US versus NATO

[CBH99]

Just goes to show you how far 'likeability' goes...and how true the saying is that it's usually not WHAT you say, but HOW you say it.  (For all of us lucky bastards who are married, I think we all understand just how true that saying is?  Or is that just me?)

 

[mariomike]

Just goes to show you how far 'likeability' goes...and how true the saying is that it's usually not WHAT you say, but HOW you say it.  (For all of us lucky bastards who are married, I think we all understand just how true that saying is?  Or is that just me?)

I think I do.

Years ago, a very likeable guy told me that likeability is 90 per cent of the battle.

Not being a good guy. Being a likeable guy. Big difference. 

 

[Infanteer]

Once again there is a huge element of unreality in the reporting of the events and what is going on. Why, for example is everyone hysterical about President Trump calling for NATO to actually meet their 2% commitments, especially when President Obama had the same talking points:

Its not unreliability in reporting.

Say you and I are neighbours, and you don't cut your grass, even through there is a bylaw saying you should do so.  If I come over and say "Hey, I'm Barry.  I'm going to ask you to mow the lawn and do your part," you're likely to take it a certain way.  If I come over with a big red hat on, s**t on your driveway, finger you and say "mow your f**king lawn," you're likely to take it a certain way.

Yeah, sure - in both cases I asked you to mow the lawn, but that's only half the story.  To refuse to see that other half, or discount its importance and effect, is just being willingly or unwillingly tone-deaf.

 

[PPCLI Guy]

An excellent piece this morning from Robert Kagan.  He points out that NATO has been under extreme pressure for sometime, but that the summit this week spells its death knell.  As NATO crumbles, so shall the rest of the edifice that is the world order of the last 70 years that has delivered unprecedented stability and prosperity.

Things will not be okay
 
by Robert Kagan July 12 at 4:08 PM 

Human beings often choose self-delusion over painful reality, and so in the days and weeks to come, we will hear reassurances that the NATO alliance is in good shape. After all, there have been spats in the past — over the Suez crisis in 1956, Vietnam in the 1960s and ’70s, missile deployment in the Reagan years and, of course, Iraq. American presidents have been complaining about shortfalls in European defense spending for decades. President Trump is not wrong to criticize Germany’s pipeline deal with Russia. As for this week’s fractious summit, we are urged to focus on the substance, not the rhetoric. U.S. forces in Europe have been beefed up in recent years, and new plans are in place to resist Russian aggression. On the ground, the alliance still functions.

All true, but unfortunately beside the point. Small troop deployments and incremental defense increases don’t mean much when the foundations of the alliance are crumbling — as they are and have been for some time. And pointing to previous differences ignores how much political and international circumstances have changed over the past decade. Europe faces new problems, as well as the return of some of the old problems that led to catastrophe in the past; and Americans have a very different attitude toward the world than they did during the Cold War. This is not just another family quarrel.

The transatlantic community was in trouble even before Trump took office. The peaceful, democratic Europe we had come to take for granted in recent decades has been rocked to the core by populist nationalist movements responding to the massive flow of refugees from the Middle East and Africa. For the first time since World War II , a right-wing party holds a substantial share of seats in the German Bundestag. Authoritarianism has replaced democracy, or threatens to, in such major European states as Hungary and Poland, and democratic practices and liberal values are under attack in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. France remains one election away from a right-wing nationalist leadership, and Italy has already taken a big step in that direction. Meanwhile, Britain, which played such a key role in Europe during and after the Cold War, has taken itself out of the picture and has become, globally, a pale shadow of its former self. The possibility that Europe could return to its dark past is greater today than at any time during the Cold War.

Some of that has to do with the changing attitude of the United States in recent years. It’s little secret that President Barack Obama had no great interest in Europe. Obama, like Trump, spoke of allied “free riders,” and his “pivot” to Asia was widely regarded by Europeans as a pivot away from them. Obama rattled Eastern Europe in his early years by canceling planned missile-defense installations in Poland and the Czech Republic as an inducement to Vladimir Putin to embrace a “reset” of relations. In his later years he rattled Western Europe when he did not enforce his famous “red lines” in Syria. Both actions raised doubts about American reliability, and the Obama administration’s refusal to take action in Syria to stem the flow of refugees contributed heavily to the present strain.

