As NATO meets in Chicago for a major conference, many see the alliance as an outdated system that cannot even sustain itself.
One year ago, outgoing Defense Secretary Robert Gates expressed disappointment with NATO, claiming Europe’s sluggish commitment and the negative effect the alliance can have on U.S. interests. He said it faces a “dim if not dismal future.”
“NATO has struggled, at times desperately, to sustain a deployment of 25,000 to 45,000 troops, not just in boots on the ground, but in crucial support assets such as helicopters, transport aircraft, maintenance, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, and much more,” said Gates.
After the end of the Cold War, which NATO was supposedly established for, Europe scaled back its military spending, while the U.S. kept it up. More than 20 years later, the U.S. accounts for about 75 percent of the spending in the 28-member NATO alliance.
Critics say this creates situations where the U.S. ends up basically protecting all of Europe and getting into wars and occupations that aren’t in its interest. Washington has tolerated this because since the end of WWII, the primary foreign policy aim has been to prevent military competitors and maintain total dominance over as much of Eurasia as possible.
There is pressure, especially given the economic troubles facing so many Western nations, to cut back on defense spending even more. Some of that pressure exists in the U.S. too, but Congress has ignored those imperatives, passing bills that cut almost nothing and actually increase military spending after a decade of ballooning budgets.
In the link given above, Doug Bandow writes:
I don't get where "Europe's inability to act without Washington" comes from. If there weren't for the US giving backing to arbitrary military adventures via NATO, Europe wouldn't have to "act" at all. Like a central bank, NATO enticies decision makers into accepting greater risk than they should, mainly to score "tough guy" points at home ("socialists for bombing") or to please the current US president – the latter being often followed by a quid pro quo either on the political scene (mutual fellation obvious on the 20:00 UTC+2 news) or the military procurement scene. Really, I never knew that Afghanistan was near the Northern Atlantic.
As for "reliance of Europe on the United States for advanced military capabilities", well duh. Military procurement in Europe is a clusterf*ck of gigantic proportions. You either have Europe-wide consortia churn out overpriced and underperforming kit under the pretense of having a local armament capability (in reality, shifting taxpayer money around). Or else you have buying decisions clearly influenced by US-based companies for kit that is out of reach of the actual budget.
In other words: manufacturers call the shots and politicians think they afford to source superpower-level gear (well, France has its tier-2 Rafale but then they didn't use to be part of NATO). The whole system is ripe for a Stalin-level purge.
Who are we protecting Europe from?
The US will continue to "protect" Europe as a necessary component of its fantasy of "full spectrum dominance." So far as I know, nobody in Europe is demanding protection. Give up the fantasy and let Europe work at protecting itself.
The basic problem is that the US has a radically imperfect understanding of security. The US is perfectly happy to impoverish its own citizens in order to protect itself from (non-existent) external threats. Keeping Americans secure in their homes; protecting as many as possible from personal bankruptcy; making sure that seniors and the disabled receive the services necessary for a secure life — all of these basics of a decent society have at least partially been sacrificed to a defense budget that swallows 60 percent of the annual overall budget.
Americans will never be satisfied with the level of national security unless these domestic "security" measures are secured. Keeping Americans in a state of fear so that the elite can continue to fleece them is not going to enhance national security.
Judging by the amount of the money spent, NATO (North Atlantic Terrorist organization) is in effect the US itself. Whereas the initial raison d etre has long expired, the new NATO has taken the role of the original colonizing countries in a sort of modern scheme, i.e. R2p.
It stands to reason that the entire West is falling apart & having trouble sustaining itself, why would NATO be any different, all the money being siphoned their way notwithstanding.
It begs a question. One country wants to establish "total dominance", and others will have to pay equal share? Why would they? Unless the "dominatrix" has promised some benefits to dominated contributors. Now, as for the others? Those not included into the dominatrix-dominated relationship? The world is being divided into the West and the Rest. Now when the primary relationship between the dominatrix and the dominated contributors runs into trouble due to the high ambitions of the dominatrix — what is the fall back? It seems that the circle of dominated-protected is just widened, to include Saudi Arabia and Gulf countries. Now they have to contribute more to the ambitious program of total dominance. But even when the coordinated targeting of those outside the matrix results in some real loot (as in Libya's sovereign funds and gold), it seems nothing is enough. It may well be that the whole "financial crisis" may be nothing more then a way to extract more money for the dominatrix ambitious plans.
As long as we print money, we can sustain many NATO’s. We need the Europeans as cannon fodder.
Slavery — A farmer plowing someone else’s land
Someone please tell me when England, France and Spain stopped ruling America? For they tell me that 2,000 Minutemen pulled off a Revolution, but not a penny of wealth changed hands, and not an acre of farm land was passed down to the laboring-class where it all belongs.
Militarism is the last place where militarism regime can create jobs by creating wars and developing more military arsenals. NATO is nothing but a instrument in that dirction, if US-NATO didnt want to create war why they inssist building a missile shild all over Europe and in Estren USA. The notions means one thing and one thing only, US-NATO looking for third world war or they are seriously preparing for it. Question is who is going to start attacking US or for that matter NATO countries. Iran, NO, China, NO, South Africa NO, South America NO, the answer to whom or from where and how is NO, in the other hand US and NATO are allready at war making sure that is continued.
"Critics say this creates situations where the U.S. ends up basically protecting all of Europe and getting into wars and occupations that aren’t in its interest."
Ummm, exactly how does that statement explain Iraq and Afghanistan?