Jonathan Saul, Robin Emmott, John Irish

BUCHAREST (Reuters). – The closest naval vessel to a NATO ally, was found in the Mediterranean after Russia attacked Ukraine. The last such ship from a major naval member of the Western military alliance left the Black Sea – an area roughly the size of California bordering Russia, Ukraine and NATO members Turkey, Bulgaria and Romania – over a month ago.

According to Turkish maritime site Turkishnavy.net which monitors foreign warship movements, a French warship made a round in January. Since then, no NATO member has tried to patrol its waters. Turkishnavy.net reports that 16 Russian ships including missile vessels and landing tank-capable ships had already set sail into the Black Sea.

As NATO scrambles to respond to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a major exposed flank is the Black Sea. The alliance’s stated determination to stop Russia building its presence in this area has not been met.

A key reason: divisions among members over whether to challenge Russia’s navy in the area, resulting in a lack of coherent and meaningful Black Sea NATO strategy, according to Reuters interviews with diplomats, intelligence officials and security sources from NATO members as well as military strategists, retired military commanders and shipping industry officials.

This includes the reluctance of some NATO member countries, such as Turkey, to accept maritime patrols to protect Moscow. The budget constraint and existence of competing priorities within some NATO alliances are also factors, they said.

Russia’s Black Sea naval presence, which provides both military and economic leverage over Kyiv, had been disrupting Ukraine’s maritime trade even before the invasion. Ukraine’s ports have seen traffic fall sharply in recent weeks, according to commercial ship data reviewed by Reuters. Following Thursday’s attack, Ukraine suspended operations at its sea ports.

It’s almost like the boa constrictor wrapped around Ukraine’s neck. Squeezing and squeezeing and more squeezing.” said James Foggo (retired U.S. admiral), who oversaw NATO’s fleets in Europe from 2010 to 2020 for nearly a decade. NATO needs a maritime strategy.

Ukraine is not an NATO ally and is not legally bound to NATO.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg stated that the attack on Ukraine also included Russian naval forces. Speaking to news media, he said NATO had more than 120 allied ships “from the high north to the Mediterranean” and more than 100 jets at high alert.

NATO didn’t immediately reply to our request for comment on this article. The NATO previously denied neglecting to the Black Sea. Stoltenberg stated earlier this month that the security of Black Sea is “vital strategic significance” for NATO. Three of NATO’s members plus two close partners, including Ukraine, have coastal borders.

NATO is focusing on ground troops. NATO plans to send around 4,000 soldiers to the Black Sea nations of Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary. The United States also sent nearly 3,000 additional troops to Ukraine’s neighbors, Poland and Romania.

Prior to Thursday’s invasion, Russia had amassed more than 150,000 troops on Ukraine’s borders, including in the Black Sea area, the United States has said.

Russia has called for an end NATO’s eastward expansion and launched airstrikes against Ukrainian cities as well as advancing tanks and troops early Thursday. Putin claimed that he authorized military action in defense of threats from Ukraine. Ukraine is a democracy with 44 million inhabitants.

Moscow claims NATO must not be allowed to use the waters claimed by it. It had previously stated that recently arriving ships are part of a planned movement of military assets. Russia long protested about the United States’ dangerous rise in military activity in the Black Sea, which it called “dangerous”. NATO claims that these activities are defensive.

NATO’s naval response to Russia also has implications for the West’s ability to assert its interests elsewhere, such as the South China Sea, where Beijing claims sovereignty.

“If the Kremlin is not deterred, then I doubt the Chinese will be impressed by what we have to say about Taiwan and the South China Sea,” stated retired U.S. general Ben Hodges. He commanded U.S. Army forces across Europe between 2014 and 2017. Ben also met Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the President of Ukraine, in Kyiv, in February.

‘CREEPING MILITARIZATION’

Russia’s dependence on the Arctic and its warmer waters, the Black Sea, has been vital since the 17th Century. Retired British Vice Admiral Duncan Potts stated that Russia, as a landpower, has been worried about its inability to access the seas.

