Great column. I think Germany's u-turn is the big news here. Macron had already been pushing for EU to build up the capacity to defend itself, but Germany was not ready to give up their pacifist pledge to themselves to atone for their WW2 sins. Putin's miscalculation has given Olaf Scholz a great opportunity to commit Germany to a path of building a credible armed forces in partnership with France. As an aside, I cannot but help wonder what UK will think of this development!
France already does not like US pushing EU around, forcing them to get involved in the middle east and Afghan wars that end up causing domestic unrest from their large muslim populations. So, my guess is that France and Germany will build armed forces capability such that they will be able to say no to the US for US' wars outside of Europe.
Once EU has a credible military that can defend the EU and NATO members, I don't see why they would allow US (and even Canada) to be part of the NATO so that they have the flexibility to get involved in US wars in ROW or not.
Generally speaking, US had too much power post the Soviet Union collapse, and that led to overreach in Afghanistan and Iraq. Multi-polar world is good for the US as it will keep our hawks in check!
I started reading all the comments below to try to articulate my own, and finally gave up because I find myself agreeing with anything from about 60-90% of what everyone is saying, and am not sure I could be so articulate. So I figured I might as well just try to say something. "Pulling out" of Europe and NATO is not the answer, and I don't necessarily think that is what Matt is suggesting. I like the analogy of the 29 year old sociology graduate to some extent, and the Ukraine crisis may be doing more than all our jawboning has done for the last 50 years on the question of Europeans pulling their own weight in NATO.
I think Putin actually does pose an existential threat not only to Ukraine, but, if not made to pay a very heavy price, to neighboring countries (insert Hitler analogy trigger warning here). Yes, we should defend Ukraine because it is a budding democracy we share values with, but it is also of strategic importance to keep the borders of a Russia led by a wanna-be Stalin as far East as possible. I may be showing my age, but I don't doubt for a second that Putin would love to either completely subjugate as much of Europe as possible, or at least have it cowed and out of the US sphere of influence (something I think he thought Trump would accomplish for him for free).
I also believe NATO and our commitment to defend European allies is deeper than "mere" treaty commitments. Putin and the old USSR sign mutual defense pacts with countries they occupy or otherwise "own." Democracies sign mutual defense treaties with countries with whom they share more than just strategic defensive interests. We really do share culture and much more with Europe and, yes, even Ukraine.
All this old-fashioned romantic blather aside, I do agree that more (significantly more) attention to Asia is vitally important, but I don't believe the two are mutually exclusive. I think Matt's (and others') ideas of making our 28-year old European kid take more, if not most, of the responsibility for his own future is a necessary step, but I wouldn't cut him off.
I started reading all the comments below to try to articulate my own, and finally gave up because I find myself agreeing with anything from about 60-90% of what everyone is saying, and am not sure I could be so articulate. So I figured I might as well just try to say something. "Pulling out" of Europe and NATO is not the answer, and I don't necessarily think that is what Matt is suggesting. I like the analogy of the 29 year old sociology graduate to some extent, and the Ukraine crisis may be doing more than all our jawboning has done for the last 50 years on the question of Europeans pulling their own weight in NATO.
I think Putin actually does pose an existential threat not only to Ukraine, but, if not made to pay a very heavy price, to neighboring countries (insert Hitler analogy trigger warning here). Yes, we should defend Ukraine because it is a budding democracy we share values with, but it is also of strategic importance to keep the borders of a Russia led by a wanna-be Stalin as far East as possible. I may be showing my age, but I don't doubt for a second that Putin would love to either completely subjugate as much of Europe as possible, or at least have it cowed and out of the US sphere of influence (something I think he thought Trump would accomplish for him for free).
I also believe NATO and our commitment to defend European allies is deeper than "mere" treaty commitments. Putin and the old USSR sign mutual defense pacts with countries they occupy or otherwise "own." Democracies sign mutual defense treaties with countries with whom they share more than just strategic defensive interests. We really do share culture and much more with Europe and, yes, even Ukraine.
All this old-fashioned romantic blather aside, I do agree that more (significantly more) attention to Asia is vitally important, but I don't believe the two are mutually exclusive. I think Matt's (and others') ideas of making our 28-year old European kid take more, if not most, of the responsibility for his own future is a necessary step, but I wouldn't cut him off.
Somewhat off topic: why hasn't Putin invaded Ukraine while he had a friend in the White House (or maybe even better from the political timing perspective: between 6 November 2019 and well before 20 Jan 2021)?
