Putin's provocations are part of his 'divide and conquer' strategy

The Russian president has pushed for years against those he considers his enemies, and his efforts have borne fruit.

Photo by Marek Studzinski on Unsplash

By David Bernell and Thomas Graham

Russian President Vladimir Putin continues to test NATO and Europe’s willingness and ability to resist his policy of reassertion. The latest provocations have involved Russian drones and aircraft. In early September, about 20 Russian drones crossed into Poland. This violation of Polish airspace, which lasted for several hours and occurred during an attack on western Ukraine, triggered a NATO military response, with allied forces shooting down several of the drones. Later that month, three Russian fighter jets entered Estonian airspace before being intercepted by NATO fighters and escorted out of the country.

The incursions into Poland and Estonia were the most brazen of these encroachments, but they were not the only instances. Estonian airspace has been violated by Russia four other times in 2025, and a Russian drone crashed and exploded in Poland in August. Over the past several weeks, possible Russian drones forced airports to close in Denmark, Norway, Germany, and Sweden, and they were detected in Lithuania, Romania, Finland, Belgium, and the Netherlands. The Russian government denied the in incident in Poland, and it claimed that its planes never entered Estonia. It has also denied any involvement with the drones that appeared in other NATO countries. However, Russia’s protests of innocence are hardly believable. This is typical Putin behavior, and it is ramping up.

The incursions are happening at the same time as incidents that could be characterized as accidents but look more like sabotage. We know Russia uses its intelligence services to coordinate and carry out attacks on industry, transportation, and critical infrastructure. Airports and logistics hubs throughout the European Union have been hampered by cyberattacks. Russia also maintains a “shadow fleet” of oil tankers and commercial ships that evade Western sanctions and have been implicated in undersea attacks. Russian sabotage is suspected, though not proved, in damage to Baltic Sea gas pipelines, power cables, and internet cables.

Amid these violations of airspace and suspected sabotage, there are targeted disinformation campaigns, another hallmark of Russia. One such effort came soon after the Russian drones were shot down in Poland. Social media in Poland was flooded with hundreds of thousands of messages, mostly parroting the Russian narrative that the drones were sent by Ukraine or NATO to try and pull Poland into joining a war that isn’t theirs, risking a third world war. Similar messages and disinformation campaigns also appeared in France, Germany, and Romania.

NATO Pushes Back

NATO is responding to Russia’s provocations. Estonia and Poland invoked Article 4 of the NATO Treaty to prompt rapid action. Article 4 allows any member state to bring an issue regarding its security to the attention of the entire alliance for discussion. NATO’s response has generally been unity. Members of the alliance see Russia as pursuing multiple objectives. One is to test NATO military forces and see whether and how they respond when confronted with Russian military forces. The Polish foreign minister said the “Kremlin wanted to test the readiness of NATO allies” and the movement of drones into Poland was a deliberate “provocation orchestrated by the Russian regime” to conduct such a test. Shooting down drones and intercepting planes demonstrated that these violations won’t be ignored. Still, to be more effective and to send a message to Moscow, NATO has debated modifying its rules of engagement and bolstered its defenses, launching “Operation Eastern Sentry.” This will entail the deployment of additional fighter planes and air defenses in the region, along with improved alliance coordination to ensure a more rapid and forceful response to Russian incursions.

NATO members also see Russian actions as part of a strategy to sow political conflict and disunion in Europe, which Putin hopes will diminish support for Ukraine and curb hostile actions toward Russia. Because European countries are also trying to respond to U.S. President Donald Trump’s views on the value of NATO and his statements about reducing American involvement in Europe’s defense, Putin’s actions also seem designed, as one observer noted, to “send a signal to European capitals that they are all alone against a resurgent Russia and can no longer count on the reassuring presence of the United States.”

The effect, however, seems to be the opposite. Every Russian provocation appears to make most NATO members even more unified, to not only defend its members but also to stand with Ukraine. To that end, the North Atlantic Council issued a statement in late September to clarify exactly where NATO stands, saying that, “Russia should be in no doubt: NATO and Allies will employ, in accordance with international law, all necessary military and non-military tools to defend ourselves and deter all threats from all directions. We will continue to respond in the manner, timing, and domain of our choosing. Our commitment to Article 5 is ironclad.” This prompted the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, to state that “any aggression against my country will be met with a decisive response.”

Though these public statements might seem to fuel confrontation, NATO in particular is testing if its words can have a stabilizing effect. Establishing a clear limit with respect to what can be tolerated seeks to remove ambiguity in Russia’s understanding of NATO’s threats and instead induce a level of caution.