Moscow’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea peninsula in 2014 allowed it to begin what one Western intelligence official described as the “creeping militarization” of the Black Sea. Russia took over or sank many of Ukraine’s navy vessels stationed in the Black Sea port of Sebastopol.

Russia’s military presence in Crimea and the modernization in recent years of key Russian naval fleets has “shifted the military balance in the Black Sea region in its favour,” said analyst Stephen Flanagan at the RAND Corporation think tank in the United States. Moscow currently has 18 major warships in the Black Sea, said Flanagan, giving it “a formidable force to conduct various operations against Ukraine.”

Meanwhile, NATO warships have been present in the Black Sea for varying periods of time. Turkishnavy.net reports that the U.S. navy spent 180 days in Black Sea in 2016, up from 60 in 2016. However, this was down from more than 200 days in 2014. According to a database created by the Monitoring Group of Black Sea Institute of Strategic Studies, and BlackSeaNews, 31 vessels were deployed to the region in 2014. In 2016, that number dropped to 14, before increasing to 31, according to the independent database.

A U.S. Navy statement stated that the U.S. Navy’s last large allied destroyer USS Arleigh-Burke, a guided-missile missile destroyer of U.S. Navy, left the Black Sea on December 31st. According to Turkishnavy.net, the Royal Navy of Britain hasn’t been to Black Sea since last Summer.

NATO member Turkey has a Navy that is active in the Black Sea. NATO partners France and America also currently have naval vessels in the Mediterranean.

PORTS ‘SHUT DOWN’

Ukraine relies heavily on its coastline for trade, with more than half of the country’s exports and imports traveling by sea. The Black Sea port of Odessa, Ukraine’s busiest port and largest oil and gas terminal, came under missile attack on Thursday, regional authorities of Ukraine’s southern Odessa region said.

A senior adviser to Ukraine’s President’s Chief of Staff said that the Ukrainian military suspended commercial shipping in its ports Thursday following Russian invasion.

Even before Thursday’s attack, there had been a growing reluctance by companies to send ships to the area because of the increased Russian naval presence, the three shipping industry officials plus one other said. This was in addition to other disruptions that have occurred to trade due to global supply chain problems, which has decreased the number of ships available for sailing into the region.

Recently, shipping traffic has been declining. According to MarineTraffic (a ship monitoring and intelligence provider based in Greece), the number of arrivals of container ships to Ukrainian ports during February has fallen to 25 visits. This is sharply lower than 48 visits for January.

Odessa has also witnessed a more drastic reduction in ships entering the port. The port was down to 46,357 containers per 20 feet in the three-week period of February from January’s 82,091 and December 2021 respectively, according to data provided by project44, a U.S. logistics platform.

NATO’S ‘HAND TIED’

Some diplomats believe NATO should already have established a Black Sea maritime Patrol mission.

According to a Western military official, Russia’s inability to maintain such an presence despite U.S. warship visits has led to large parts of the coastlines near Romanian or Bulgarian shores being declared off limits for many months while Moscow holds military maritime exercises.

NATO is heavily dependent on member Turkey’s help; the other alliance members bordering the Black Sea – Bulgaria and Romania – have limited navies.

Turkey holds the rights to control the passage of ships between the Black Sea and the Mediterranean under the 1936 Montreux Convention. Ships coming from other non-littoral nations, like Britain and France cannot stay more than 21 days. Each year, France holds three naval exercises at the Black Sea.

But Turkey must balance Ankara’s strong diplomatic ties with Moscow and its obligations as a NATO ally. According to two Turkish security experts and the NATO ambassador, informal negotiations at NATO with Ankara regarding a maritime policing operation have failed.

The defense ministry of Turkey told Reuters that they are examining the situation and prepared to handle any eventuality. NATO had previously refrained from commenting on the possibility that a Black Sea policing Mission might be possible.

“NATO has one hand tied behind its back,” Paul Taylor, a European analyst at the Friends of Europe think tank, referring to Turkey’s reluctance to impose more control over the Black Sea.