" I think he probably would have beaten Obama if he’d run on his record as a moderate technocrat rather than embracing hard-right austerity economics."
"Hi, I'm Mitt Romney - I favor everything my opponent does and oppose nothing he doesn't, but the difference is that I have less experience in elected office than he does and aren't as smart. Vote for me because I'm the white guy, k thx"
The tough part of this is that just as you sometimes need to let your kid make his own mistakes, if we want Europe to sustain a real defense capacity we need to create a situation where we’re not going to bail them out.
^ I don't think this is realistic. If push comes to shove, it is in the US (and democracy)'s best interests to help bail out Europe.
I would quibble that the US should not be walking away from Europe and leaving them to defend themselves but instead we're saying: "call us when you need us and we will come, with your help we can make a safer world for our shared values." We will share our intelligence with you, we will collaborate on technology, we will continue to provide our nuclear umbrella (since it's already made), and our focus in the Indo-Pacific will make that part of the world safer for European investment and cultural cooperation.
Furthermore, as you (Europe) increases your capabilities we, the Americans, will listen more to your wants and desires.
This is a deepening partnership, where Europe gets more responsibility, but also more say. I think the current crisis actually is a good picture of what that means. Yes, Biden may lead the alliance but we will wait for European buy in until we agree to these Russian sanctions. We understand: Ukraine is closer to you, and Russia is an important economic partner to you in a way they are not important to us. So we will not force using SWIFT sanctions until you guys agree. We will let you take the primary credit for the sanctions, and do the coordinating.
In exchange Europe agrees to be more supportive of the US in the Indo-Pacific. We will be deferential in Europe if Europe is more deferential in Asia (where Japan may take a more leading role than either the US or the EU).
I grew up in the Cold WAR. Bergman should go back to those decades. There was no time during those decades that the US wanted Europe to build up its own defenses. There was much more fear of losing the US grip on Europe (see: Charles de Gaulle). My, how the world changes.
An important goal of both World Wars, shared by Russia and the Western Allies, was the de-militarization of Germany. (We kind of blew it the first time at Versailles...).
An EU alliance led by a re-armed Germany makes sense but it requires a lot of people to forget a lot of history. So who else can lead this alliance? France is on the continent, in the EU, and has nukes. And per Matt's chart they are a relatively big spender on defense.
Or have the alliance led by a Big Three of the UK, Germany and France. Or add Italy and Poland and make it Five.
The current solution, having NATO led by the biggest power (that's the US!) had an appealing simplicity.
Well. If Putin flipped out over Western expansion of NATO and overtures to the Ukraine, what might he do about a re-militarized Germany? I'm pretty sure that is a Russian nightmare like no other.
Given that Russia ran successful influence ops that plausibly changed the outcome of the presidential election four years later, it seems like Russia actually was the biggest geopolitical threat to the US in 2012. Romney’s reasoning may have been flawed, but nothing China has done 2012-22 has hurt US interests as much as that.
Prioritization requires pragmatism and an understanding of basic economic principles like tradeoffs and opportunity costs. It is dictated by strategy, which in turn is informed by clearly established and well understood outcome objectives.
It is increasingly my conviction that an insufficient number of people in our “political and media ecosystems” possess the cognitive aptitude to create realistic goals, craft coherent strategy, or indeed understand the axiom that you can’t have your lunch and eat it, too. And when they think they can, it’s because they’re too stupid to realize they stole someone else’s lunch to make it happen.
“The European countries most enthusiastically supporting Ukraine are not the most solidly democratic ones, but the ones with the most historical conflict with Russia.”
The Baltic countries don’t have a long history experiencing democracy, but their people have a long history of yearning for it. After recently visiting, my takeaway was that they have a far greater appreciation for liberty and democratic principles than the average American does now.
“But that’s why I don’t love the emphasis on the two percent threshold. Part of the deal here should be that if you spend the money wisely, you don’t actually need to spend that much. It’s really a political question of coordinating and procuring things that are useful.”
Okay, but what sounds more achievable to you: Creating a plan to spend the money wisely, gaining the cooperation of many other countries since specialization is wise in this case, navigating diverse interests and clearing the political hurdles necessary to implement that wise plan? Or, taking the shotgun approach of committing to a 2% spend level, knowing at least some good will come of it? I see the 2% rule as a pragmatic solution for getting something done.
Europeans have proven over and over again that they are irresponsible with too much military prowess and it ends up sucking for the whole world. I think we are better off allowing them to drink, eat and clutch their feelings of moral and cultural superiority so we at least keep it nice for vacations.
