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By Sean Rayment
Critical gaps across European NATO militaries risk undermining deterrence against Russia, according to a new report on collective defence by the Council on Geostrategy.
Entitled Collective Defence, the Strategic Defence Review, and Capability Gaps, the report highlights shortfalls across air, sea and land power, and argues that without urgent reform and integration, European allies could struggle to respond effectively to future crises on the continent.
In a foreword to the report, General Sir Richard Barrons, who also co-authored the 2025 Strategic Defence Review, warns that “hope and denial” have too often replaced coherent strategy in European defence planning.
The analysis identifies weaknesses ranging from limited missile defence capacity and slow production rates to inadequate counter-drone systems and shortfalls in anti-submarine warfare.
The report also highlights growing vulnerabilities in logistics and industrial resilience, with many NATO members dependent on commercial shipping and supply chains ill-suited for wartime demands. Barrons wrote: “We know what needs to be done. What is left is to decide to do it at the speed determined by the risks.”
In the report, Gen Barrons states: “Making these changes in the face of the acute Russian challenge to Europe must acknowledge the strategic absurdity of Europe feeling threatened by a Russia with an economy 12 times smaller.
“Russia has advantage in aggressive mobilisation and a singular autocracy, not in resources, capacity for innovation or industrial power. If deterrence fails, it will be for want of making hard choices, for want of the political and social will, the military and industrial competence, to spend money differently and quickly enough to sustain escalation dominance. It is not about affordability.
“This report describes very clearly where the gaps are in European military capability compared to Russia today. It shows what needs to be done and where military transformation should focus. It recognises deterrence as a ‘whole-of-society’ undertaking, no longer an outsourcing exercise to small professional forces, and it illuminates the decisive role ahead for private sector innovation and industry.
“We know what needs to be done. What is left is to decide to do it at the speed determined by the risks. Relying on the largesse of friends and the forbearance of enemies to continue to spend most of our money on ourselves for the next decade substitutes hope and denial for competent, coherent strategy.”
Report author William Freer, a Research Fellow in National Security at the Council, said the study sought to provide “a clear picture of European NATO and its current capabilities stacked against a Russian military capable of posing problem sets that could challenge the foundations of the Alliance.”
He added that Russia’s military, once the war in Ukraine ends, will likely emerge with “a large infantry-based army, supported by a deep and replaceable long-range fires magazine, shielded by A2/AD systems and backed by a powerful nuclear arsenal.”
Among its recommendations, the report calls for a more focused UK force structure with greater emphasis on air and naval power, the expansion of missile production capacity, and consideration of a UK-built sub-strategic nuclear missile to bolster deterrence. It also urges closer integration among European allies to avoid duplication and address gaps more efficiently.
Freer noted that European navies are particularly vulnerable, with fewer than half of NATO’s surface warships commissioned in the past 15 years and none equipped for ballistic missile defence. Despite recent increases in defence spending, he warned that “gaps remain. It is vital that deterrence in the Euro-Atlantic continues to hold.”
The full report is available here: https://www.geostrategy.org.uk/research/collective-defence-the-sdr-and-capability-gaps/