Europe's Moment: A Sanctuary Strategy for Ukraine
Ukraine has faced more than three years of relentless assault from an imperialist Russia determined to erase its sovereignty. Western weapons and aid have been vital, but Europe’s response has been hesitant, fragmented, and over-reliant on Washington.
Words of solidarity have not stopped missiles or drones and hesitation has allowed Moscow to dictate the terms of engagement. With Ukraine’s heartland under constant bombardment, Washington searching for a negotiated settlement and Putin openly indifferent to genuine peace – exploiting talks as cover while pursuing the war – it is now time for Europe to seize the initiative.
The urgency has been underscored by the overnight Russian drone incursion into Poland on 9-10 September. Several were shot down by NATO aircraft – the first time since the war began – triggering Article 4 consultations and the launch of Operation Eastern Sentry, to reinforce the eastern flank. This latest incident has emboldened European leaders to consider further steps, with Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski openly suggesting that drones and missiles should be intercepted over Ukrainian airspace, which otherwise pose spillover risk to neighbouring populations. His remarks point to a growing political consensus in Europe – that it can no longer maintain the status quo.
The War in Ukraine now demands a decisive intervention: a Sanctuary Strategy implemented by a coalition of the willing. This coalition – already preparing for a post-war peacekeeping role – must establish itself in Ukraine before the terms of peace are decided; waiting until after risks irrelevance. London and Paris must be the ones to drive this – as Europe’s two nuclear powers and permanent members of the UN Security Council. Along with regional anchors/enablers like Poland and Romania, smaller European states, many of whom already contribute to Ukraine’s defence, could be integrated in a NATO-style framework to ensure the mission is both scalable and collective.
By acting now, this European coalition would create a zone where Ukraine’s statehood endures and its armed forces are freed for decisive battles. Such a strategy provides necessity and relief for Ukraine, forces Moscow into strategic recalculation, re-establishes European credibility, further protects European airspace, and ultimately promotes the conditions for peace.
Sanctuary Strategy
The first element is a no-fly zone (NFZ) over central and western Ukraine. The protected area proposed here would run from the tri-border (Belarus–Russia–Ukraine) south-east to Pavlohrad, then south-west via Kryvyi Rih to Mykolaiv, west to Dobroslav and from there south through Odesa to the boundary of Romanian airspace on the Black Sea. This shields Ukraine’s heartland and covers the entire Belarusian border, denying Moscow a northern vector to circumvent Ukraine’s eastern air defences. Command and coordination would mirror NATO-style air policing, with clear rules of engagement and shared oversight. Enforcement rests on two components: layered air-defence to intercept missiles and a quick-reaction patrol force to engage any intruding aircraft or drones that stray within the NFZ.
Moscow currently bombards central and western Ukraine at will, confident no red line prevents it from striking power grids, ports and civilian centres. A defensive no-fly zone and border presence would change that strategy
The second element is a defensive ground presence on Ukraine’s border with Belarus. A modest multinational deployment along this flank would be far from the front lines and strictly defensive. Its purpose would be to prevent Moscow from opening a new axis of attack, as it did during the initial invasion in February 2022 and to relieve Ukraine of the need to keep large forces tied down in reserve. Limited in size and posture, such a presence would act as a visible deterrent rather than a combat formation, signalling that any renewed assault from Belarus would automatically involve European states and raising the costs of escalation for Moscow.
Four-Pillar Approach
The first pillar is necessity and resilience. Without external support, Russia is free to target the whole of Ukraine by air. A deployment on Ukraine’s border with Belarus also prevents Moscow from again using it as a staging ground, as it did in 2022. Furthermore, shielding Kyiv, Odesa and Lviv from bombardment would provide a significant psychological reprieve and morale boost to continue fighting. Societal resilience and military necessity are inseparable: by protecting Ukraine’s heartland, Europe ensures both the capacity and the determination to endure.
The second pillar is force redistribution. By assuming responsibility for Ukraine’s western and northern skies, European forces would allow Kyiv to shift its most capable air defence systems away from static protection of the heartland and toward the front lines. Just as importantly, it relieves Ukraine of the burden of holding significant forces in reserve to guard the northern frontier, allowing those troops to be redeployed to decisive battles in the east and south. The effect would be a force multiplier: Europe absorbs the defence of Ukraine’s survival core, while Ukraine concentrates its best assets on regaining territory and resisting Russia’s offensives.
The third pillar is strategic recalculation. Moscow currently bombards central and western Ukraine at will, confident no red line prevents it from striking power grids, ports and civilian centres. A defensive no-fly zone and border presence would change that strategy. Every missile or drone aimed at Ukraine’s west would now carry the risk of interception and confrontation with European states. Credible limits reduce miscalculation and this situation would force Moscow into a costly strategic recalculation.
The fourth pillar is promoting peace. This war will not end through battlefield annihilation but at a negotiating table. A sanctuary ensures Ukraine arrives from a position of strength rather than desperation. Furthermore, a European presence must be reviewable and conditional, enduring only as long as Ukraine requires and scaling down as part of a settlement. This makes it not an open-ended protectorate but a shield for survival that can be adapted as circumstances change – and a card to hold in negotiations, turning protection into leverage for de-escalation. A presence that can be normalised or scaled down as part of a peace agreement.
