Russia’s drone strike near Ukraine-Poland border puts NATO neighbors on edge

(CNN) — It doesn’t really matter if they meant to do it.

The Russian drone strike that hit a train near Ukraine’s border with Poland as a group of former Western officials travelled out of the country is a clear escalation by Moscow. Ukraine’s railway network said it believes former CIA chief David Petraeus, former UK prime minister Boris Johnson and other dignitaries who were all nearby, either at the local railway station or on trains, were likely targeted.

Intent is hard to prove in conflict. The proof, to some degree, is an afterthought in the rubble – the damage is by then clear, as is the need for retaliation. Killing a former CIA chief on a railway platform would have provided some element of deniability for Russia; how could they know for sure he was there? But it would fulfil the warnings of Western intelligence, circulating for some time now, that Moscow will seek some form of escalation with Ukraine’s NATO allies in the near future.

A full-on military conflict with NATO seemed an unlikely goal for a Russian state struggling to suppress and occupy its relatively tiny neighbor. Instead, a lateral move, in the deniable hybrid space, seemed more likely, and Ukraine and others warned its borders with NATO states might come under attack.

The immediate impact of Ukraine’s diplomatic commuter link being under attack is profound. The railway is the best method for heads of state or senior officials from Ukraine’s allies to get in and out of Kyiv, to show vital support, share the most sensitive intelligence, or discuss vital matters. Trains, and the civilians on them, now routinely come under attack from Russian drones. The latest versions use other airborne Russian drones to transmit signals and even video feeds, in real time, back to their pilots inside Russia. These “mesh” networks extend their range and lessen the risk electronic warfare can disrupt them, a remarkable development that helped Moscow hit trains so close to Poland.

The net result is Western officials and their security details, whose job it is to minimize risk, must now either rethink how they get in and out of Ukraine or widen the envelope of acceptable risk. In a wartorn country where air travel is too perilous to even consider, the roads are the obvious option, but are jammed, precarious, and cursed with long, torturous border queues. New ideas are needed to maintain the flow of high-profile visitors to Kyiv at a time when shows of support, real aid, and proper partnership are essential. It is likely that without the option of a swift and safe railway, Western officials facing a longer trip time than about 10 hours each way will reconsider whether a remote video call isn’t just better.

This is likely part of Russia’s aim – to deny Ukraine the easy and free use of its border crossings and rail network to move goods and important visitors, and to leave its Western neighbors on edge. Moscow’s drip-drip escalation has been palpable for years now, as sabotage incidents become more frequent, and recklessness in the form of stray drones or ballistic missiles cross into and test NATO’s outer defenses. None of this sustained probing is accidental. It all fits inside Russia’s grey-zone doctrine of conflict, in which heightening confrontation happens in gradual, tiny steps, none of which, in themselves, appear worth starting a war over.

But the picture is increasingly bleak for NATO and, of course, Ukraine. Moscow correctly calculates that NATO – fractured between the Trump administration and Europe and partially distracted with Iran – does not have the bandwidth or budget for proper conflict with a Kremlin that believes winning – or even sustaining – this war in some way is a matter of survival.

Similarly, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin lacks the resources to risk a full-on war with NATO. But his military-industrial base is slowly edging into a new era of cheaper, longer-range, more accurate and deadly drones and missiles. The new Russian jet-powered Geran 4 and 5 drones travel at 600 kilometers (373 miles) an hour over 1,000 kilometers. Ukraine struggles to stop them, and its engineers are working on the issue 24/7 as a matter of life and death. For NATO, they represent a future horror that European member states hope never comes their way, given that their military spending on the technology they would need to defend themselves is, to be polite, uselessly behind the curve.

Ukrainians already face a winter blighted by heightened attacks on heating and food supplies. That is guaranteed, especially as the West has failed to supply them with more Patriot interceptors. The fresh struggle of the coming months will be for NATO to tackle Moscow’s growing reach, daring and persistence, when it comes to threatening their borders, former prime ministers on railways, and probably border crossing points too.

The warnings of escalation have amplified for months. With Sunday’s railway attack, the moment of their realization is upon a poorly-equipped Western alliance.

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