I am not going to address everything Trump says every day because that would be a waste of everyone's time. But this 5% thing needs some discussion. Trump is now saying NATO countries need to spend the equivalent of 5% of their gross domestic product on defense. No one, not even the US is anywhere near that (from NATO):
Yes, NATO countries have agreed to use a crappy metric to urge each other to spend more (tis crappy because input measures suck--you can spend a lot and not get a lot of capability--ask the Greeks). The last summit urged NATO to consider moving from 2% to something a bit higher but not 5%. This would require NATO countries to double or even triple their spending, and that is not going to happen.
So, what is Trump thinking? First, he is bad at math, so he may not understand what he is asking for. Second, every conversation with Trump about NATO indicates that he thinks of it as a protection racket--if countries pay, then nothing bad will happen to them. He seems not to understand that the 2% or 5% does not go into the US's pockets or into NATO's bank, but that the money is just more money spent in each country on their respective militaries. Third, is he doing this because he thinks it will lead to these countries buying more American military hardware? Not sure but most of these countries are already standing in line for F-35s, HIMARS artillery systems, and much of the latest tech made in the US.
I think there are two possibilities here:
- Trump thinks every deal anyone makes is exploitative, so he is seeking to revise the NATO deal since it must have exploited the US. Any deal Donald Trump is not involved in is a rip-off. So, his resentment engine kicks in. Remember how upset he was at NAFTA? Canada and Mexico agreed to a new deal that Trump proposed--since Trump was involved, it could not possibly be exploiting his side (even though the new deal didn't really change anything all that much).
- Alternative, Trump is setting up NATO to fail. There is no way that NATO countries will get to 5% in the next five years, and most won't even promise to do so. This will give him the pretext to undermine the alliance further and even pull out.
I was flummoxed long ago why Trump ran against NATO in his 2016 campaign--did this really win votes? NATO is popular in the US, more popular now than 10 years ago. But it turns out that being a populist who seeks to undermine all institutions means attacking NATO. I don't think Trump is doing this because Putin wants him to do so (Putin wants him to do so), but because Trump senses that his base likes him shitting on international organizations. He's pulled out of the WHO and out of other international agreements, and it is only the first week of his second term.
One last thing: three things motivate Trump: attention-seeking, greed, and resentment. This NATO stuff really hits the first and the third--it always gets headlines, and Trump is still pissed off at those shots of leaders mocking him at past NATO summits.
I have already bet that NATO won't survive a second Trump term. I think this move to focus on 5% is the start of a campaign to pull the US out. Folks might say that Congress fixed that with legislation, but Trump is immune, remember? What laws have constrained him thus far?
I hope I am wrong about this, but I tend to be better about predicting consequences than predicting elections...
13 comments:
I am betting on No. 1. I think it's fairly clear that Donald Trump considers any negotiation to b.e a zero-sum game where he must win. The problem is that not only does he think that, but I believe he is still thinking as some kind of a New York real estate promoter.
If you're working a deal in New York, I imagine what you can do is start with an unreasonable negotiating position, threatening and generally blustering around until you come to an agreement with the opposite side or one or either of you walk away from the deal. I don't think Trump has managed to grasp that in international affairs you don't necessarily walk away from the deal. What your opponent does is arm up and attack, economically, politically, or militarily.
Not only is Trump bad at math I don't think he's quite mastered some simple financial transactions conceptually. I think he's still believes that person exporting to the United States is paying the tariff.
I have already bet that NATO won't survive a second Trump term. I think this move to focus on 5% is the start of a campaign to pull the US out.
We can only hope. NATO lost its reason for existing in 1991. It is a dangerous anachronism it is more likely to get us into wars then actually protect us. Opening a NATO office in Japan is absolutely insane unless you regard it more as an imperialistic tool and a local defense alliance.
I very much disagree with your last paragraph. NATO has kept the peace between Russia and Europe, it made an important difference in Bosnia and in Kosovo. It is far from anachronistic when Russia is engaged in aggression on the edge of Europe.
