We are becoming dangerously comfortable with an unstable Europe
We are becoming very good at living with things that ought to worry us, writes EJ Ward
There is something that keeps me awake at night occasionally, and it isn't really the idea that Russian tanks are suddenly going to appear on the streets of London.
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It is the feeling that Europe is changing around us, becoming more dangerous and unstable, and that somehow we are all getting used to it. Drones crossing NATO airspace, Russian warships and European military aircraft coming dangerously close to each other, Germany moving troops east, strikes landing close to the Polish border, North Korean soldiers fighting and dying in Europe.
None of this is normal, or at least it shouldn't be, but it has started to feel normal because there is always something else the next day.
Overnight, Russia attacked Ukraine and Ukraine attacked Russia. I could have written that sentence at almost any point over the last four and a half years, and I think that is part of what bothers me.
A huge war is happening on the edge of Europe and somehow it can now be another notification on the phone before we make a coffee and get on with the day.
British Defence Intelligence estimates that around half a million Russian troops have been killed since the full-scale invasion began, with total casualties far higher. If somebody had told me in February 2022 that Russia could absorb losses on that scale and still keep going, I'm not sure I would have believed them.
Yet that is where we are, with Moscow even turning to North Korea for manpower. North Korean troops fighting in Europe should have made everyone stop, but even that has become part of the background.
The more I look away from Ukraine itself, the less reassured I feel. We have seen a Russian drone strike a train close to the Polish border. Denmark has accused a Russian frigate of firing flares towards one of its military helicopters, while Lithuania saw NATO aircraft scrambled and a drone entering its airspace from Belarus shot down.
Any one of these incidents can be disputed or explained. Put them together and they start to look much more worrying.
Ursula von der Leyen said this week that these aren't isolated incidents but part of a wider pattern of Russian aggression and provocation designed to test Europe's readiness and resolve. I think that word, test, matters.
Russia doesn't need to invade a NATO country tomorrow to find out how NATO reacts. It can push a little here and a little there. A drone crosses a border. A ship behaves more aggressively than it should. A cable is damaged. Somebody is recruited online to carry out sabotage.
That is what grey-zone warfare does so well. It creates doubt, confusion and deniability, and because there is never one obvious moment where everything changes, you can get quite a long way down the road before you realise how different the world has become.
Germany certainly seems to have noticed. It is building a permanent military presence in Lithuania, while across Europe defence budgets are rising and governments are talking far more seriously about resilience and readiness.
Britain is particularly good at keeping a comforting bit of distance. It is over there. We are here. We are an island. But that isn't really how the threat works anymore, although psychologically I think the Channel makes us feel that at times.
I have spent the last couple of years writing, or banging on, about defence, national security, cyber attacks, resilience, and the grey zone, and what I notice again and again is how seriously the people who work in this area take it.
They aren't generally talking about Russian tanks landing at Dover. They talk about disruption, pressure, access and vulnerabilities.
The National Cyber Security Centre said it dealt with more than 200 incidents affecting UK critical national infrastructure and the systems around it, with around three-quarters assessed as linked to hostile states. Its chief executive has said Britain operates in the space between peace and war.
A confrontation with Russia doesn't have to start with missiles heading towards Britain. It could be a water company hit, a port disrupted, GPS interference, a defence company compromised or a cable damaged under the sea.
The Government appears to understand at least part of this. The Ministry of Defence plans to test whether it can mobilise the Strategic Reserve, roughly 95,000 former regulars and reservists who could potentially be recalled, while Britain is also preparing a major exercise looking at how the country would cope with a hybrid attack involving cyber operations, sabotage and disinformation.
That doesn't mean somebody in Whitehall believes war with Russia is inevitable, but countries don't rehearse these things for fun either.
That is where I think the public conversation has gone wrong. We seem to have two settings. Either everything is fine, or somebody is screaming about World War Three. I don't think either is useful.
An enormous space exists between panic and complacency, and preparedness sits there. Can the lights stay on if systems are attacked? Can hospitals keep working? Can damaged infrastructure be repaired quickly? Those are boring questions until the day they suddenly aren't.
And that is probably the bit that occasionally keeps me awake. Not because I think war is coming tomorrow, but because I think we are becoming very good at living with things that ought to worry us. One drone isn't the point. One ship isn't the point. One cyber attack isn't the point. It is the slow drip of them all together.
The people I speak to in the military and security world aren't panicking, but they aren't dismissive either. They are preparing. Governments across Europe are preparing. NATO is preparing. Britain is beginning to prepare.
I hope deterrence works, Ukraine survives and Europe gets stronger. But hope isn't the same thing as preparedness, and pretending that all of this is normal won't make Europe safer.
The world around us has changed far more than we have allowed ourselves to admit, and maybe the first thing we need to do is simply acknowledge that.
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EJ Ward is LBC's Investigations Editor and covers intelligence, defence and security topics.
LBC Opinion provides a platform for diverse opinions on current affairs and matters of public interest.
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