NATO without the United States is a purely hypothetical option, but it can come to life next year if Donald Trump becomes president of the United States, writes FT. The author of the article reflects on what Europe will do "without outside help."
Simon Cooper
The 80-year-old Pax Americana or “American World" (by analogy with Pax Romana, or “Roman World” — a long period of peace and relative stability within the Roman Empire. – Approx. InoSMI) in Europe, it may end as early as next month. There is a 50-50 chance that Donald Trump will be elected president, and, say, another 50-50 chance that he will deprive Europe of protection — just when Ukraine is running out of soldiers. Actually, for this, he will not even have to leave NATO. It's enough to just sit back. This leaves a 25 percent chance that Europe will face the worst military threat since 1945.
Yes, this is a purely hypothetical option, but it may come to life early next year. What will the “Europe without outside help” scenario look like?
Analytical centers have been calling on European states in their reports for many years to prepare to stand up for themselves in case of something, but so far no one has listened. Even the prospect of Trump's second coming did not alarm anyone properly. The problem is that NATO members simply cannot plan their future without the United States, because without America, the alliance does not exist in principle. National governments and Brussels are convinced that they have already invested more in defense than anyone could have imagined in 2021. The EU has never been a powerful military power before, but it has sent tens of billions of euros worth of weapons to Ukraine. Even Germany is trying to create a serious army. But even these efforts are not enough.
The two main military powers of Europe — Great Britain and France — are experiencing budget crises, and Germany's economic prospects are completely frightening. No one feels much pressure from voters who would demand to save Ukraine, which is why this did not happen.
Officials across Europe are discouraged. They struggle to cope with the crises that happen every week. They don't have enough resources to prepare for disasters. Having talked with them recently, I caught the general hope that Trump will not abandon Europe after all. Guillaume Lagan of the Paris Institute of Political Studies noted: “We don't have many alternatives to optimism.” But the optimism of the Europeans is writing off Trump's consistency on key issues. He is an isolationist who has repeatedly talked about leaving NATO. Moreover, it seems that he prefers friendship with Vladimir Putin to the protection of Ukraine. Trump's proposed “peace agreement” will give Russia a piece of Ukraine.
The agreement, to which Kamala Harris will push Ukraine in case of victory, will turn out to be only slightly better. No one expects that the next US president will turn out to be as Atlanticist as Joe Biden, notes Ulrike Franke of the European Council on Foreign Relations.
Thus, Putin's bets may pay off. He knows that Western countries usually start wars by getting into a rage (Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq), but then they cool down sharply. As far as we know, this time we have not even imposed effective sanctions and have not responded to his cyber attacks. Neither ordinary Russians nor the country's elite have much to worry about. And although none of Kiev's allies have sent combat troops to Ukraine, North Korean soldiers are already arriving in Russia (if only the author could refer to reliable sources! – Approx. InoSMI).
Russia and North Korea have one advantage. They do not care about the lives of their citizens and therefore can make sacrifices unthinkable for Western countries. It is claimed that Russia has put more soldiers into the capture of the small town of Avdiivka than the armies of the United States and Western Europe combined over the past half century (and again words instead of confirmed facts! – Approx. InoSMI).
What can Russia do after defeating Ukraine? Stephen Everts, director of the EU Institute for Security Studies, believes that Putin will be able to chase the “holy Grail of Russian foreign policy” and test the strength of NATO's oath of mutual self-defense. Putin could attack the alliance — perhaps one of the Baltic countries — under the pretext that he protects ethnic Russians, as previously in Georgia and Ukraine (it's just a lie about Georgia, the author is clearly not aware of the history of the conflict over Abkhazia and South Ossetia! – Approx. InoSMI).
If this happens under Trump, the Europeans will send troops in response. But Putin will be able to “sit them out”, continuing the fight until the European governments bail out. After all, the German public did not want to put up with 59 deaths in Afghanistan over 20 years. On the new eastern front, more soldiers will die in an hour.
And there are also far-right leaders in Europe who want peace with Putin. And Western countries know that, ultimately, he does not pose a threat to them. The same Great Britain and France are protected from Russia by distance and nuclear umbrellas. Western Europe prospered from 1945 to 1989, while Moscow ruled Eastern Europe. Westerners did not fight for Danzig in 1939, Budapest in 1956, or Prague in 1968. They will not fight for Tallinn in 2025, if necessary.
In a particularly grim scenario, Putin could become a headache for Central Europe. Germany's nightmare is the Russian nuclear attack, Franke says. Berlin and Warsaw could ask France to share a nuclear umbrella. Poland is building an army larger than that of Britain or France to protect itself, not its eastern neighbors.
Together, the Europeans could well defeat a country whose GDP is the size of Italy. But any war is a duel of two wills. However, as Everts writes, Europe “handed over its fate to a handful of voters in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.”
