How To Make A Leftist-Statist-Globalist Mad

     We’ve got plenty of those here in the U.S., and they’re madder than a mob of March hares:

• Here’s one,
• Here’s another,
• And another,
• And one more for lagniappe.

     But America doesn’t have a monopoly on them. Oh no. Europe has plenty – many highly placed, too:

     European leaders hate him because he will tell them hard truths they desperately want to deny. German diplomats literally laughed when Trump warned them that they were too dependent on Russian gas, but after the invasion of Ukraine and the bombing of the Nord Stream pipeline (conducted by Ukraine with the assistance of the United States’ Joe Biden!) they were not laughing.
     Early in his first term, Trump began pushing NATO countries to at least honor their treaty obligations to increase defense spending to the 2% of GDP minimum. This demand was beyond the pale. An outrage! It was Trump breaking a sacred trust, even if that sacred trust was being broken daily and had been for decades by the Europeans themselves.
     How could Trump point out, quite rudely, that Europe wasn’t doing what it was both legally and morally obligated to do?!
     Sacre bleu!

     Europe’s descent into military feebleness was deliberate. America enabled it with the North Atlantic Charter and our guarantee of a “nuclear umbrella.” The potentates of the Old World seized their chance right then and there. They ceased to take their own militaries seriously, slashed military budgets, poured scorn on their armies’ needs for modern equipment and training in the tactics of the new battlefield, and directed the “savings” into their welfare states. National defense? We don’t do that anymore. America will handle it.

     It took a few years – in 1956, Britain and France still had enough muscle to contribute, albeit apparently negatively – to the Suez Canal War. But by 1967 it was all a memory. When hostilities broke out in the Middle East, the “Continental powers” sat back and watched.

     And so today, when Europe is anxious to guarantee the defense of the border of Ukraine – where exactly is that, I wonder? – the enfeebled nations of European NATO can’t even muster a couple of properly equipped divisions with which to do so. They want America to do it.

     The cherry atop this slag heap is that Ukraine is not a NATO member, and probably never will be. NATO has no treaty obligation to rush to the defense of a non-member. But then, the masters of European NATO don’t see their obligations the same way they did at the beginning of the alliance:

     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.

     [From NATO’s website.]

     I’d bet that a goodly portion of NATO’s budget goes to meddling in nations that aren’t members. The consequences for the forces under NATO’s own commanders “should” be “obvious.”

     The hour has come for the United States to announce that it’s leaving NATO. NATO itself was the spark that lit the Ukraine-Russia conflagration. Had it never been suggested that Ukraine might be admitted to NATO, it’s likely that Vladimir Putin’s ambitions would have been sated once his forces had seized Crimea and the long-sought warm water port that came with it. But that’s to the side. The need of the time is to end the war and, if possible, put an end to NATO’s power to involve America in conflicts far from us.

     “America First” surely ought to mean that much.

     “I have said this before, but I shall say it again and again and again; your boys are not going to be sent into any foreign wars.” — Franklin D. Roosevelt, October 30, 1940.