I very much disagree with your last paragraph. NATO has kept the peace between Russia and Europe....
I, in turn, must disagree here. From the Russian side, from the collapse of the USSR until February 2022, I have seen no indication of Russian aggression. Somehow applications to join NATO do not seem to indicate any.
On the other hand the steady, almost remorseless, advance east by NATO culminating in the effective colonization of Ukraine does not give me confidence in NATO's goodwill. I believe every Soviet/Russian president from President Mikhail Gorbachev to President Vladimir Putin has warned that the eastward extension of NATO was unacceptable. US ambassador William Burn's famous "Nyet means Nyet" cable from Moscow pointed out the serious problems of a Ukraine in NATO and NATO, blithely, continued on with, at least, the suggestion that Ukraine would be a member of NATO. For that matter, for how many years did we have Canadian troops training Ukrainian forces?
NATO's record in Libya is distinguished. I believe Libya went from one of the wealthiest countries in Africa to a failed state with reportedly open slave markets and what appears to be a major industry smuggling refugees towards Europe.
Officially NATO, albeit we are basically speaking of the USA, invaded and occupied Afghanistan. Why? Because a small number of the members of Al Qaeda, accused of planning the 9/11 attack were in the country. Did anyone ask for their extradition? Not that I am aware of. Instead NATO invaded with great success. After 20 years, a more fanatic version of the Taliban has replaced an earlier version.
I am not familiar enough with the the Bosnia and Kosovo situation to really comment but that the " Office of the High Representative (OHR) in Bosnia and Herzegovina" still exists does not strike me as encouraging but NATO forces may have had a stabilizing effect early in the conflict.
Overall, I see no useful role for NATO. Other defense alliances may make sense but I see NATO as a bureaucratic organization continually searching for a raison d'être and ends upserving as a tool of US policy.
No indication of Russian aggression? Look at all the frozen conflicts where Russian interference/intervention led to the former Soviet countries losing control over their territories: Moldova, Georgia, etc.
Are you forgetting about 2014? Annexation of Crimea was quite aggressive. Then Russia created a separatist movement in Donbas to replicate the formula that worked so well in Moldova, Georgia, and elsewhere. The Canadian mission to train Ukraine's armed forces was a response to this.
Libya was a mess, I concur. But the initial inclination to try to stop Qaadafi from destroying Benghazi was not wrong.
Afghanistan: yes, the Taliban (a notoriously oppressive regime) was asked to kick out Al Qaeda and they refused. While NATO was operating in Afghanistan, the lives of most Afghans were better by most objective criteria, but the alliance did fail to build a self-sustaining government.
While things are not perfect in Bosnia nor Kosovo, ask the people there about NATO vs the UN.
In the current conflict, while Russia has engaged in all kinds of hybrid attacks, it has not engaged in any conventional attacks against any NATO members. That looks like a successful alliance to me.
One last thing: 2014 happened not because Ukraine was getting closer to NATO membership (it wasn't), but because Ukraine was closer to getting EU membership. That is something Putin couldn't stomach.
No indication of Russian aggression? Look at all the frozen conflicts where Russian interference/intervention led to the former Soviet countries losing control over their territories: Moldova, Georgia, etc.
Moldova appears to be a straight-forward dispute between between language/ethnic groups with the majority Russian-speaking Transnistria and the Gagauz-speaking Gagauzia seemingly existing as quasi-independent entities. The presence of Russian troops in Transistria seems originally due to a reportedly massive ammunition dump at the village of Cobasna. My assumption would be that Russia did not want this dump falling into the hands of Moldova and from there, potentially, onto Romania. That these troops helped protect the breakaway "state" of Transnistria likely was intended but could even have been accidental. Gagauzia, after all, seems to have won some autonomy on its own.
