Feb 21, 2025 10:13 PM
(This post was last modified: Feb 21, 2025 10:20 PM by C C.)
https://www.yahoo.com/news/u-won-t-aband...57447.html
EXCERPTS: . . . Europe is in disarray, and Ukraine feels betrayed. That is the view coming out of last week’s series of high-level European security conferences. [...] For starters, while the comments made by Hegseth and Vance might be concerning, neither one of them claimed that the U.S. was poised to withdraw from NATO. Far from it.
In the same address, Hegseth said, “Our transatlantic alliance has endured for decades. And we fully expect that it will be sustained for generations to come.” But he made clear that European NATO members [...] need to do more—namely spend 5 percent of their GDP on defense and secure European soil, including in Ukraine as part of any eventual peace deal, with European and not U.S. troops.
The reality is that Europeans themselves have been frustrated over their inability to develop more strategic autonomy, so the comments by Hegseth and Vance are a useful push. [...] Given that the U.S. military industrial base has faced sharp capacity limits in recent years, such a division of labor appears necessary.
Neither did Vance signal a lack of commitment to NATO. In his Munich address, he said “the Trump administration is very concerned with European security” and that it sees Europeans spending more on defense as “part of being in a shared alliance together...”
[...] Moreover, for all of Trump’s bluster ... bluster that is not unprecedented for a U.S. president—Trump eventually became a self-described “NATO fan,” after claiming credit for the increases NATO allies made to their defense spending. While these increases were already in motion ... then-NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg was more than willing to praise Trump for pushing the European powers to make more progress in meeting that obligation.
Additionally, while the U.S. may want to focus on deterring China, Europe remains important in that great power competition. As I wrote last year when reflecting on NATO’s enduring relevance to the U.S., “So long as instability in Europe can influence the global and, hence, U.S. economy, the United States will have a strong incentive to keep a seat at the table of European security.” If there is one thing that Trump values, it is having a seat at the table, and NATO provides it, giving the U.S. the ability to shape policy and respond militarily if needed, even if the day-to-day U.S. troop presence is diminished.
While the U.S. is unlikely to abandon NATO, there is still some cause for concern over Ukraine. On this issue, specifically the possibility of reaching a deal to end the war, the picture is less clear, in part due to the slew of verbal jabs and accusations Trump and Zelenskyy have traded since the direct U.S.-Russia diplomatic channel was launched.
On one hand, it seems that Trump is so keen to make good on his campaign promise to end the war that he’ll do anything to induce Russia to stop fighting [...But...] it is increasingly likely Trump will find that Russia, and specifically Putin, is not really interested in a deal regardless of what is offered and who is at the table. Indeed, Putin has already downplayed the two leaders’ lengthy phone conversation, which Trump announced triumphantly.
Some see the comments made by Trump administration officials last week as the beginning of the end of the long-standing U.S. role in European security. After all, the U.S. is now run by a president who has a 19th-century view of the world and the United States’ place in it. In concrete terms, that means the U.S. is separated from the troubles of Europe by a “big, beautiful Ocean,” as Trump put it in a social media post. But even if the U.S. will no longer play as central a role in maintaining European security, that doesn’t mean the Trump administration is interested in abandoning NATO to the dustbin of history—and Europe to Russia... (MORE - missing details)
EXCERPTS: . . . Europe is in disarray, and Ukraine feels betrayed. That is the view coming out of last week’s series of high-level European security conferences. [...] For starters, while the comments made by Hegseth and Vance might be concerning, neither one of them claimed that the U.S. was poised to withdraw from NATO. Far from it.
In the same address, Hegseth said, “Our transatlantic alliance has endured for decades. And we fully expect that it will be sustained for generations to come.” But he made clear that European NATO members [...] need to do more—namely spend 5 percent of their GDP on defense and secure European soil, including in Ukraine as part of any eventual peace deal, with European and not U.S. troops.
The reality is that Europeans themselves have been frustrated over their inability to develop more strategic autonomy, so the comments by Hegseth and Vance are a useful push. [...] Given that the U.S. military industrial base has faced sharp capacity limits in recent years, such a division of labor appears necessary.
Neither did Vance signal a lack of commitment to NATO. In his Munich address, he said “the Trump administration is very concerned with European security” and that it sees Europeans spending more on defense as “part of being in a shared alliance together...”
[...] Moreover, for all of Trump’s bluster ... bluster that is not unprecedented for a U.S. president—Trump eventually became a self-described “NATO fan,” after claiming credit for the increases NATO allies made to their defense spending. While these increases were already in motion ... then-NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg was more than willing to praise Trump for pushing the European powers to make more progress in meeting that obligation.
Additionally, while the U.S. may want to focus on deterring China, Europe remains important in that great power competition. As I wrote last year when reflecting on NATO’s enduring relevance to the U.S., “So long as instability in Europe can influence the global and, hence, U.S. economy, the United States will have a strong incentive to keep a seat at the table of European security.” If there is one thing that Trump values, it is having a seat at the table, and NATO provides it, giving the U.S. the ability to shape policy and respond militarily if needed, even if the day-to-day U.S. troop presence is diminished.
While the U.S. is unlikely to abandon NATO, there is still some cause for concern over Ukraine. On this issue, specifically the possibility of reaching a deal to end the war, the picture is less clear, in part due to the slew of verbal jabs and accusations Trump and Zelenskyy have traded since the direct U.S.-Russia diplomatic channel was launched.
On one hand, it seems that Trump is so keen to make good on his campaign promise to end the war that he’ll do anything to induce Russia to stop fighting [...But...] it is increasingly likely Trump will find that Russia, and specifically Putin, is not really interested in a deal regardless of what is offered and who is at the table. Indeed, Putin has already downplayed the two leaders’ lengthy phone conversation, which Trump announced triumphantly.
Some see the comments made by Trump administration officials last week as the beginning of the end of the long-standing U.S. role in European security. After all, the U.S. is now run by a president who has a 19th-century view of the world and the United States’ place in it. In concrete terms, that means the U.S. is separated from the troubles of Europe by a “big, beautiful Ocean,” as Trump put it in a social media post. But even if the U.S. will no longer play as central a role in maintaining European security, that doesn’t mean the Trump administration is interested in abandoning NATO to the dustbin of history—and Europe to Russia... (MORE - missing details)