Dr. Moritz Brake—Lieutenant Commander (Res.) and Senior Fellow at the Center for Advanced Security, Strategic and Integration Studies (CASSIS)—provides a sharp assessment in Formiche.net of the simultaneous NATO “Baltops 2025” drills and Russian naval exercises in the Baltic Sea. He draws attention to the scale of both operations: about 50 NATO ships, 25 aircraft, and 9,000 personnel operating alongside over 20 Russian warships, air assets, and approximately 3,000 forces. Brake points out that “the Russians are very aggressive. Whatever happens in the Baltic always carries the risk of escalating into something more serious”. While he downplays the likelihood of a deliberate Russian attack on NATO units, he warns of provocations—such as blockading NATO ships or aggressive overflights—designed to “test NATO’s responsiveness” . His analysis underscores two key messages: firstly, the danger of unintentional escalation in a tight operational arena; secondly, that Moscow is intentionally using these drills to challenge the Alliance and gather intelligence. Overall, Brake frames the Baltic sea encounter as a dangerous mix of strategic maneuvering and serious security risk.
Dr. Moritz Brake at Formiche.net: What lies behind the face‑off between Moscow’s and NATO’s fleets in the Baltic Dr. Moritz Brake at Formiche.net: What lies behind the face‑off between Moscow’s and NATO’s fleets in the Baltic
Dr. Moritz Brake, Senior Fellow at CASSIS, warns in Formiche.net about the risk of unintended clashes between Russian and NATO fleets in the Baltic and views Russian provocations as aggressive asymmetric tests.
Moritz Brake is a Senior Fellow at the Center for Advanced Security, Strategic and Integration Studies (CASSIS) and a reserve officer in the German Navy. He received his PhD from the War Studies Department of King's College London in July 2022 with a thesis on the German Navy as an instrument of foreign policy. He is a member of the German Maritime Institute (DMI) and an auditor of the French Institut des Hautes Études de Défense National (IHEDN). In addition to a Master's degree in War Studies from King's College London, Brake holds a nautical patent and an engineering degree in nautical science from Jade University in Elsfleth, Germany. In active naval service, he most recently served as a youth officer in public relations as a security policy advisor on behalf of the German government, and served in the UN mission UNIFIL (Eastern Mediterranean, Lebanon, 2007) and the EU anti-piracy mission ATALANTA in the Horn of Africa (2010 & 2011), in addition to seagoing service on merchant and warships.