NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has warned that a Chinese assault on Taiwan could quickly widen into a two-front conflict, with Beijing urging Moscow to attack NATO territory in Europe. In an interview published by the New York Times on 5 July, Rutte said President Xi Jinping would likely telephone Russian President Vladimir Putin to “keep us busy in Europe” while China moved on Taiwan. Speaking later in Berlin, the former Dutch prime minister underscored China’s accelerating military build-up, noting that Beijing already fields more warships than the United States and possesses about 1,000 nuclear warheads. He also cited internal NATO assessments that Russia could regenerate enough forces to mount a full-scale assault on alliance territory within three to seven years. Rutte pressed members to lift defence spending to 5 % of gross domestic product, arguing that stronger deterrence is the best way to make the scenario he described “too dangerous for the Kremlin to contemplate.” Signs of heightened preparedness are already visible. The Financial Times reported on 8 July that the Port of Rotterdam—Europe’s busiest—has begun reserving docks for NATO supply ships, converting part of a container terminal for safe ammunition transfer and coordinating with neighbouring Antwerp to share large volumes of U.S., U.K. and Canadian military cargo. Rotterdam’s port authority expects to host amphibious drills four to five times a year, part of wider European efforts to reinforce logistics in the event of conflict with Russia.