>Are you forgetting about 2014? Annexation of Crimea was quite aggressive. Then Russia created a separatist movement in Donbas to replicate the formula that worked so well in Moldova, Georgia, and elsewhere. The Canadian mission to train Ukraine's armed forces was a response to this.
No of course not. However, overall I do not remember any real aggression by Russia during the Crimean referendum and its returning to be part of Russia. Excuse me if I am covering ground you are familiar with but Crimea became part of the Russian Empire in 1783 when Catherine II (aka The Great) pried it out of Ottoman hands. It remained part of Russia until Nikita Khruschev transferred it from the Russian SSR to the Ukrainian SSR in 1954. I still am not sure if he did this arbitrarily or officially, dotting all the eyes and crossing all the t's. In any case nobody asked the Crimeans. He may have done this for any reason from wanting to give his Ukrainian buddies easier access to quality dachas to a "bribe" for political support. I don't know.
In any case it a reasonably well-functioning USSR, it likely did not make huge differences to Crimeans. If you move from Kanata to Aylmer, it's probably about the same.
An the USSR collapsed Crimea wanted out of Ukraine. There were two referenda in the 1990's for independence. On 20 January 1991 Crimea voted to return to its old state as the "Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic". The referendum was 94.3 YES. Crimea wanted out \ but it did not get it. There was another referendum in 1994 with more or less similar results though I think tthe vote may have been in the high 70's rather than low 90's. My note-taking software is mucking up so I'm a bit vaguer than I should be. In either case, most Crimeans were not showing any fondness for Kiev.
When we come to 2014, what do we have? We have a country seriously split on language/ethnic/religious/political grounds with the West (more ore less Ukrainian speaking) and the East-South (more ore less Russian-speaking). In the presidential election leading up to the Maidan Coup, Viktor Yanukovych was elected, heavily supported by the Russian-speaking East including Crimea. The election seems to have been fair. Once he had beenn deposed things started to go to hell in a handbasket. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 Crimeans were burnt to death in the Odessa Trade Union Building while returning from the protests in Kiev.
It a stunningly stupid move in its first sitting the new Verkhovna Rada bannd Russian, Hungarian and Romanian as official languages. My first thought on hearing this was' "It's the start of a civil war". I have lived most of my life in Eastern Ontario and Western Québec.
Crimea, again, decided on a referendum to get out of Ukraine. The vote this time was ~97% for union with the Russian Federation. Normally, I would completely discount tese results but given the circumstances I find them believable. Dead Crimeans in Odessa, a new and hostile regime in Kiev and quite beleivable reports of various Banderite militias heading to Crimea to sort things out probably made union with Russia look awfully good.
BTW, the stories of the "little green men" are true but what some people forget is than under treaty provisions about Russia using the navel port of Sevastopol, Russia had thousands of sailors, soldiers and marines in the Crimea. If thy were showing up on street corners, it was unlikely they had been rushed in from Kazan or Rostov-on-Don. It was more likely they strolled over from their quarters or caught a local bus.
i>Libya was a mess, I concur. But the initial inclination to try to stop Qaadafi from destroying Benghazi was not wrong.
Well, that assumes that Qaadaffi was planning on destroying Benghazi. He may have been but I am not sure I am going to believe US /NATO propaganda. Quite seriously, why would he destroy one of his major cities? A nasty massacre, I'd believe. In any case, based on its record in Libya, NATO cannot be trusted to keep to its mandate but can be trusted to be maximally damaging including "accidentally" arranging the murder of the Libyan head of state.
Afghanistan: yes, the Taliban (a notoriously oppressive regime) was asked to kick out Al Qaeda and they refused.
I have read that they offered to extradite Al Qaeda to another Islamic state if the USA/NATO provided acceptable evidence. I think I read that they were horrified and were desperate for any face–saving way of dumping Bin Salman and the rest of the Al Qaeda band.
