Norway’s defense chief - NATO has just two to three years to rebuild its military stocks before Russia attack alliance members in Europe

 

 Russia’s war machine is moving into overdrive

Norway’s defense chief thinks NATO has just two to three years to rebuild its military stocks before Russia has renewed its own ability to attack alliance members in Europe, Bloomberg reported Tuesday.

 “At one point someone said it’ll take 10 years” for Russia to regenerate its losses from the ongoing Ukraine invasion, “but I think we’re back to less than 10 years because of the industrial base that is now running in Russia,” Gen. Eirik Kristoffersen said Monday in Oslo. Still, he added, “It will take [Moscow] some time, which gives us a window now for the next two to three years to rebuild our forces, to rebuild our stocks at the same times as we are supporting Ukraine.”

 One U.S. expert’s grim forecast: “Unfortunately for Ukraine and the West, it is increasingly clear that, with sufficient political will, even an anemic level of economic growth can likely sustain the Russian war effort for years to come,” Atlantic Council alum Emma Ashford wrote recently in a 10-point mythbusting analysis for the Stimson Center. “The most plausible range of scenarios for the war suggests grinding conflict that moderately advantages Russia, but only in the costly conquest of tiny amounts of territory,” she wrote in late May.

To those looking for a settlement or some sustainable way out of the Ukraine war, “Assurances to Russia about future NATO expansion, or conventional arms control limitations on either side, could help to defuse concerns about future conflict and improve the odds a settlement will succeed,” she said, and cautioned, “Precisely because they are controversial, however, these issues will be significantly harder to reach agreement on.”