Pretty low, even if Trump wins. The things preventing that scenario are two-fold:
Trump can’t unilaterally leave NATO. He would need the Senate to do it I think (I’m not 100% sure here).
Even without NATO, the EU (especially the Nordics & Poland) have sizable militaries and a defense agreement with the Baltics. It would be suicide for Russia to do that.
Personally, I’m more worried about the potential of Ukraine being left out to dry causing them to fall, immediately followed by Moldova falling, which would then pull Romania (and therefore the EU) into the war. This would not be a defensive war, which wouldn’t trigger article 5. Who knows how things would spiral from there.
I wonder how much independence Russia has now. I doubt they’d march into another country by their own will right after Ukraine, they usually take some time to sit out the situation and replenish resources (2nd Chechen - Georgia - Ukraine 2014 - Ukraine 2022), but what if they’d be pushed by China or whoever to continue being a destabilizing chaos actor? Like with Transistria in Moldova, they also has tabs in Georgia-Armenian conflict and northern regions of Kazakhstan has the same vatnik sympathy problem as Donbass pre-2014 as I’ve heard.
Unlike those previous conflicts, Russia has deployed pretty much their entire military equipment reserves. With how much of a brain drain they had, it will take them a long time to re equip for another war.
Realistically, what are the odds of the US pulling out of NATO and Russia deciding it’s time for Baltic special operation?
Pretty low, even if Trump wins. The things preventing that scenario are two-fold:
Trump can’t unilaterally leave NATO. He would need the Senate to do it I think (I’m not 100% sure here).
Even without NATO, the EU (especially the Nordics & Poland) have sizable militaries and a defense agreement with the Baltics. It would be suicide for Russia to do that.
Personally, I’m more worried about the potential of Ukraine being left out to dry causing them to fall, immediately followed by Moldova falling, which would then pull Romania (and therefore the EU) into the war. This would not be a defensive war, which wouldn’t trigger article 5. Who knows how things would spiral from there.
I wonder how much independence Russia has now. I doubt they’d march into another country by their own will right after Ukraine, they usually take some time to sit out the situation and replenish resources (2nd Chechen - Georgia - Ukraine 2014 - Ukraine 2022), but what if they’d be pushed by China or whoever to continue being a destabilizing chaos actor? Like with Transistria in Moldova, they also has tabs in Georgia-Armenian conflict and northern regions of Kazakhstan has the same vatnik sympathy problem as Donbass pre-2014 as I’ve heard.
Unlike those previous conflicts, Russia has deployed pretty much their entire military equipment reserves. With how much of a brain drain they had, it will take them a long time to re equip for another war.