While NATO was operating in Afghanistan, the lives of most Afghans were better by most objective criteria
No, they were not overall. Life in the major cities was better for almost everyone, especially for women and girls. Oh, and it was certainly much better for opium poppy farmers and, I assume, various drug merchants and the attendant middlemen. Opium production boomed under the Occupation. I noticed the other day that opium production has dropped precipitously since the Taliban returned.
Life in much of rural Afghanistan does not seemed to have improved much if at all. All one got was bombs and drone attacks by coalition forces interspersed by visits from some suspicious Taliban and then doors being kicked in in the middle of the night by US Special Forces. I have not read the reports but I understand the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconsruction has any number of hair-raising reports on the success of various initiatives.
There were some decent health and education initiatives. I know there were some decent agricultural and irrigation attempts but given the outstanding levels of contractor and local Afghan corruption and Taliban attacks I am not sure that there were many successes.
the alliance did fail to build a self-sustaining government.
To be perfectly honest, I think the Alliance, particularly the USA did not understand Afghanistan enough to have organized a functioning school board let alone a functioning government. But then, Afghanistan seldom seems to have had what we in the West would think of as a functioning government in, at least, a couple of centuries.
However, if you noticed that when Pres. Trump started negotiations with the Taliban over the US withdrawal, the Afghan Government was not invited. This may be a hint of how serious about a self-sustaining government the Alliance was.
While things are not perfect in Bosnia nor Kosovo, ask the people there about NATO vs the UN.
I will have to do that.
In the current conflict, while Russia has engaged in all kinds of hybrid attacks, it has not engaged in any conventional attacks against any NATO members. That looks like a successful alliance to me.
Why engage in conventional attacks on NATO members? I suspect that the Kremlin has been seriously worried about the judgement and mental stability of the White House and hangers-on since before the start of the Special Military Operation. Don't poke the animal with a stick. While I realize he is not in the US Administration, all anyone outside the USA has to do is listen to Senator Lindsey Graham for a few minutes to start asking themself "Is everyone in Washington this crazy".
BTW, what Russian hybrid attacks are you referring to? I am sure there are some but none come immediately to mind.
One last thing: 2014 happened not because Ukraine was getting closer to NATO membership (it wasn't), but because Ukraine was closer to getting EU membership. That is something Putin couldn't stomach.
No the EU was a minor annoyance if that. As I mentioned before every Soviet/Russian president from President Mikhail Gorbachev to President Vladimir Putin has warned that the eastward extension of NATO was unacceptable. The Maidan Coup opened up the possibility of the US Navy taking over Sevastopol. I cannot prove this is authentic but it's been kicking around for a long time so I'd rate it a possible
Putin has a rather dry sense of humour. He might have decided that encouraging Ukraine to join the EU was a good idea. Nothing like having the poorest and most corrupt country in Europe become a member.
One can just hear the howls of rage from grain farms across the EU as Ukraine flooded the market with cheap wheat, corn, and barley. When the EU tried something like this last winter, if I have my dates correct, Polish farmers blockaded the border.
More likely, Putin and the Kremlin did not care all that much if Ukraine joined the EU though it might have upset some established trade relations. My notes are messed up but IIRC, what Russia and Putin were pointing out was that the trade agreement with the EU (not full membership) would allow the EU to flood Ukraine with un-taxed or very low-taxed goods that by virtue of existing Russia-Ukraine agreements could end up in the Russian Federation and Russia could not permit that attack on its economy. So Yanukovych had a choice, go with a mediocre trade offer from the EU or keep a fairly lucrative deal with Russia and Russia would throw in some kind of bonus.
Yanukovych took the better deal and a coup immediately followed.
I am too busy to respond to all of this but re Crimea, the Russians seized the place and then held a farcical referendum.
re Crimea, the Russians seized the place and then held a farcical referendum.
So basically you are saying you know zilch about the issues, the peoples, and the actions, but are happy to accept USA propaganda?
Okay.
No, I am saying that i don't have time to argue with someone who has bought into Russian propaganda
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