The alliance’s top military leader says NATO must consider how pre-emptive action could serve as defense as it faces mounting hybrid threats from Moscow.
By yourNEWS Media Newsroom
NATO’s most senior military official, Admiral Giuseppe Cavo Dragone, has suggested the alliance may need to rethink the boundaries of its defensive posture, including the potential for “pre-emptive strike” operations as a form of deterrence against Russia.
The Italian admiral, who succeeded Admiral Rob Bauer as chairman of NATO’s military committee earlier this year, told the Financial Times that the alliance’s success with “enhanced, active deterrence” in recent years had demonstrated the benefits of more assertive defensive measures. He indicated that NATO might need to explore even bolder approaches in the future to maintain credibility.
In remarks reported by the Financial Times, Admiral Dragone referenced Russia’s so-called “dark fleet” — covert oil tankers accused of conducting underwater sabotage of Europe’s energy and communications infrastructure throughout 2023 and 2024. These operations, involving deliberate severing of power and fiber-optic cables by anchor dragging, largely ceased following NATO’s deployment of surveillance ships, drones, and patrol aircraft under Operation Baltic Sentry.
As reported in 2024, those incidents were widely seen by European leaders as calculated hybrid warfare. Dragone pointed to the alliance’s maritime operation as evidence that proactive deterrence can work, stating, “From the beginning of Baltic Sentry, nothing has happened. So this means that this deterrence is working.”
He also signaled that NATO’s defensive evolution may extend to cyberspace. “On cyber, we are kind of reactive,” he said. “Being more aggressive or being proactive instead of reactive is something that we are thinking about.”
Ultimately, Dragone emphasized that “we are studying everything,” suggesting the alliance is reviewing the full spectrum of deterrence options, including preemptive capabilities. “How deterrence is achieved — through retaliation, through pre-emptive strike — this is something we have to analyse deeply because there could be in the future even more pressure on this,” he said.
The admiral acknowledged the challenge NATO faces against authoritarian adversaries that operate without the same legal or ethical restraints. “We have much more limits than our counterpart because of ethics, because of law, because of jurisdiction,” Dragone explained. “It is an issue. I don’t want to say it’s a loser position, but it is a harder position than our counterparts’.”
These constraints, he added, complicate discussions about how far the alliance can go in matching Russia’s aggression: “Being more aggressive compared with the aggressivity of our counterpart throws up issues like legal framework, jurisdictional framework, who is going to do this?”
The tone marks continuity with Dragone’s predecessor, Admiral Rob Bauer, who frequently warned that NATO nations must prepare for a possible war footing with Russia. Bauer repeatedly urged member states to brace their societies for conflict, describing any potential confrontation as a “whole of society event.” In 2024, he stressed that civilians must be ready for basic survival measures during the early stages of a crisis: “The people, they have to understand they play a role. Society is part of the solution… you need to have water, you need to have a radio on batteries, you need to have a flashlight with batteries to make sure you can survive the first 36 hours. Things like that, that’s simple things but it starts there.”
Dragone’s comments signal that NATO’s military leadership is now weighing whether deterrence through preemptive readiness — rather than reactive response — could define the alliance’s future doctrine in an era of escalating hybrid threats.
Original article
Comments