The scene took place a decade ago at a Polish station, when several American Bradleys lost their turrets when passing under a platform that was too low, symbolizing a problem that Europe never solved: the structural vulnerability of your military logistics network. on a continent that is rearmed at a vunknown speed since the Cold War, the shortcomings are not only found in the absence of more tanks, ammunition or entire brigades, but in the physical inability to move them in time.
The hidden fragility. In the month of July already we count the first indication. Then Europe realized that rearmament I had to start on the roads under a very simple premise: a Russian invasion would unleash fatal congestion. In fact, the invasion of Ukraine in 2022 is already exposed that reality. France could not transfer his Leclercs to Romania via the shortest land route through Germany and was forced to send them by sea, a deviation that evidenced what military planners have been pointing out with frustration for years: Europe is not prepared to move a modern army from its western ports to the eastern border in a credible time frame for deterrence.
Now, in addition, he is certain of a number: deterrence takes about 45 daysand in a real scenario it would be equivalent to losing a war before appearing on the front, so it is imperative to reduce. How much? The plan is to reduce it five or even three daysaccording to the objectives that Brussels is finalizing. That is the heart of problem that obsesses to German General Alexander Sollfrank: that everything, from documentation to the resistance of a tunnel and the availability of a train driver, will work “like a Swiss clock” when Moscow tests NATO’s reaction capacity.
The political challenge. They remembered in the Financial Times that even before the first armored train crosses Europe, the critical obstacle is political. The experience of 2022 showed that, although US intelligence accurately warned of the imminent Russian attack, some European leaders did not believe that Putin would give the order.
Military mobilization can only begin once governments accept that the threat is real, and that delay (hours or days) is gold for the aggressor. General Ben Hodges, former commander of US forces in Europe, formulated it to put it bluntly: the key is not just how to move troops, but how to speed up decision-making, open ammunition depots, activate convoys and do it before Russia launch your offensive.
And more. Added to this is the strategic unknown of Donald Trump, whose record of oscillations against Russia keeps Europe in constant tension: even if Washington claims to remain committed with Article 5clarity, synchronicity and speed could be conditioned by your posture.
Only when that political decision is made will the massive movement to the east begin, a flow whose magnitude (200,000 soldiers and thousands of armored vehicles from the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom) demands a continental precision no priors.
Geography as an enemy. That said, almost all analysts agree: the real bottleneck of European defense is on your physical map. Europe, despite being a densely developed continent, is not designed to move heavy divisions from one end to the other. The tunnels are too low, the clearances too narrow, the Baltic roads incompatible with those of the rest of the continent, the bridges (such as the collapsed Carola in Dresden in 2024) too old to support the weight of a modern tank.
Even the inclination of the railway track can become at a risk When a train transports armored vehicles: the cargo could overturn. The realization of this reality led Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania to launch the Rail Baltica projecta €24 billion investment explicitly designed to support oversized military trains and eliminate the dangerous process of transferring vehicles between networks with different gauges.
And on the Peninsula. In Spain and Portugal, the situation is similarmaking any urgent transfer from the peninsula difficult. Germany, which should act as Europe’s great military highway, is perhaps the most worrying example: exhausted roads, bridges in critical condition and a railway network that years ago was no longer suitable for high-intensity operations.
The logistical dimension. Moving an army in Europe is not just a matter of infrastructure: it is also a administrative nightmare. Since most of the countries crossed would not be formally at war, their labor and customs laws would remain in force even in full military mobilization. A convoy crossing three borders could clash to three different regulations on mandatory breaks for truck drivers, incompatible customs procedures or transit permits that must be issued on paper, since NATO avoids digital documents for fear of cyberattacks.
Germany, Poland and the Netherlands have tried to break this labyrinth by creating a “military Schengen” embryonic, but regulation remains fragmented, slow and vulnerable. Brussels has identified 2,800 critical points of infrastructure that need urgent modernization, although only 500 have been prioritized, and the fulfillment of the plans depends on governments whose political priorities change every year. Added to this complexity is the vehicle multiplication and calibers in service, which makes it almost impossible to standardize the logistics chain. As Sollfrank warnsyou cannot plan every “screw”, but you can plan the scenarios, and today Europe is just beginning to understand the real scale of the problem.
The industry as a decisive link. Plus: the modernization of military mobility requires not only adapting bridges and roads, but also rebuilding industrial capacity to transport a contemporary army. A light division may require up to 200 trains, each with more than 40 cars, which represents more than 8,000 logistics platforms for a single operational movement. European railway companies, from Deutsche Bahn to Baltic operators, are signing agreements to reserve military capabilities, while Rheinmetall begins to offer complete services for convoys crossing Germany, from mobile dormitories to emergency workshops.
But Europe does not produce enough high-capacity railcars or specialized vehicles, and the industry requires joint tenders and unified specifications to be able to produce at the necessary pace. With NATO countries committed to increasing defense spending up to 5% of GDP By 2035, part of that increase must be dedicated to transforming the infrastructure into a network capable of absorbing the largest military movement in Europe since 1945.
Deterrence and credibility. For NATO, mobility It is more than a logistical issue: it is the basis of your credibility. Deterrence only works if Russia knows that Europe can react quicklythat their armies can reach the east before the enemy consolidates their positions and that an eventual attack would find a forceful response in days, not weeks.
think about it unthinkable (the invasion of an allied country, the need to move 200,000 soldiers in record time, the possibility of crossing half of Europe under pressure) is no longer an academic exercise, but a strategic need.
In that context, the Sollfrank warning sums up the paradigm shift: credibility depends on being ready, and being ready means resolving every vulnerability before Moscow can exploit it. Meanwhile, Europe is racing against the clock to rebuild a military geography that disappeared after the end of the Cold War, and whose absence, if maintained, would turn any defense into an empty promise.
Image | 7th Army Training Command
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