Strategic Considerations
This is not a NATO mission. The elephant in the room with the Sanctuary Strategy is the absence of the United States and most likely proceeding without Washington’s blessing. That is precisely what makes it necessary. The new European security order cannot be built on hesitation across the Atlantic; if the continent is to prove it can shoulder responsibility for its own defence, it must act decisively when survival is at stake.
Nor can Europe afford to wait for peace talks brokered elsewhere. Meaningful negotiations will not come while Ukraine is struggling, nor while Moscow believes it can steadily wear the country down through relentless strikes. A true settlement only becomes possible if Ukraine survives long enough to bargain from strength and Russia is confronted with an impasse.
This strategy would also not significantly raise the risks of escalation. While they do exist, they are minimal – comparable to the routine risks NATO already manages in defending its own airspace. A bounded, defensive mission at Ukraine’s request reduces miscalculation and forces Moscow to think twice before widening the war. For years, Russia has claimed that each European step – missile systems, tanks, long-range strikes and F-16s – would cross a ‘red line’. Each time Europe eventually acted without harm. These warnings are not real thresholds but psychological tools to weaponize European caution. Moscow also cannot credibly cry foul, having already broken the taboo on secondary belligerents by deploying North Korean troops. To accuse others of escalation while importing foreign fighters is pure hypocrisy and it knows this.
The capabilities required for such an endeavour already exist in Europe – with fighter jet patrols, long-range air defence and ISTAR platforms. Mobilising them for a bounded mission over Ukraine would not strip NATO of critical resources. Rather, it would build on – and ultimately replace – temporary reassurance missions such as Operation Eastern Sentry. By pushing the interception zone eastward, this strategy transforms European air defence from a reactive posture to one of depth. At present, drones are only engaged once they cross into allied airspace, leaving a narrow window of opportunity before European populations are at risk. Intercepting over Ukraine allows the same forces to intercept more effectively, with fewer resources, than if concentrated solely inside NATO airspace.
Geography reinforces this logic: with Poland and Romania as natural enablers. This proposed NFZ’s northern boundary would extend from Poland’s already heavily patrolled eastern airspace, likewise its southern boundary would extend from Romania’s existing air policing zone over the Black Sea.
By securing Ukraine’s heartlands, a European presence also allows Kyiv to redeploy its own air defences and forces from static tasks to contested theatres in the east and south. Far from weakening NATO’s posture, this approach forces Russia to engage even partially with European defence, tying down its bandwidth, draining its capacity, and ultimately eases pressure on NATO’s eastern flank with a significant buffer-zone. Ukraine is already degrading Russia’s military capacity more effectively than NATO could ever achieve without direct war. A sanctuary ensures that this survival effort is secured, sustained and multiplied in the short term.
Belarus forfeited neutrality when it served as the staging ground for Russia’s initial invasion. A modest multinational deployment here would not be offensive but stabilising, deterring any renewed northern thrust and relieving Ukraine of the burden of keeping forces in reserve
The same logic applies to the ground presence on Ukraine’s border with Belarus. Belarus forfeited neutrality when it served as the staging ground for Russia’s initial invasion. A modest multinational deployment here would not be offensive but stabilising, deterring any renewed northern thrust and relieving Ukraine of the burden of keeping forces in reserve. Poland already stations substantial forces along Belarus’s western frontier, demonstrating that deterrence along this axis is necessary; extending it into Ukraine, at Kyiv’s request, is a precautionary move, not an instigation. If Russia were to strike European troops, escalation would be Putin’s choice, not Europe’s. That burden lies with Moscow.
Such a presence would not be without precedent. During the Cold War, NATO maintained forward units in Berlin and West Germany for decades under the shadow of nuclear risk. These were not assault formations but tripwires: their very presence prevented escalation by ensuring aggression would meet resistance from day one. It is no coincidence that Russia flaunts Soviet symbols – from battlefield banners to Lavrov’s USSR T-shirt in Alaska. Europe must meet that nostalgia with the same stabilising principle: presence is deterrence.
Far from undermining NATO, a coalition of the willing would strengthen it. By acting together, Europeans would shoulder a greater share of responsibility, answering long-standing calls for burden-sharing and reinforcing alliance credibility. The legal foundation is equally clear: no principle in international law runs deeper than the right to self-determination and self-defence. Ukraine, as a sovereign state under attack, is entitled to both.
Conclusion
Since February 2022, Europe’s dilemma has been how to intervene in Ukraine without triggering uncontrolled escalation. The ‘Sanctuary Strategy’ answers that question. Limited in scope and defensive in posture, it places the burden of escalation squarely on Moscow while giving Ukraine the means to endure. The recent drone incursions on NATO’s eastern flank have demonstrated that Ukraine’s defences alone cannot fully eliminate the risk of spillover. By acting now, a European coalition led by London and Paris can seize the initiative and deny Russia the ability to bomb Ukraine into exhaustion – creating the conditions that compel Moscow to end the war on just terms.