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NATO’s role as a deterrent is still critically important to the US
Joe Biden this week is wrapping up his first trip abroad as President of the United States. Reasonably successful week, brought him to the G7, EU, face-to-face with Vladimir Putin. He also attended a meeting that brought NATO heads of state together for the first time since December 2019. Former President Donald Trump was no fan of NATO, though saying it was obsolete was the one thing he admitted he was wrong about in foreign policy as president, so kind of interesting. But Biden's strong support for the organization was a welcome change for the military alliance.
Not everyone out there is happy about a warm embrace from the US of NATO. Historian Stephen Wertheim just wrote a piece in The New York Times entitled "Sorry, Liberals. But You Really Shouldn't Love NATO." It's a provocative argument and we think it misses the mark in a few important ways. So we're taking out the Red Pen.
Let's start at the beginning. NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, was founded back in 1949 in the wake of World War II. It was largely a response to the Soviet Union. Its mission was to protect European democracies, both diplomatically and, if necessary, with military force. Many people have challenged the existence and the point of NATO since the Soviet collapse back in '91, not just Wertheim, but we take issue with some of the arguments that are presented here.
Number one, Wertheim argues that NATO's existence risks great power war, I quote, "that the US should avoid like the plague." Does NATO really bring that risk though? On the contrary, we'd say it's helped to prevent a great power conflict by deterring Russian attacks on its members for decades and still now. Even Putin has said, as president, that only an insane person can imagine that Russia would suddenly attack NATO. That feels like a deterrent effect to me. Keep in mind that Article 5 of NATO, the pledge that an attack on one member nation is an attack on all, has actually only been invoked once, by the United States, after 9/11.
Next, Wertheim contends that "the Biden administration now faces a stark choice, commit to fight for Ukraine, creating a serious risk of war with Russia, or admit that NATO expansion has come to an overdue end." Wait, what? Neither Obama nor Trump actually faced such a "stark choice." Biden can continue bolstering Ukraine's defenses, Obama didn't want to do that, Trump did, work to lower the temperature with Russia and back NATO. This is frustrating to Ukraine's president who wants full membership and during the NATO summit tried tweeting that Ukraine was really, really, really about to become a member, and he got precisely nowhere. It's not actually an either/or.
Wertheim also writes that "Europe is stable and affluent far removed from its warring past." Meaning, of course, that it no longer needs a military alliance with the US or US involvement in it for protection. But remember, when Russia attacked Georgia in 2008 and Ukraine six years later, just a few weeks ago, Russia was massing troops on Ukraine's border. No one thinks Russia wants to overrun the continent with tanks as Wertheim suggests. But how about threatening Europeans with cyberattacks, with nerve agents on their individual citizens? These concerns are real, they cannot easily be dispensed with.
Finally, Wertheim concludes that if the United States doesn't trust the Europeans to defend themselves then it "truly intends to dominate the world in perpetuity." Number one, that's wildly overstated given the role and impact and power of China globally. But to talk just about the North Atlantic frame, supporting European allies who want help from the United States, by the way, as is very clear from the NATO summit itself, is not the same as wanting to dominate the world. Indeed, the United States wants Europe to take a bigger stake in its own defense to allow America to shift more of its attention to China. And Wertheim's argument ignores the fact that Europe still trusts the United States, even if not as much as it has historically and wants the US to contribute to the continent security through NATO. In fact, the Alliance expanded precisely because Eastern and Central European and Baltic countries like Lithuania and Estonia wanted a guarantee against Russian military aggression. NATO has served its purpose on that front.
In a meeting this week with NATO's secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, President Biden affirmed the US commitment saying of the Alliance, "If there weren't one, we'd have to invent one." Well, there is one, and I grant you NATO needs a bit of reinvention. But should the US back out completely? Sorry, Stephen Wertheim, but not right now.
That's your Red Pen. Hope you found it useful. See you again soon. In the meantime, stay safe and avoid fewer people.
Putin's next move won't be a Baltic invasion that could unify NATO
Today we're taking a look at a recent op-ed from Politico, penned by Russian studies scholar Leon Aron of AEI.
And the title asks a provocative question, "Could Putin launch another invasion?" Aron links the current political moment in Russia, big protests, struggling economy, and Putin's own thirst for power and popularity, with the factors that led to Russia's incursion into Ukraine and annexation of Crimea in 2014. He lays out the possibility that Russia could make military moves yet again, potentially against Estonia, Latvia, or Lithuania, the three Baltic states that all happen to be members of both the European Union and NATO.
Some context: This has been quite a week for US/Russia relations. President Biden in an interview with ABC News agreed with an assertion that Vladimir Putin is a "killer," I think he called him "soulless," too. And Russia responded by recalling their ambassador to the United States. All this comes as the American intelligence community released a report this week claiming that Russia had launched yet another campaign in the 2020 election to undermine Biden.
So a logical question would be: What is Putin's next move? Could he wage yet another military campaign?
Now, as with many of the pieces that we look at, some points Aron makes are right on the money. Yes, Putin did gain a lot of popularity after the operation in Crimea, especially. And yes, NATO faces real issues; Turkey is barely an ally these days, countries are slow rolling in terms of spending cash that they're promised, the French are talking about strategic autonomy, and yes, Putin always seems to have a surprise or two up his sleeve. But we are completely not convinced by the argument that an invasion of the Balts may be on its way.
So let's take out the Red Pen.
First, Aron writes that Putin's interventions, especially in Ukraine "worked," driving a "Crimean consensus" that victory in war overshadows troubles at home.
Sure, the Crimea intervention "worked" for Putin. Until it didn't. Putin has had to downplay military involvement in Ukraine of late to avoid a backlash from a Russian public that cares primarily about domestic issues still, like pensions, for example. And let's not forget that getting involved in Libya, in Syria, even in Nagorno-Karabakh didn't yield any real popularity bump of note for Putin.
Next, Aron writes that "we tend to repeat what worked." That is, Putin reached for the military lever before when he faced trouble, so he might do so again.
Well, Putin's decision making doesn't occur in a vacuum. Every past intervention was driven by national interest and foreign policy goals. Does Putin care about Putin? Of course. But Putin can't be sure that cooking up a foreign war would help matters it home. In fact, it might actually make them worse.
Finally, Aron says that Putin may consider a "fast and victorious poke at NATO's eastern flank," targeting the Baltic states and breaking NATO.
An attack on the Balts may be fast or it may be victorious, but probably not both. And Putin knows this. Western leaders are conflicted about the alliance, but an assault on full-fledged NATO State and EU members is exactly the kind of provocation that could awaken it. Putin understands this. He hardly wants to bring the alliance together as it's eroding. Low-cost efforts to steadily undermine legitimacy and grabbing targets of opportunity when available, that is much more Putin's speed.
Putin certainly seems to want to be president for life and probably is going to end up running for a fifth term, though a lot can happen in three years. Military moves that diminish his popularity or lead to further widespread protest, never mind bring together his adversaries, that is a strong NYET for now tovarishchey.
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