Here is a short personal observation on what we have learned over the past nine months of releasing RedHorizon, our weekly research brief covering the military situation in Ukraine, Belarus, and NATO’s Eastern Flank.

The bottom line up front is that I am cautiously optimistic about the trajectory of NATO’s efforts—by both the United States and European allies—to improve defence capabilities on the Eastern Flank.

When we began systematically tracking Eastern Flank developments earlier this year, we had a solid grasp of the formal NATO force posture: troop numbers, rotational frameworks, and headline deployments. What we lacked was a deeper understanding of domestic politics, institutional constraints, defence-industrial realities, and the genuine level of political commitment underpinning force generation, mobilisation, and sustainment. Over time, it became clear that this context matters at least as much as force posture itself. Deterrence is not defined by order-of-battle slides alone, but by whether capabilities can be generated, integrated, and sustained under real crisis conditions.

On the U.S. side, progress remains visible not only in continued presence, but in credibility and integration (still). Rotational deployments, deeper command-and-control integration, and increasingly realistic exercises indicate a shift away from reassurance-by-symbolism toward readiness-for-contingency. The emphasis is less on static numbers and more on how quickly forces can be reinforced, sustained, and employed in a high-intensity scenario.

European allies, meanwhile, are moving more unevenly—but in ways that are structurally significant. Defence spending increases are increasingly being translated into actual ground combat power rather than remaining at the level of procurement announcements. Across the Eastern Flank, states are expanding land forces, investing in armour, artillery, air defence, and long-range fires, while also rebuilding training pipelines, reserve systems, and logistics—areas long neglected in peacetime force models. On top of that, Germany will have a fully-deployed brigade (5,000 troops) in Lithuania in 2027-2028.

One of the most encouraging shifts has been in defence-industrial policy. Ammunition production, repair capacity, and sustainment infrastructure are no longer treated as background issues. Exercises, too, have changed in character: they now increasingly test reinforcement, endurance, and multi-domain coordination rather than scripted reassurance scenarios.

None of this removes real constraints. Demography, industrial bottlenecks, political cycles, and competing fiscal pressures remain. Progress is uneven, and vulnerabilities persist. But compared to the pre-2022 baseline, there is a clear shift away from declaratory deterrence toward practical, capacity-based deterrence. NATO forces on the Eastern Flank are becoming more capable, the overall trajectory is correct, and the flank already looks markedly different from 2022. It will look very different again three years from now.

Developments from just last week illustrate this trend clearly.

In Estonia, authorities entered a deliberate one-year transition phase in force generation. For 2026, conscription intake will be sharply reduced—from around 4,000 to 1,200—in order to rebuild instructor capacity, standardise training methods, and refresh wartime procedures. This contraction is explicitly preparatory. From 2027, Estonia plans to shift to a uniform 12-month conscription model designed to sustain complex capabilities such as rocket artillery and medium-range air defence. In parallel, Tallinn established a Future Capabilities and Innovation Command, a hybrid civilian–military structure focused on UAVs, automation, and rapid implementation of battlefield lessons. Defence-industrial capacity also advanced with the launch of domestic explosives filling at Ämari, strengthening supply-chain resilience.

Latvia formalised one of the most ambitious defence budgets in NATO, allocating EUR 2.16 bn (4.91 % of GDP) for 2026, with a clear trajectory toward 5 %. More than half of spending is directed toward combat capabilities—particularly IFVs, layered air defence, artillery, munitions, and UAVs—while EUR 55 m is earmarked for counter-mobility infrastructure along the eastern border. Riga also accelerated domestic defence-industrial development, including a 155 mm propellant-charge facility, EDF-backed UAV programmes such as VANTAGE, and expanded innovation funding. Operationally, exercises like Winter Shield 2025 tested winter combat and heavy UAV integration.

In Lithuania, the week was dominated by hybrid pressure from Belarus, prompting a nationwide state of emergency. Vilnius moved to integrate the Armed Forces more directly into internal security, granting soldiers temporary law-enforcement powers and deploying air-defence units along the Belarusian border. At the same time, Lithuania approved a record 2026 defence budget of EUR 4.79 bn (5.38 % of GDP), with major investments in CV90 Mk IV IFVs, Leopard 2A8 tanks, CAESAR artillery, HIMARS, and layered air defence. Defence-industrial localisation advanced through tank assembly, artillery support facilities, and ammunition-compatibility initiatives. Infrastructure spending expanded training areas in the Suwałki corridor, underscoring Lithuania’s focus on division-level readiness and sustained allied presence.

Poland continued to consolidate its role as the logistical and operational backbone of NATO’s Eastern Flank. Allied integration deepened through German Eurofighter deployments, Patriot rotations, and forthcoming Bundeswehr engineer support for Tarcza Wschód, Poland’s nationwide border defence programme. Warsaw also advanced major territorial defence reforms, creating a dedicated Border Defence Component within the Territorial Defence Forces to free manoeuvre brigades for high-intensity warfighting. Logistically, Poland joined NATO’s Central Europe Pipeline System, recognising fuel sustainment as decisive for prolonged conflict. Industrially, Poland reached milestones in K2 tank localisation, artillery expansion (now Europe’s largest 155 mm SPH fleet), domestic ammunition production, loitering munitions, naval mine warfare, and soldier modernisation. The overall trajectory points toward large-scale, sustained, high-intensity readiness.

Finally, Romania focused on airspace security, Black Sea posture, and sustainment capacity. Bucharest clarified its rules for engaging Russian drones, balancing escalation control with population safety, while reinforcing counter-drone measures under NATO’s Eastern Sentry framework. Allied integration continued through rotations of Spanish marines and cooperation with Dutch forces. On the industrial side, Romania moved to assume responsibility for the European F-16 Training Centre—supporting both national and Ukrainian pilot training—while expanding radar coverage through SAFE-financed acquisitions.

Taken together, these developments illustrate how activity has intensified not only in Ukraine, but across the wider region. Yet developments on the Eastern Flank itself remain largely underreported and receive limited attention in broader public discussions of NATO posture and actions. From a deterrence perspective, however, they are among the most consequential shifts currently underway in Europe.

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