Obama was only doing what he thought the American people wanted. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, along with the 2008 financial crisis, left Americans disenchanted with global involvement and receptive to arguments that the alliances and institutions they supported for all those years no longer served their interests. The Obama administration tried to pare back the American role without abandoning the liberal world order, hoping it was more self-sustaining than it turned out to be. But the path was open to a politician willing to exploit Americans’ disenchantment, which is precisely what Trump did in 2016.

NATO has never been a self-operating machine that simply chugs ahead so long as it is left alone. Like the liberal world order of which it is the core, it requires constant tending, above all by the United States. And because it is a voluntary alliance of democratic peoples, it survives on a foundation of public support. That foundation has been cracking in recent years. This week was an opportunity to shore it up. Instead, Trump took a sledgehammer to it.

Never mind the final communique that Trump deigned to sign, or his reassurance at the end that the alliance was “very unified, very strong, no problem,” and or his claim that “I believe in NATO.” In his press comments alongside NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, in his tweets and in his private comments to European leaders, Trump made clear that he does not believe in NATO. In fact, he used this summit to lay out for the American people why NATO was not only “obsolete,” as he once said, but also a rotten deal for them.

Consider the question of allied military spending. As many pointed out, Trump could have come to Brussels and taken credit for the increased commitments that the Allies have made — and of course he did force Stoltenberg to give him credit. But then he moved the goal posts. He insisted the 2 percent of gross domestic product mark must be reached not by 2024, as agreed by the alliance (including the United States), but by January — something he knows is impossible. Then he went further, insisting that the allies spend 4 percent of their GDP on defense, higher even than his own defense budget.

These are not negotiating tactics. They are the tactics of someone who does not want a deal. In the private meeting, Trump is reported to have warned the allies that if they did not meet the 2 percent standard by January the United States would “go it alone.” To Stoltenberg he publicly warned that the United States was “not going to put up with it.” Whether he has any intention of making good on such threats scarcely matters. In his tweets, he asked, “What good is NATO” if Germany was paying Russia for gas? Why should the United States pay billions to “subsidize Europe” while it was losing “Big on Trade”? Those comments were not aimed at Europe. They were designed to discredit the alliance in the eyes of his faithful throng back home.

But even Trump must know the likely response in Europe. The insults and humiliations he inflicted on allied leaders will not be forgotten or forgiven. They will make it impossible for European leaders to win public support for the spending Trump disingenuously claims to want. What German leader after such a tongue-lashing could do Trump’s bidding and hope to survive politically?

Any student of history knows that it is moments like this summit that set in motion chains of events that are difficult to stop. The democratic alliance that has been the bedrock of the American-led liberal world order is unraveling. At some point, and probably sooner than we expect, the global peace that that alliance and that order undergirded will unravel, too. Despite our human desire to hope for the best, things will not be okay. The world crisis is upon us.

 

[Journeyman]

…. the President is upending the post war domestic, trade and diplomatic conventions which are not really applicable to the post Cold War world anymore

Are those conventions applicable to a growing Cold War 2.0 world?



Aside:  Personally, I believe that diplomatic civility is in order 99.9% of the time;  on very rare occasions, lashing out for shock value may provide some impetus, but when it's constant, it wears thin [well, except to those members of 'his base' who think Beavis & Butthead is a documentary, I guess].  When it is constant, commentary like  "watching NATO diplomats deal with President Trump at the NATO summit was like watching psychiatrists deal with a disturbed child" isn't "unreality" or some anti-Trump conspiracy, it's a self-inflicted wound.

 

[Altair]

I call dibs on "Dishonest" and "Weak" for the next game of Trump Twitter Bingo!  ;D

Turns out it was May who got the brunt of the American Presidents broadside.

 

[Altair]

An excellent piece this morning from Robert Kagan.  He points out that NATO has been under extreme pressure for sometime, but that the summit this week spells its death knell.  As NATO crumbles, so shall the rest of the edifice that is the world order of the last 70 years that has delivered unprecedented stability and prosperity.

Imagine that.

If NATO members don't reach the target by 2020, instead of 2024 as was agreed on, America would go it alone.