An Effective Russian Strategy?

Putin’s longstanding strategy is “divide and conquer,” to exploit divisions in NATO and the EU, weaken the commitment of Russia’s adversaries to one another, and sow discord among them. But this is only one facet of Putin’s approach to the West. Putin is also pursuing the strategy within these same countries. It involves what has been called “hybrid warfare” against Russia’s enemies, consisting of several components: military (planes and drones; a shadow fleet of ships); economic (industrial sabotage); political (election interference in the United States, France, Poland, Romania, and others; championing populist/right-wing parties in several countries); and media/disinformation (planting fake news stories that go viral, some of which is are tied to election interference).

One part of this hybrid warfare revolves around NATO’s response to the Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. If NATO countries have to fear Russian military incursions in their own territories, and if they cannot be certain of American backing, then they will have to devote more of their resources and attention to themselves, giving less military aid to Ukraine.

The less tangible part that Putin seems to be gambling on has to do with impeding the collective NATO response to Russia itself. Russia clearly sending its planes and drones into NATO countries (while saying these are accidents with no hostile intentions), drones whose origins cannot be definitively determined appearing in multiple countries, and sabotage that cannot be attributed all complicate the response to Russia’s provocations. It is difficult enough to get all NATO countries to agree on a course of action when the facts are clear (such as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine). It is even harder when events can be described as accidents, or not that bad, or maybe not even Russian actions. In such a context, the potential costs of a forceful NATO response might seem too high.

Though a number of European countries demonstrate their willingness to advance the interests of NATO to support a fellow democracy in Ukraine, the United States increasingly sits on the sidelines, providing a concrete demonstration of Western disunity. Though Trump recently posted on social media that “Ukraine, with the support of the European Union, is in a position to fight and WIN all of Ukraine back in its original form” and invited the Ukrainian president back to Washington for another meeting, his earlier words and actions have made things far more difficult for Ukraine (berating President Volodymyr Zelensky in the White House, cutting military aid and intelligence, holding a summit meeting with Putin to try to negotiate without any Ukrainian representatives present). It is always unclear if or when Trump will change his mind and take actions welcomed by Russia and lamented by Ukraine. Meanwhile, Trump continues to wage economic warfare through tariffs, and he further isolates the country by alienating America’s historic friends, allies, and trading partners.

In addition, the United States is making itself and other countries increasingly vulnerable to foreign manipulation through social media disinformation operations. The Trump administration has massively cut funding and staff for programs such as the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe. It also closed the State Department office that monitored and countered foreign disinformation campaigns, saying that the office was silencing American conservative groups, even though the office only addresses foreign information attacks. In response to these actions, Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) argued that “the president is completely ceding the global information space to our adversaries, who are only too happy to fill the void with anti-American propaganda…. Moscow and Beijing celebrate each time this administration dismantles another critical foreign policy tool.”

More broadly, many of Trump’s domestic policies are advancing the goals of U.S. adversaries by further dividing Americans. Trump is fragmenting American society by unleashing an unaccountable police force (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) acting with impunity, deploying military forces into American cities, cutting funding to states and cities governed by the Democrats, prosecuting perceived political enemies with politically motivated criminal charges, and appointing sycophants and unqualified people to run the U.S government. The United States is creating one self-inflicted wound after another, providing one advantage after another to Russia.

Putin has pushed on multiple fronts for many years against those he considers his enemies, and his efforts have borne fruit. He is more powerful and richer than ever. Russia is making territorial gains in Ukraine and launching waves of missile and drone attacks. And the country has stronger ties to many countries around the world. Meanwhile, Putin sees disunity in the West, along with dysfunctional government and erratic leadership in the United States. He has even said that the United States is headed down the same path as the former Soviet Union. And he sees geopolitical realignment comprised of the rise of China and his own assertion of political and military power.

It’s not difficult to see why Putin believes Russia is winning—against Ukraine, against NATO, and against the United States. But it is also up to European powers and United States—and how they respond over time—to determine whether or not the Russian leader proves correct in his thinking.

Ambassador Thomas Graham Jr. is former acting director of the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency under President Clinton, and served as General Counsel of ACDA during the presidencies of Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush. He is the author of several books on nuclear arms control, U.S. foreign policy, and American politics.

David Bernell is an Associate Professor in the School of Public Policy at Oregon State University. He is the author of Constructing US Foreign Policy: The Curious Case of Cuba, and The Energy Security Dilemma: US Policy and Practice. He also served in the Clinton Administration with the US Office of Management and Budget, and the US Department of the Interior.

You can find their work on Substack at Defending Democracy.

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