Per RedState on Sunday, the Biden administration is currently formulating a plan to send thousands of troops, a naval battle group, and air elements to defend Eastern Europe against Russian aggression. That comes as Vladimir Putin’s country amasses over 100,000 troops on the border of Ukraine, threatening an invasion. The United States has already begun to evacuate its embassy personnel while telling the other Americans in the country that they are on their own.
Shortly after the announcement of possible US military commitments, the rest of NATO delivered an absolutely embarrassing response to the tensions in their own region.
This is how NATO always works. US taxpayers pay gobs of money to “protect” the Europeans from Russia. But when push comes to shove, it’s the US that sends in thousands of troops and dozens of ships and warplanes to act as a deterrent. Meanwhile, the best Denmark and Holland can come up with is “here’s two fighter jets and a cargo ship.” You can bet any troop deployments from France will number in just the hundreds as well.
Meanwhile, Germany isn’t doing anything at all. In fact, they are actively seeking to undermine NATO even as a member of it, empowering and enriching Russia via energy deals.
What’s the response to such abuse? The Biden administration and the American press pretend like it’s the US that has actually been unfair to the Europeans. It’s asinine, and these latest events prove just how right Donald Trump was about NATO. It’s a dysfunctional group of free-loading nations that refuse to provide for their own defense, instead, demanding a country across an ocean do it for them.
There is no reason that these European NATO countries can’t put together a large enough force to serve as a deterrent to Russia in place of yet more US deployments. It is the European mainland that is supposedly under threat, not the US mainland. It only makes sense that the Europeans do their own heavy-lifting.
Yet, when Trump tried to force these weak, spineless NATO members to step up to the plate, he was excoriated as hurting our alliances. Well, how is that working out? It sure looks like those rejuvenated alliances under Biden are producing the same lackluster results. At least Trump got Germany to throw a bit more cash in the pot and stopped them from becoming energy-dependent on Russia.
The next Republican president has to take a hardline with NATO and really reform the alliance. This is not sustainable, and the American people are only going to grow more disillusioned with a setup that has the US doing everything while the Eurotrash chip in a couple of planes.