newspaper recalls episodes that have already occurred. Russian missiles have landed on Polish territory and drones have entered Romanian airspace.

The question of stockpiles

A second element concerns ammunition. Transfers to Ukraine have left significant gaps in certain categories of weaponry.

The systems named include the Precision Strike Missile, the Army Tactical Missile System known as ATACMS, and short-range Stinger missiles. These are stocks that cannot be rebuilt quickly.

The shortage is not only about available quantities. Replenishing precision missile lines requires dedicated production capacity, while the same weapons continue to be sought by the Ukrainian front.

The objective attributed to Vladimir Putin would not be military but political. A limited action would serve to fragment the Alliance, testing whether its members respond together or each on their own.

The reasoning reported by the newspaper starts from episodes that have already happened. The missiles that landed in Poland and the drones that entered Romanian airspace produced no collective response, and it is that precedent which makes the scenario less remote than before.

Heather Conley, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, identifies the decisive point. «L'incognita riguarda la risposta che darebbero gli Stati Uniti» (The unknown is the response the United States would give), she said.

The article places the scenario in a wider frame that includes Russia's relations with China and with Iran.

These are intelligence assessments reported by a newspaper, not official announcements. Neither NATO nor the governments concerned have publicly confirmed the change in analysis.