The statesman hasn't yet been born who can undo the damage this american president has done to American prestige, respect, and influence on the world stage.

It's increasingly clear that NATO, the G7, whatever international organization that relies or depends on America can start planning on going on without it. America has ceded it's place in the world, replaced with a level of isolationism not seen since the 1930s.

America has no friends right now. Serve them right. If another attack on the scale of 911 happens in the US after January, I doubt anyone lifts a finger to assist. America can do it alone.

Same goes for Korea. If America comes to the the decision that military action is needed, do it by themselves.

 

[Journeyman]

Having a bad day?  Imagine how the past few days have been for Kay Bailey Hutchison, the U.S. ambassador to NATO;  she has to pick up the pieces.  :nod:

 

[Jarnhamar]

I have a question about this USA NATO Germany Russia business because I think it's going over my head.


NATO is essentially there to deter Russia in the Atlantic and by extent in Europe. The US spends a considerable amount of money in NATO, on the defense of Europe and in Germany's defense.

Germany is buying energy (natural gad/oil/whatever) from Russia.

[Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder has been working for the Russian energy industry since he lost to Chancellor Merkel in 2005]


Isn't what Germany doing sort of a conflict of interest ?

Why spend money and man power on Germany with a view to protecting them "from Russia" when Germany puts themselves in a position where Russia can turn their lights and heating off, so to speak. Not to mention strengthen Russian economy. That doesn't make sense to me.






A lot of SciFi works about the future show large corporations replacing traditional countries in terms of world disputes, wars and soldiers. Maybe it'll be non-fiction before we know it.

 

[Altair]

I have a question about this USA NATO Germany Russia business because I think it's going over my head.


NATO is essentially there to deter Russia in the Atlantic and by extent in Europe. The US spends a considerable amount of money in NATO, on the defense of Europe and in Germany's defense.

Germany is buying energy (natural gad/oil/whatever) from Russia.

[Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder has been working for the Russian energy industry since he lost to Chancellor Merkel in 2005]


Isn't what Germany doing sort of a conflict of interest ?

Why spend money and man power on Germany with a view to protecting them "from Russia" when Germany puts themselves in a position where Russia can turn their lights and heating off, so to speak. Not to mention strengthen Russian economy. That doesn't make sense to me.






A lot of SciFi works about the future show large corporations replacing traditional countries in terms of world disputes, wars and soldiers. Maybe it'll be non-fiction before we know it.

This is nonsense.

Every country trades with Russia, and every country that trades with Russia strengthens the Russian economy.

And trade is a two way street, should Russia turn off the taps, there are multiple other sources that Germany can get its gas from, albeit, at a higher price than what Russia sells it for, but Russia, by turning off the gas, would lose out on revenue as well, counter to their own interests.

So unless the american president is calling for a complete and total embargo on Russia, focusing on Germany buying their gas from Russia is nothing but a deflection.

It's ironic, because I get the feeling that after his summit with Putin, the American president is probably going to be asking for a elimination of sanctions on Russia.

 

[daftandbarmy]

This is nonsense.

Every country trades with Russia, and every country that trades with Russia strengthens the Russian economy.

And trade is a two way street, should Russia turn off the taps, there are multiple other sources that Germany can get its gas from, albeit, at a higher price than what Russia sells it for, but Russia, by turning off the gas, would lose out on revenue as well, counter to their own interests.

So unless the american president is calling for a complete and total embargo on Russia, focusing on Germany buying their gas from Russia is nothing but a deflection.

It's ironic, because I get the feeling that after his summit with Putin, the American president is probably going to be asking for a elimination of sanctions on Russia.

Trump's main goals in all of his negotiations is to try and shake up existing agreements, with everyone, to try and get a better deal for the US while playing to his base in order to crush the Democrats in the upcoming mid-terms.

He's doing a great job, based on those goals.

 

[Altair]

Trump's main goals in all of his negotiations is to try and shake up existing agreements, with everyone, to try and get a better deal for the US while playing to his base in order to crush the Democrats in the upcoming mid-terms.

He's doing a great job, based on those goals.

America is simply focusing on the best deal it can get for itself, others be damned. No way to constructively come to mutual agreements with anybody else.

