A Question That Must Be Asked

     Longtime stalwart of the Dextrosphere Maura Dowling has posted a highly informative graphic:

     Reading the color-coding can be a bit challenging, but the upshot of the thing is best condensed by noting which countries were added to the NATO alliance after the fall of the Soviet Union and the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact:

• 1999: Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary
• 2004: Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia
• 2009: Croatia, Albania
• 2017: Montenegro
• 2020: North Macedonia
• 2023: Finland
• 2024: Sweden

     Given that the purpose of NATO was to prevent the expansion of the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact, what reason did the nations above have for joining the alliance once the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact had ceased to exist – and what reason did the previous members of NATO have for admitting them?

     Give it a moment’s thought.

     Time was, it was clearly understood that a military alliance is a military alliance: that is, a pledge of mutual military defense among the member nations should warfare impinge upon any one of them. Sometimes such an alliance is made conditional upon non-aggression by its members; that was and is the case in NATO. Sometimes the compact also specifies which aggressors it has in mind, though that is not the case with NATO.

     The Atlantic Alliance has had some troubling consequences. These are ably set out in Melvyn Krauss’s 1986 book How NATO Weakens The West. As far as I can tell from a layman’s knowledge of such things, Dr. Krauss’s analyses remain accurate and applicable in this Year of Our Lord 2025. Among President Trump’s aims is the redress of the worst of those faults, two of which have been highlighted by the war in Ukraine.

     As the Alliance has swollen, so also have the aims of its masters. That’s made explicit on NATO’s own website:

     Ensuring stability at home by engaging outside of NATO

     The outbreak of crises and conflicts beyond Allied borders can jeopardise the national security of NATO member countries – a more dangerous and unpredictable world makes things less safe for everyone. As a result, the Alliance also contributes to peace and stability through crisis prevention and management, and through partnerships with other organisations and countries across the globe. Essentially, NATO not only helps to defend the territory of its members, but also engages – where possible and when necessary – to project its values further afield, prevent and manage crises, stabilise post-conflict situations, and support reconstruction.

     It all sounds very nice, doesn’t it? Charitable! Humanitarian! After all, who could possibly be opposed to peace and stability? And crisis prevention! Who would have an issue with that?

     It takes a moment’s reflection to grasp how utterly unbounded it is. By the above, there’s no situation anywhere on Earth that’s outside the scope of NATO’s interests. Should the North Atlantic Council in Brussels decide that a famine in Brunei or an uprising in Tasmania “jeopardises the national security of NATO member countries,” the resources of some or all of NATO’s member nations would be directed toward “managing the crises” and ensuring “peace and stability.”

     A mission “defined” that elastically is an open-ended grant of latitude to do whatever the North Atlantic Council might decide to do, wherever, whenever, and however it might decide to do it. No development or condition of any description falls outside it. In other words, it’s no mission at all.

     The United States is often called the “senior member” of NATO. The implication is that American preferences have precedence over those of other member nations. This is neither in the words of the North Atlantic Treaty, nor is it the history of the alliance.

     It’s well known that the U.S. contributions to NATO, in funds, personnel, and materiel, heavily outweigh the other member countries. At last estimate, 70% of the funds that fuel NATO are contributed by the U.S. This is despite a population imbalance in the other direction: 330 million Americans, over 500 million Europeans. And of course, American military bases are dotted throughout Europe, though no European NATO member has a single soldier, much less a base, in the U.S.

     European pressure on the U.S. to intervene in crises in non-NATO nations has caused America to involve itself conflicts that were of no concern to America. American humanitarian efforts are globally well-known, and in the main we should be proud of them, but American involvements in other nations’ wars and civil uprisings are another matter entirely. The current European pressure on Washington to put American troops and resources into Ukraine is merely the latest case of this. It’s an illustration of how NATO’s nebulous mission has overextended its “senior member.”

     Which leads us to an overwhelming question: Why do we tolerate it?

     It’s plain what the European members get out of NATO: a de facto subsidy for their military establishments, a net flow of American funds into Europe, and the deterrent value of the American nuclear arsenal. But what do we get out of it?

     As a nation: American gets nothing, not even the gratitude or good will of the other members. Indeed, the resentment of Europe’s peoples toward the United States is palpable, with a few pleasant exceptions. We’re blamed for a lot of their troubles, an explanation for which is seldom offered. It calls to mind Helmut Schoeck’s observation:

     No one admits publicly, and hence public opinion does not admit, that ingratitude is the norm. It is astounding that countless benefactors allow themselves to be persuaded over and over that ingratitude with the resultant hatred is a rare and special case.

     We also have Robert A. Heinlein on the subject:

     “‘Gratitude’ is a euphemism for resentment. Resentment from most people I do not mind—but from pretty little girls it is distasteful.”
     “Why, Jubal, I don’t resent you—that’s silly.”
     “I hope you don’t . . . but you will if you don’t root out of your mind this delusion that you are indebted to me. The Japanese have five ways to say ‘thank you’—and every one translates as resentment, in various degrees. Would that English had the same built-in honesty! Instead, English can define sentiments that the human nervous system is incapable of experiencing. ‘Gratitude,’ for example.”

     While I’m not fully in accord with Heinlein’s dismissal of honest gratitude, it’s plain that the open-handed individual is often resented rather than thanked and appreciated for his generosity. Between nations, the pattern is practically unbroken.

     That overwhelming question becomes more imperative with every horizontal divider.

     Ultimately, we must cease to ask why “we” tolerate the NATO drain on us and ask the real question. As always, it’s most piercing in the original Latin:

     Within the political and military establishments, there are persons and groups that benefit from NATO, perhaps to the tune of billions of dollars. Are they individually identifiable? Unclear. But they must exist. America is not a masochistic nation. If it’s being steered in a direction averse to its national interests, who is holding the tiller? What can we do to thwart him – or them – and reestablish the primacy of our interests?

     These are hard questions with unpleasant implications. Donald Trump may be the one to answer them. Stay tuned.