The first Secretary-General of NATO, Lord Ismay, famously said the purpose of NATO was to keep the Soviet Union out, the Americans in, and the Germans down. The first part is pretty obvious, even now. And the last because, well, WWI and WWII. But the idea behind keeping the Americans in was less that American military might would guarantee a victory against the Soviet army but that America would be stuck with fighting on the side of the West Europeans, incurring casualties, and all that meant. Since few people thought we really had a way of overcoming a full-scale Soviet invasion through the Fulda Gap and the elsewhere, military planning was based on an accelerating number of American deaths, leading to battlefield and then (if necessary) full strategic nuclear exchanges.
That is, the bottom line of keeping the "Americans in" was the promise of an American nuclear shield over Europe.
While the nuclear threat from Russia is currently less than from the Soviet Union (he said rather nervously), it's hardly gone. An America being less and less "in" NATO means that the Europeans have to think about a full-spectrum defense against a nuclear-armed foe. So France and the UK have nukes. Should Germany now embark on a nuclear weapons program? Who would coordinate and manage the use of those weapons? A supranational military structure, removing them from French/British/German control?
Since China is our most important geostrategic concern, keeping the status quo in Europe is clearly complicated. But handing over the keys to the Europeans is no walk in the park either.
I don’t really think the division of resources is actually that critical. Our commitments to Europe are almost entirely the Army and Air Force. Unless we plan on building bases on Taiwan, our military commitment in Asia will always be almost entirely naval.
The geography of each theater is very lopsided in this way. China would struggle to project air power to Japan while we would struggle to maintain air power in South Korea or Taiwan against Chinese missile barrages. It goes without saying that armies don’t march across seas and South Korea is a first rank land power. (And, of course, Russia doesn’t have a navy worthy of comment, so what our navy would do is not clear.)
So these commitments don’t compete with each other that much, really. We don’t need carriers and destroyers in Europe (and European navies are a bright spot in the overall defense picture anyway) and don’t need armies in Asia.
I just don't see how a bunch of armies knitted together won't be at a disadvantage against a resolute single military, particularly when you're operating in that foe's regional backyard in Eastern Europe.
Great column. I think Germany's u-turn is the big news here. Macron had already been pushing for EU to build up the capacity to defend itself, but Germany was not ready to give up their pacifist pledge to themselves to atone for their WW2 sins. Putin's miscalculation has given Olaf Scholz a great opportunity to commit Germany to a path of building a credible armed forces in partnership with France. As an aside, I cannot but help wonder what UK will think of this development!
France already does not like US pushing EU around, forcing them to get involved in the middle east and Afghan wars that end up causing domestic unrest from their large muslim populations. So, my guess is that France and Germany will build armed forces capability such that they will be able to say no to the US for US' wars outside of Europe.
Once EU has a credible military that can defend the EU and NATO members, I don't see why they would allow US (and even Canada) to be part of the NATO so that they have the flexibility to get involved in US wars in ROW or not.
Generally speaking, US had too much power post the Soviet Union collapse, and that led to overreach in Afghanistan and Iraq. Multi-polar world is good for the US as it will keep our hawks in check!
Was the other Republican Patrick Mara?
I started reading all the comments below to try to articulate my own, and finally gave up because I find myself agreeing with anything from about 60-90% of what everyone is saying, and am not sure I could be so articulate. So I figured I might as well just try to say something. "Pulling out" of Europe and NATO is not the answer, and I don't necessarily think that is what Matt is suggesting. I like the analogy of the 29 year old sociology graduate to some extent, and the Ukraine crisis may be doing more than all our jawboning has done for the last 50 years on the question of Europeans pulling their own weight in NATO.
I think Putin actually does pose an existential threat not only to Ukraine, but, if not made to pay a very heavy price, to neighboring countries (insert Hitler analogy trigger warning here). Yes, we should defend Ukraine because it is a budding democracy we share values with, but it is also of strategic importance to keep the borders of a Russia led by a wanna-be Stalin as far East as possible. I may be showing my age, but I don't doubt for a second that Putin would love to either completely subjugate as much of Europe as possible, or at least have it cowed and out of the US sphere of influence (something I think he thought Trump would accomplish for him for free).
I also believe NATO and our commitment to defend European allies is deeper than "mere" treaty commitments. Putin and the old USSR sign mutual defense pacts with countries they occupy or otherwise "own." Democracies sign mutual defense treaties with countries with whom they share more than just strategic defensive interests. We really do share culture and much more with Europe and, yes, even Ukraine.
