US versus NATO

[Journeyman]

U.S. Officials Scrambled Behind the Scenes to Shield NATO Deal From Trump

Fearful of a repeat of the G-7 disaster ....Two senior European officials said Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis were also keen to avoid another confrontation similar to the G-7, and the NATO declaration was completed days before leaders set foot in Brussels.

Not Bolton alone;  it looks like there was some unity of purpose amongst the WH staff.

 

[a_majoor]

Bolton is doing great work. I don't know how accurate the article is because msn tends to be anti-administration.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/us-officials-scrambled-behind-the-scenes-to-shield-nato-deal-from-trump/ar-BBLILmn?ocid=spartanntp 

U.S. Officials Scrambled Behind the Scenes to Shield NATO Deal From Trump

I'll ask a pertinent question here: did this declaration advance President Trump's stated aims and goals? Increased spending and readiness, 30 brigades, 30 air wings and on 30 days notice seem to be in line with the President's stated goals. Maybe this is just another example of saying one thing in public to apply pressure and seeing results of that pressure outside of the limelight.

 

[Blackadder1916]

I'll ask a pertinent question here: did this declaration advance President Trump's stated aims and goals? Increased spending and readiness, 30 brigades, 30 air wings and on 30 days notice seem to be in line with the President's stated goals. Maybe this is just another example of saying one thing in public to apply pressure and seeing results of that pressure outside of the limelight.

What is your reference for the numbers?  From what I've seen the  “Four Thirties" are battalions not brigades and squadrons not wings.  From the Brussels Summit Declaration.

https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/official_texts_156624.htm

14.  We also continue to reinvigorate our culture of readiness.  As part of our efforts, Allies continue to ensure that NATO has the full range of capabilities and forces that are trained, interoperable, deployable, and ready to meet all Alliance requirements.  Furthermore, today, we have agreed to launch a NATO Readiness Initiative.  It will ensure that more high-quality, combat-capable national forces at high readiness can be made available to NATO.  From within the overall pool of forces, Allies will offer an additional 30 major naval combatants, 30 heavy or medium manoeuvre battalions, and 30 kinetic air squadrons, with enabling forces, at 30 days’ readiness or less.  They will be organised and trained as elements of larger combat formations, in support of NATO’s overall deterrence and defence posture.  The NATO Readiness Initiative will further enhance the Alliance’s rapid response capability, either for reinforcement of Allies in support of deterrence or collective defence, including for high-intensity warfighting, or for rapid military crisis intervention, if required.  It will also promote the importance of effective combined arms and joint operations.

I suppose one could judge the relative importance of an initiative by where it is placed in an announcement.  Paragraph 14 of a 79 paragraph declaration can't be all bad, but the short word on the NATO Readiness Initiative is . . .

https://www.nato.int/nato_static_fl2014/assets/pdf/pdf_2018_06/20180608_1806-NATO-Readiness-Initiative_en.pdf

The initiative aims to enhance the readiness of existing national forces,
and their ability to move within Europe and across the Atlantic – in
response to a more unpredictable security environment.

This is not about new forces but about increasing the readiness of forces
Allies already have – forces that could be made available for collective
defence and crisis response operations.

And of course, unless one has the number of currently available units (from all NATO countries including the USA) who are on 30 day readiness, a comparison can't be made.

 

[a_majoor]

I see I misread the size of the formations.

We still see NATO moving (or being moved) towards the vision President Trump has been articulating, weather the media chooses to acknowledge this or not. My feeling is there is a lot of smoke covering the actual activity happening behind the scenes in this and many other areas.

 

[Blackadder1916]

. . .  the vision President Trump has been articulating, . . .

I sorry, but somehow "vision" and "articulating" are not words I associate with President Trump.  Of course, his message may be lost in his bombastic manner but the only thing that gets through seems to be "freeloaders" and "me, me, me".  But not wanting to get into the all too common argument about the worth or worthlessness of Mr. Trump's approach to diplomacy, I'll just give my view of what is happening with NATO.  They are continuing on the same path that they started on long before the possibility of a Trump presidency was contemplated.  There have been some refinements to account for the turmoil of Trump but most of these changes are perhaps a direct response to Russia.  It is likely that some of the Russia response is also due to a feeling that the current US president is a little too cozy with the Russian president.  It wouldn't surprise me that the pre-summit negotiations that resulted in the agreed declaration were as much representative of the opinions of the senior members of the US security team, i.e. Bolton, Mattis, et al.

While the Brussels Summit Declaration is not an easily read, concise document, some impressions can be gleaned from its organization.  In its 79 paragraphs, it starts off with some general comments in para 1 about the organization and its goals.  Para 3 affirms the Wales agreement, i.e. 2% defense spending.  Then paras 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 specifically are aimed at Russia as the threat to NATO, its member states and partners and generally Russia as a threat to world peace - para 8 does deal with the possibility of negotiating with Russia favourably but para 9 sets it in its place as being historically untrustworthy.  Paras 10 and 11 deal with the terrorism threat.  Paras 12 and 13 are essentially a preamble to a discussion of the changes/initiatives that NATO are already undertaking or have agreed to.  Para 14, as I quoted in my previous post, deals with the NATO Readiness Initiative.  There really is little new other than some reorganization that (in my opinion) is almost a message to Russia of "don't frig with us".  But it is a subtle message, maybe because it was released prior to Mr. Trump's meeting with Mr. Putin and they had to take into account the personality of the president.

As for the NATO Readiness Initiative (Four Thirties), it seems that not only is for existing forces (no new troops) the numbers appear to be based on the total of NATO elements on 30 days readiness and would not be in addition to any existing forces with a short readiness period.

 

[tomahawk6]

Can we not discuss this without the usual bashing of President Trump ? I think he has made progress on the issue of every member paying their fair share. I haven't seen members quitting the alliance. Afterall its in the best interest of Europe to be strong and vigilant.

 

[tomahawk6]

An interesting piece by strategypage on the neglect faced by European forces in NATO. Essentially money and readiness go hand in hand.

http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htlead/articles/20180806.aspx