VILNIUS and WASHINGTON—February 22, 2026, marked eighty years since US diplomat George Kennan sent the Long Telegram from Moscow, laying the intellectual foundations for a containment strategy against Russia. As Kennan described in a follow-up Foreign Affairs essay that presented his ideas to the public, “the main element of any United States policy toward the Soviet Union must be that of a long-term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies.” Two days after this anniversary marked four years since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, starkly illustrating the consequences of abandoning Kennan’s core strategic insight in favor of illusions about convergence, dialogue, or historical inevitability.
Europe today faces a familiar temptation: to substitute process for power, engagement for strategy, and institutional continuity for genuine security. The question is no longer whether Russia can be accommodated into a cooperative European order—that experiment has already failed. The question now is whether Europe and its allies are prepared to organize their security around the reality that Russia cannot be accommodated and must be contained.
Europe’s strategic indecision: Why calls for engagement are back
So far this year, several European countries—France, Germany, and Italy among them—have revived calls for renewed engagement with Moscow. Just this month, the Belgian prime minister said that Europe must negotiate with Russia, adding: “In private, European leaders agree with me, but no one dares to say it out loud.” Meanwhile, the United Kingdom, Poland, and some Baltic leaders remain skeptical.
At the surface level, renewed engagement seems to be driven by fears of European marginalization in emerging diplomatic formats, particularly as the United States has engaged in limited talks about Russia’s war in Ukraine, which have now been paused due to the war in Iran. Europeans do not want to wait for a seat at the table in these talks—especially regarding peace in Ukraine and any future security architecture for the continent.
At a deeper structural level, engagement returns precisely when high-end deterrence and defense posture becomes politically costly, and institutional enforcement weakens. Dialogue appears less disruptive than sustained military modernization, sanctions, and forward deployments. But it is also less pertinent.
Limited but persistent European calls to re-engage with Moscow do not amount to a coherent plan to restore stability. They are reactions to the breakdown of the rules-based order—and to Europe’s inherent uncertainty about how to respond. The core fallacy here lies in conflating the existence of the rules-based order with the institutions that once embodied it. When those rules are violated, the question is not how to preserve institutions as they are, but whether they must be reformed, redesigned, or, in some cases, abandoned altogether.
The failure of stand-alone multilateralism
For decades, Euro-Atlantic security rested on the implicit assumption that institutions themselves generate stability by establishing expectations and enforcing adherence to norms. Multilateral diplomacy presumes rational actors and assumes that repeated interaction will gradually encourage restraint. Authoritarian regimes, nevertheless, have repeatedly exploited this logic by using engagement to gain time, acquire undeserved legitimacy, and garner asymmetric advantage. When enforcement erodes, institutions tend to maintain themselves through inertia rather than effectiveness. Processes replace outcomes, and participation becomes an end rather than a means for something more valuable.
Simply being at the table does not produce peace. When detached from military instruments of power, engagement consumes time while aggressors build strength. The Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) provides a cautionary example. Rather than confronting Russia’s systematic violations, the organization has increasingly prioritized procedural continuity over substance. Russia and Belarus remain formally engaged while openly dismantling every foundational principle of the OSCE. The result is a structure without content—an institution unable to defend itself, trapped in outdated working methods, and unwilling to adapt to strategic reality.
Multilateralism that cannot enforce its own norms ceases to be a safeguard and becomes a liability. But if a full-scale war in Europe has not forced an institutional transformation, what will?
Why neither engagement nor Cold War nostalgia works
Engagement is often framed as the alternative to escalation. History suggests otherwise. The United States did not pacify Europe during the Cold War through talks. Rather, Washington’s containment strategy deterred the Kremlin from aggression against the United States’ European allies. Kennan’s concept rested on sustained counterpressure—political, economic, and military—designed to shape adversary behavior over time.
At the same time, a nostalgic return to Cold War models is neither possible nor desirable. The Cold War–era strategies of “forward defense” and “flexible response” entailed a permanent, large-scale US military engagement in Europe. The era of such US engagement in Europe is ending. Washington has been explicit about this for years: Europe must develop its own capabilities, capacity, and strategic will. NATO’s ongoing command reforms reflect this shift toward greater European responsibility. The Alliance has begun moving toward a new agenda centered on credible deterrence and defense, resilience, scaling up industrial production, and burden-sharing.
Uncoordinated European initiatives to restart dialogue with Moscow risk undercutting this trajectory by weakening NATO deterrence and defense posture before it is fully restored. The real danger lies in drifting into an incoherent middle ground—where deterrence is insufficient to constrain Russia and engagement without the strength to back it up is insufficient to stabilize Europe’s relations with Moscow.
Updated containment: A functional Euro-Atlantic approach
Containment does not lead to escalation. Rather, it is a stabilizing approach that ensures any dialogue takes place within the framework of credible defense. Similarly, escalation and escalation dominance are different concepts. NATO does not seek to escalate conflicts, but it must retain the capacity to respond from a position of strength if escalation occurs. Securing such escalation dominance requires clear red lines, credible capabilities, political will, and courage.
An updated containment strategy for European countries should rest on five pillars:
First, deterrence before dialogue. Credible military posture is not optional—it is the precondition for engagement. Without the ability to deny cost-free aggression, dialogue risks becoming a channel for delay, leverage, and asymmetry rather than a tool for stability.
Second, institutions are judged by function, not sentiment. Structures that cannot enforce norms must be reformed, bypassed, or replaced. Preserving institutional continuity in the absence of enforcement does not uphold order—it obscures its erosion and delays necessary adaptation.
Third, favor regional and functional formats. Where consensus-bound forums fail, coalitions, primarily regional ones, need to come to the fore. Smaller, purpose-driven groupings can act where unanimity-based institutions are blocked, restoring effectiveness without waiting for unreachable consensus.
Fourth, European ownership. Defense industrial mobilization, infrastructure hardening, and sustained support for Ukraine must become permanent features of European security.
Fifth, strategic coherence. NATO must seize escalation management—through large-scale multidomain exercises, robust responses to hybrid attacks, and the explicit recognition that legacy arrangements with Russia no longer apply. Maintaining escalation dominance will also require breaking a long-standing taboo and integrating conventional and nuclear planning.
An updated containment strategy will require closing sanctions loopholes, integrating civil-military logistics, and expanding defense production through state-backed investment. The Kremlin’s allies and enablers will need to be constrained across multiple regions—from the Indo-Pacific to the South Caucasus and Central Asia.