All this old-fashioned romantic blather aside, I do agree that more (significantly more) attention to Asia is vitally important, but I don't believe the two are mutually exclusive. I think Matt's (and others') ideas of making our 28-year old European kid take more, if not most, of the responsibility for his own future is a necessary step, but I wouldn't cut him off.
I started reading all the comments below to try to articulate my own, and finally gave up because I find myself agreeing with anything from about 60-90% of what everyone is saying, and am not sure I could be so articulate. So I figured I might as well just try to say something. "Pulling out" of Europe and NATO is not the answer, and I don't necessarily think that is what Matt is suggesting. I like the analogy of the 29 year old sociology graduate to some extent, and the Ukraine crisis may be doing more than all our jawboning has done for the last 50 years on the question of Europeans pulling their own weight in NATO.
I think Putin actually does pose an existential threat not only to Ukraine, but, if not made to pay a very heavy price, to neighboring countries (insert Hitler analogy trigger warning here). Yes, we should defend Ukraine because it is a budding democracy we share values with, but it is also of strategic importance to keep the borders of a Russia led by a wanna-be Stalin as far East as possible. I may be showing my age, but I don't doubt for a second that Putin would love to either completely subjugate as much of Europe as possible, or at least have it cowed and out of the US sphere of influence (something I think he thought Trump would accomplish for him for free).
I also believe NATO and our commitment to defend European allies is deeper than "mere" treaty commitments. Putin and the old USSR sign mutual defense pacts with countries they occupy or otherwise "own." Democracies sign mutual defense treaties with countries with whom they share more than just strategic defensive interests. We really do share culture and much more with Europe and, yes, even Ukraine.
All this old-fashioned romantic blather aside, I do agree that more (significantly more) attention to Asia is vitally important, but I don't believe the two are mutually exclusive. I think Matt's (and others') ideas of making our 28-year old European kid take more, if not most, of the responsibility for his own future is a necessary step, but I wouldn't cut him off.
Somewhat off topic: why hasn't Putin invaded Ukraine while he had a friend in the White House (or maybe even better from the political timing perspective: between 6 November 2019 and well before 20 Jan 2021)?
" I think he probably would have beaten Obama if he’d run on his record as a moderate technocrat rather than embracing hard-right austerity economics."
"Hi, I'm Mitt Romney - I favor everything my opponent does and oppose nothing he doesn't, but the difference is that I have less experience in elected office than he does and aren't as smart. Vote for me because I'm the white guy, k thx"
The tough part of this is that just as you sometimes need to let your kid make his own mistakes, if we want Europe to sustain a real defense capacity we need to create a situation where we’re not going to bail them out.
^ I don't think this is realistic. If push comes to shove, it is in the US (and democracy)'s best interests to help bail out Europe.
I would quibble that the US should not be walking away from Europe and leaving them to defend themselves but instead we're saying: "call us when you need us and we will come, with your help we can make a safer world for our shared values." We will share our intelligence with you, we will collaborate on technology, we will continue to provide our nuclear umbrella (since it's already made), and our focus in the Indo-Pacific will make that part of the world safer for European investment and cultural cooperation.
Furthermore, as you (Europe) increases your capabilities we, the Americans, will listen more to your wants and desires.
This is a deepening partnership, where Europe gets more responsibility, but also more say. I think the current crisis actually is a good picture of what that means. Yes, Biden may lead the alliance but we will wait for European buy in until we agree to these Russian sanctions. We understand: Ukraine is closer to you, and Russia is an important economic partner to you in a way they are not important to us. So we will not force using SWIFT sanctions until you guys agree. We will let you take the primary credit for the sanctions, and do the coordinating.
In exchange Europe agrees to be more supportive of the US in the Indo-Pacific. We will be deferential in Europe if Europe is more deferential in Asia (where Japan may take a more leading role than either the US or the EU).
Just my 2 cent quibble.
I grew up in the Cold WAR. Bergman should go back to those decades. There was no time during those decades that the US wanted Europe to build up its own defenses. There was much more fear of losing the US grip on Europe (see: Charles de Gaulle). My, how the world changes.
An important goal of both World Wars, shared by Russia and the Western Allies, was the de-militarization of Germany. (We kind of blew it the first time at Versailles...).
An EU alliance led by a re-armed Germany makes sense but it requires a lot of people to forget a lot of history. So who else can lead this alliance? France is on the continent, in the EU, and has nukes. And per Matt's chart they are a relatively big spender on defense.
