NATO is suffering from ‘Boiling Frog Syndrome’

On the night of 9th-10th September 2025, whilst carrying out a major air attack on Ukraine, the Russian military sent a number of UAVs well beyond Ukraine’s borders into Poland, a NATO member state, with several UAVs being shot down by a joint NATO air mission and one of the UAVs being found crashed more than 300km inside the Polish border.

At the time of writing, the number of UAVs believed to have breached Polish airspace varies from 8 to 20+, but the incursion has been acknowledged by NATO and Poland’s leaders, who are seeking to invoke Article IV of the NATO Charter.

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Article IV states: “The Parties will consult together whenever, in the opinion of any of them, the territorial integrity, political independence or security of any of the Parties is threatened.” – The last time Article IV was invoked was when Russia launched it’s “special military operation” to invade Ukraine in 2022.

The satirical Twitter account “Darth Putin” commented the night before the attack: “The “coalition of the willing” should be called the “coalition of the meetings”. They don’t do blitzkrieg, they do sitzkrieg.” While satirical, there is growing consensus that this is no longer a joke. NATO and other western allies have been more than happy to hold frequent summits and meetings regarding the future of Ukraine and Russia’s illegal invasion of it, but have realistically done little more than supply aid to Ukraine to try and prevent it.

And in a “Trump wants peace” era of international politics, too many European nations are perhaps still looking to Washington for leadership and decision making, when the simple fact is that after 3 years of war in Europe, they should be looking at themselves.

Poland has been re-arming for some time now, in recognition of the fact that if Russia ever does push beyond Ukraine, it is squarely in the line of fire. Likewise for Estonia, Lithuania and several of the other smaller eastern-European nations. The UK, France and Germany meanwhile have seemed largely inactive, although Germany’s new Chancellor Merz seems to be ramping up efforts to face the coming threat.

But why does a couple of dozen drones flying into Polish airspace matter? Because it’s Russia’s way of testing NATO’s resolve. The drones haven’t explicitly attacked military or civilian targets in Poland, and thus the case to argue a NATO Article V situation is loose at best, but the problem is that if NATO simply does nothing more than have meetings and issue condemnations, the alliance will suffer from Boiling Frog Syndrome.

Boiling Frog Syndrome: “If you drop a frog in a pot of boiling water, it will of course frantically try to clamber out. But if you place it gently in a pot of tepid water and turn the heat on low, it will float there quite placidly. As the water gradually heats up, the frog will sink into a tranquil stupor, exactly like one of us in a hot bath, and before long, with a smile on its face, it will unresistingly allow itself to be boiled to death.” (Source: The Story of B (1996), by Daniel Quinn)

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine should have been the cause of an immediate response from NATO, despite Ukraine not being a NATO member. 50+ years ago in the Cold War, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine would have been viewed in much the same way as the Vietnam and Korean wars – efforts to be made to stop the spread of an evil regime. Unfortunately, in an increasingly hesitant world, with political leaders less focused on genuine global cohesion, the invasion of Ukraine was allowed to occur with little-to-no actual steps taken to prevent it, nor to prevent it happening elsewhere.

Among other issues, that has emboldened China, who continue to set their sights on an invasion of Taiwan, likely an event that will occur before 2030. China continues to watch the situation in Europe, knowing full well that if NATO is unwilling to defend it’s own borders or those of Ukraine from Russian forces now, it will be even less willing to defend Taiwan in the years to come. Combined with a return of American Isolationism and “America First” policies, the situation in Europe becomes a litmus test indicating the likely response in east-Asia later in the decade.

NATO has sat back and issued condemnations and held meetings for far too long, while Ukraine has done it’s best to hold Russia in a stalemate in eastern Ukraine. Russia’s economy is collapsing, but so too arguably is Ukraine’s manpower and equipment levels (the collapse only being stemmed by clever tactics and military aid from allies in Europe). NATO’s frog has been sat in the pan for a while, and Russia continues to turn up the heat – but will NATO’s leaders notice and respond appropriately? To all appearances, the answer seems to be no.

What starts as a couple of dozen drones over Poland today, could be hundreds of drones over several NATO countries in the coming months. NATO will need to make a decision at some point when it’s going to accept that it is at war with Russia.  The grey-zone conflict that Russia has been fighting with NATO for many years cannot be ignored – whether it’s the Novichok poisoning in the UK, undersea cable interference in the north, electronic warfare operations out of Kaliningrad or airspace incursions over Eastern Europe, Russia is doing what it (and its predecessor the Soviet Union) has always done – testing NATO’s responses and resolve.

NATO must draw the line somewhere, and I don’t doubt the majority of ordinary citizens would rather the line be drawn now at Ukraine, than let history repeat itself with lines someday drawn in Berlin, or the English Channel.