Russia's Invisible War Against Europe

Belarus is of particular concern.

In late August, the plane of European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen found itself without satellite navigation during a landing approach in Bulgaria. Pilots were forced to land the plane using paper charts and ground beacons. European officials confirmed that the plane's navigation system had been deliberately jammed, and suspicion immediately fell on Russia. This incident clearly demonstrated a new hidden threat to the continent - Russia's purposeful interference with GPS navigation in European airspace.

The case of von der Leyen's plane is only the tip of the iceberg. According to a joint report by Sweden, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland, in the first four months of 2025 alone, more than 122,000 flights experienced problems with satellite navigation in the skies of Northern and Eastern Europe. These failures are caused by jamming signals and "spoofing" of coordinates, when false location information is transmitted to navigation systems.

The consequences ranged from temporary loss of communication with satellites to failure of onboard systems, which could not be restored until landing.

According to experts, the sources of interference are definitely localized in Russia: in the Kaliningrad region, near St. Petersburg, as well as in Smolensk, etc. It is from there that Russian military installations emit powerful signals that jam satellite broadcasts over neighboring countries. Similar incidents also occur in the Baltic States. Last year, Russian jamming prevented two Finnair flights from landing in Estonia's Tartu, and in January this year Ryanair pilots aborted a landing in Vilnius.

European states see such actions as part of a broad hybrid warfare campaign the Kremlin is waging against the West. NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte explicitly called GPS jamming an element of "hybrid threats." Such attacks could have catastrophic consequences, he said, and are therefore taken extremely seriously by the Alliance.

Electronic attacks are only one front in this war. Moscow is also resorting to infrastructure sabotage, cyberattacks, disinformation and espionage. The overall goal is clear: to destabilize Europe and demonstrate its vulnerability to Russian pressure.

Russia's aggressive behavior in the air in Europe confirms that Vladimir Putin has no intention of stopping at Ukraine. Parallel to the war against Kiev, the Kremlin is demonstrating its readiness to challenge its neighbors.

Belarus, which has been turned into a springboard for Russian demonstrations of force, is particularly worrisome. In August-September, the country is hosting a large-scale exercise called "West-2025," which involves about 30,000 Russian and Belarusian servicemen, including units with nuclear weapons and the latest missiles. According to the Polish Defense Ministry, the exercise scenarios envision strikes against Poland and the Baltic States, i.e. a direct clash with NATO.

In response, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia are holding mirror NATO maneuvers involving 40,000 soldiers. Warsaw warns of possible provocations during Zapad 2025. From cyberattacks to navigation failures.

The situation with GPS jamming has become a wake-up call for the EU and NATO. The EU has already announced plans to strengthen defense capabilities by launching additional satellites to monitor signal interception. NATO, in turn, is developing technologies to counter electronic jamming.

It is clear that the Russian threat goes far beyond Ukraine. It encompasses both the digital space and the peaceful skies above European cities. This invisible war threatens the lives of civilians and undermines trust in basic elements of security.

All of this shows how far Russia's destabilization of Europe has gone. And Russia is acting in the usual way, testing the enemy "for lice", identifying its reactions and weak points. And if the result "satisfies" it, aggression will inexorably slide from hybrid to active. Especially since Russia is unlikely to really plan to invade or occupy Europe.

For now, limited military provocations that would show the weakness of collective European security and the vulnerability of its members in the face of external threats will be enough. It is necessary to break the system, to sow chaos, uncertainty and fear in order to promote the necessary politicians, to impose "friendship" with Russia, to decompose opponents from within.

It is necessary to recall that before a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Russia in 2021 presented an ultimatum not to Ukraine, but to NATO, demanding a return to the "borders of 1991". That is, to return to it the entire "zone of influence of the USSR". The war that started afterwards was thought by the Russian leadership as a war against Europe and the West. And in this respect, as we see, nothing has changed.

Petr Oleshchuk, Doctor of Political Sciences, Professor of Taras Shevchenko National University, specially for Charter97.org.

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