Or have the alliance led by a Big Three of the UK, Germany and France. Or add Italy and Poland and make it Five.
The current solution, having NATO led by the biggest power (that's the US!) had an appealing simplicity.
Well. If Putin flipped out over Western expansion of NATO and overtures to the Ukraine, what might he do about a re-militarized Germany? I'm pretty sure that is a Russian nightmare like no other.
Given that Russia ran successful influence ops that plausibly changed the outcome of the presidential election four years later, it seems like Russia actually was the biggest geopolitical threat to the US in 2012. Romney’s reasoning may have been flawed, but nothing China has done 2012-22 has hurt US interests as much as that.
Prioritization requires pragmatism and an understanding of basic economic principles like tradeoffs and opportunity costs. It is dictated by strategy, which in turn is informed by clearly established and well understood outcome objectives.
It is increasingly my conviction that an insufficient number of people in our “political and media ecosystems” possess the cognitive aptitude to create realistic goals, craft coherent strategy, or indeed understand the axiom that you can’t have your lunch and eat it, too. And when they think they can, it’s because they’re too stupid to realize they stole someone else’s lunch to make it happen.
“The European countries most enthusiastically supporting Ukraine are not the most solidly democratic ones, but the ones with the most historical conflict with Russia.”
The Baltic countries don’t have a long history experiencing democracy, but their people have a long history of yearning for it. After recently visiting, my takeaway was that they have a far greater appreciation for liberty and democratic principles than the average American does now.
“But that’s why I don’t love the emphasis on the two percent threshold. Part of the deal here should be that if you spend the money wisely, you don’t actually need to spend that much. It’s really a political question of coordinating and procuring things that are useful.”
Okay, but what sounds more achievable to you: Creating a plan to spend the money wisely, gaining the cooperation of many other countries since specialization is wise in this case, navigating diverse interests and clearing the political hurdles necessary to implement that wise plan? Or, taking the shotgun approach of committing to a 2% spend level, knowing at least some good will come of it? I see the 2% rule as a pragmatic solution for getting something done.
Europeans have proven over and over again that they are irresponsible with too much military prowess and it ends up sucking for the whole world. I think we are better off allowing them to drink, eat and clutch their feelings of moral and cultural superiority so we at least keep it nice for vacations.
The first Secretary-General of NATO, Lord Ismay, famously said the purpose of NATO was to keep the Soviet Union out, the Americans in, and the Germans down. The first part is pretty obvious, even now. And the last because, well, WWI and WWII. But the idea behind keeping the Americans in was less that American military might would guarantee a victory against the Soviet army but that America would be stuck with fighting on the side of the West Europeans, incurring casualties, and all that meant. Since few people thought we really had a way of overcoming a full-scale Soviet invasion through the Fulda Gap and the elsewhere, military planning was based on an accelerating number of American deaths, leading to battlefield and then (if necessary) full strategic nuclear exchanges.
That is, the bottom line of keeping the "Americans in" was the promise of an American nuclear shield over Europe.
While the nuclear threat from Russia is currently less than from the Soviet Union (he said rather nervously), it's hardly gone. An America being less and less "in" NATO means that the Europeans have to think about a full-spectrum defense against a nuclear-armed foe. So France and the UK have nukes. Should Germany now embark on a nuclear weapons program? Who would coordinate and manage the use of those weapons? A supranational military structure, removing them from French/British/German control?
Since China is our most important geostrategic concern, keeping the status quo in Europe is clearly complicated. But handing over the keys to the Europeans is no walk in the park either.
I don’t really think the division of resources is actually that critical. Our commitments to Europe are almost entirely the Army and Air Force. Unless we plan on building bases on Taiwan, our military commitment in Asia will always be almost entirely naval.
The geography of each theater is very lopsided in this way. China would struggle to project air power to Japan while we would struggle to maintain air power in South Korea or Taiwan against Chinese missile barrages. It goes without saying that armies don’t march across seas and South Korea is a first rank land power. (And, of course, Russia doesn’t have a navy worthy of comment, so what our navy would do is not clear.)
So these commitments don’t compete with each other that much, really. We don’t need carriers and destroyers in Europe (and European navies are a bright spot in the overall defense picture anyway) and don’t need armies in Asia.
I just don't see how a bunch of armies knitted together won't be at a disadvantage against a resolute single military, particularly when you're operating in that foe's regional backyard in Eastern Europe.