Encircling NATO: the evolution of Russia’s power-projection in the MENA region, 2011–2025

Abstract

During the previous decade, Russia’s revisionist aspirations have defied the United States and its NATO allies’ purposes to preserve their dominant position in the current distribution of power. Contemporary literature argues that Russia’s policies in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region were characterised by opportunism – it abstained from participating in regional rivalries and was focused on claiming economic and political benefits in the region. This study asserts that the most important purpose of Russia’s grand strategy was NATO’s encirclement from the southern flank through power projection in Libya, Sudan, and Syria. Relying on Mearsheimer’s offensive realist theory, Buzan, and Lawson’s approach to establishing a periodisation, and George and Bennet’s method of structured, focused comparison, this study analyses the evolution of Russia’s power projection in the MENA region from the Arab Spring in 2011 to the aftermath of the fall of the Assad regime in 2025.