According to assessments by, among others, the German intelligence service, Russia will be ready for large-scale aggression against one or more NATO countries by 2028 or 2030. Dutch intelligence agencies estimate that a limited war against NATO could become possible within a year after the end of the war in Ukraine. Last week, the Polish and Latvian intelligence services reported that Russia is preparing limited military incursions against the Baltic states to test NATO’s resolve. With a U.S. president who continues to cast doubt on NATO, it is only logical that Putin might decide to test the Alliance.
European armed forces, including those of the Netherlands, must adapt to this new reality. Speed and adaptability are essential. Unfortunately, organizations that were built during peacetime are not well suited to either. European militaries can no longer continue along their current path, if only because American support can no longer be taken for granted. Europe’s allies must therefore step up and become stronger together.
The Dutch Defense White Paper 2026, published this week, acknowledges all of this. Yet the document itself makes it difficult to assess what the armed forces of the future will look like or what concrete plan exists to transform them to meet this new reality within the next few years. It provides only broad direction: greater emphasis on drones, artificial intelligence, and emerging military domains such as cyber, the electromagnetic spectrum, and space. On drones, it states that within five years more than half of all “operational effects”—in other words, the means by which the enemy is engaged—should be delivered by unmanned systems. However, it remains unclear how the drone revolution unfolding in Ukraine will be translated into the Dutch armed forces.
What strikes me is that Dutch Defense White Papers have increasingly become broad political strategy documents rather than detailed planning documents explaining how the armed forces will transform and which capabilities will be procured over what timeframe. Whereas the individual services—the army, air force, and navy—used to receive substantial chapters of their own, they are now referred to simply as “domains,” each covered in a very short paragraph.
I see this as a sign of the times. Defense expertise has become scarce in politics, so policy documents are apparently expected to remain uncomplicated. Simple infographics have therefore become increasingly important. At a time of rising international tensions, that is hardly a reassuring development.
To me, the key question the document should answer is whether the Netherlands will be ready for Russian aggression between 2028 and 2030.
The White Paper states that by 2035 the country’s “military capabilities should be broadened and deepened.” That seems rather late. Moreover, it is far from certain that this objective can actually be achieved. The Ministry of Defence is notorious for its cumbersome procurement procedures and other regulations that make the rapid acquisition of weapons virtually impossible. The White Paper devotes a single sentence to simplifying these procedures but gives no indication of how this will be done.
Greater speed could be achieved by jointly developing weapons with Ukraine or by purchasing them there. Many experts see a shift from the United States to Ukraine as one of the most important future suppliers of advanced weapons systems. Ukraine possesses both the technological expertise and the battlefield experience that are crucial for transforming the Dutch armed forces and rapidly reducing their dependence on the United States. Yet this insight is absent from the White Paper, even though defense cooperation between the Netherlands and Ukraine continues to intensify.
Source: Trouw, Rob de Wijk, 2 juli 2026
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