It cannot even negotiate a NAFTA deal with its two closest neighbours, one of which is it's largest market for exports. This is America pulling out of global affairs in terms of military, trade, and diplomacy.

No way to sugar coat it or say that he's bluffing. He's doing what he has always said he was going to do, destroy the international arrangements that he feels takes advantage of America. Shame he doesn't see the cost in doing so, but that's what is happening.

If America would rather go it alone on trade,diplomatically, and militarily, then I hope they suffer for that decision.

Because he isn't going to get a better deal on NAFTA, so he will probably just kill it if he can.

He isn't negotiating a better deal on Iran, and Europe and China refuse to follow along.

The Paris deal will continue on in some way shape or form without the only country in the world who refused to go along with it.

TPP will continue along, and ironically, open up the Canadian dairy market that Trump continues to go on about.

NATO, good luck America, will all your foreign adventures without assistance.

G7 will be the G6, and america will be shut out of the west global policy makers and the agenda they set.

America isn't renegotiating anything right now, it's tearing everything up in a fit of nonsense

 

[Jarnhamar]

This is nonsense.

Cutting the supply of fuel and power to would be a great preemptive strike for a Russian invasion of Germany.

Invasion a ridiculous notion? Then why put so much money and effort into germanies defense against them.

 

[Altair]

Cutting the supply of fuel and power to would be a great preemptive strike for a Russian invasion of Germany.

Invasion a ridiculous notion? Then why put so much money and effort into germanies defense against them.

The costlier the effort, the less likely it is to be undertaken.

 

[Baz]

When I was at SHAPE I heard the saying "the purpose of NATO is to keep the Russians out and the Germans in" more than once.

Given history, do we really think it is a good idea to be marginalizing Germany when nationalism is only starting to rise there again?  Do we really think it is a good idea to plant the idea of militarization in Germany again?  Do we think that by making it even harder for Merkel to keep the government together, and possibly enable the right wing to take root there?

 

[Altair]

When I was at SHAPE I heard the saying "the purpose of NATO is to keep the Russians out and the Germans in" more than once.

Given history, do we really think it is a good idea to be marginalizing Germany when nationalism is only starting to rise there again?  Do we really think it is a good idea to plant the idea of militarization in Germany again?  Do we think that by making it even harder for Merkel to keep the government together, and possibly enable the right wing to take root there?

At least Germany will be together with a United Europe next time something goes down.

I fear this just creates another military power block to be dealt with in the future.

America, solo.

EII AKA, Europe.

Russia

China.

There is not guarantee the EII plays nicely with the USA should the USA go it alone.

 

[Baz]

At least Germany will be together with a United Europe next time something goes down.

Not so sure of that... one result of the US marginalizing NATO and Brexit affecting the EU could be the crumbling of the foundations of both.  It would be ironic that we go back to the situation that the leaders post WWII worked so hard to avoid...

 

[Journeyman]

It would be ironic that we go back to the situation that the leaders post WWII worked so hard to avoid...

You need to stop listening to Alanis Morissette.    ;D

 

[Altair]

Not so sure of that... one result of the US marginalizing NATO and Brexit affecting the EU could be the crumbling of the foundations of both.  It would be ironic that we go back to the situation that the leaders post WWII worked so hard to avoid...

Could, but looking at the soup sandwich Brexit is turning out to be may be giving some people pause.

I think it's telling that when faced with the American President, and his threats to NATO, Europe turned to increased European integration and the creation of a EII, notably, including the UK.

That's a formidable force right off the bat, France, Germany, the UK working together. If and when NATO dies, the core of it's replacement, in Europe's case, is already built.

 

[Good2Golf]

...That's a formidable force right off the bat, France, Germany, the UK working together. If and when NATO dies, the core of it's replacement, in Europe's case, is already built.

Interesting hypothesis: if "Son of Nato" forms after Dad's death, and doesn't have the Eastern European elements in it, thereby re-establishing the buffer that Gorbachev and Yeltsin understood from Reagan would remain post-USSR, is that Trump skillfully maneuvering to re-stabilize the relationship with Russia, thereby actually increasing stability?  ???

Regards
G2G