The Problem with Europe in One Chart
And why Trump and Vance are right to kick the hell out of the EU
Every “right thinking” person is supposed to be appalled by President Trump’s handling of the Russo-Ukraine war, with the most hysterical retreating to the rubber room of the Russia Hoax in believing Trump is a Putin agent. Thank goodness Trump didn’t look into Putin’s eyes and discern that Putin is a believing Christian.
In any case, this Guardian poll of European opinion shows why Trump and Vance are right to kick the hell out of Europe for their virtue-signaling cowardice. They’re all for Ukraine, you see, but don’t want to spend much of their own money for Ukraine’s defense:
Chaser—from the Wall Street Journal today:
Vice President JD Vance created a stir when he called out European governments for silencing dissent and accused politicians of fearing their own citizens. His message, in a speech at the Munich Security Conference in February: “If you’re running in fear of your own voters, there is nothing America can do for you.”
German free-speech advocates hoped Mr. Vance’s words might prompt their leaders to reconsider their course—if not out of principle, then at least as a gesture to improve relations with the new U.S. administration. To those familiar with Berlin, the official response was predictable: defiance, not reflection. . .
The coalition pact includes Orwellian language: “The deliberate dissemination of false factual claims is not protected by freedom of speech.” A new “nongovernmental” media oversight body will target “information manipulation” and “hate.”
In February a journalist tweeted a satirical edited photo of Interior Minister Nancy Faeser holding a sign that read: “I hate freedom of speech.” The meme proved prophetic. The journalist was sentenced to seven months probation and ordered to issue a personal apology to the minister.
And this is why Trump and Vance are right to raise questions about why the U.S. should remain an unconditional lead partner for NATO.
Let me go out on a limb, a limb that includes my 4 children who are in uniform or the Naval reserves as officers in intel, subs, intel, and aviator (Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya). So I have some skin in the game and participated in the game for a time.
We all get to ask the question what is the US doing in Europe, Ukraine, the Red Sea, …, Jordan, …, Syria? My answer is we have bases in Europe and are more or less free to use them to get close, listen, and hop, skip, and a jump to most of Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. Diego Garcia is not enough.
So why do we need forward bases? Well, that is where things get sticky. The answer is Energy flow and Trade flow. Aircraft Carriers are important as forward tactical bases, but friendly ground and ports are indispensable to get from here to there.
Energy and Trade are vital to holding global order together — by the improvement in living standards, improved health and diet, education of populations, and building stable regimes. When regimes of third-world countries go awry you have Iran stirring up trouble from the Red Sea to the Levant and the Persian Gulf. You have China making plans to take over the western Pacific. You have NORK’s building nuclear weapons and sending the know-how to Pakistan and Iran. All of these destabilize the world. If a problem breaks out in Kashmir, and Pakistan and Indian armies open fire, and one side pushes the other too far, and a nuke is tossed, … then what?
Well that’s not our problem. We can say that’s Europe’s problem. Maybe it is. And we need to be hard on Europe to either shut up and get in line, or act. Europe likes the blab. And we can’t simply pretend the problem is theirs when they won’t do anything. But, a Europe that opposes the US can make our life complicated. It is OK to say, “Europe, I’m just not that in to you. Ruin your own countries.” But we need locations from which to operate, and they have them.
While the world is not our problem, if it becomes a problem, it can affect enough places that can coalesce into a problem— see how the tiny Houthis re-route global trade flow. Removing these cancers early is best. Removing them over there is best. And, that requires forward deployments and forward bases. It requires projection of force. This is not something I want. But it is important for global stability, which is important for domestic tranquility. Ignore the problems over there, and eventually they coagulate into something ugly.
Russia has its hands full and will unlikely invade much of anything for a while. The IDF has put Iran back on its heels. China lusts for Siberian energy and resource, hegemony over the western Pacific, and also Taiwan by threat of force. We have to restore geopolitical balance, or at least divide it in our favor.
It is our 21st Century version of the 19th Century GREAT GAME between the British Empire and Russia competing over the Central Asia. Once again in Kissinger Style, we want to break the Russo-Sino alliance and that can only happen if we can get Russia to lay down its sword in Ukraine and welcome it into the west again. Putin has to and will eventually go, but he needs to save face if we can turn the page. We should not be fooled, Russia is as powerful as Europe(and it is pretty weak except for its unreliable nukes). But it commands a huge interior landmass from which to threaten the west or check China. It controls, more or less, Siberia. We need Russia on our side — and thus, we need to create suspicion between China and Russia — which will not be easy.
Like it or not, global stability is still as important today for our way of life as it was in 1946.
The US has plenty of domestic energy, and energy next door in Canada, … Mexico, and in Venezuela. However, energy is important for everyone and those who can control its extraction and flow, can control trade, events and ultimately states. Energy is food; it is necessities. It is desirables. It is improved living standards, and that translates into political power and coercive force. Hegemons, even regional ones, even non-state hegemons, can do a lot of damage to the Flows. We need a world that flows and does not become clogged and infected. That leads to regression, failed states and conflict.
Explain again, please: why are we spending our money and risking our young people's blood for these people? It made more sense when they were supposed to be free countries threatened by the unfree and communist USSR. Now what?