Is it time for the US to re-evaluate our commitment to NATO?

[starbright]

Here are a few things that make sense to me:

• Being in a formal alliance reduces the chance of long term drift into strategic rivalry.
• Maintaining a common command structure framework, procurement standards and so on makes co-operative operations of various sorts easier to pull off in the future.
• It's a good forum for coralling political and diplomatic support.

This sums up everything I wanted to say. There is still value in an alliance without a clear purpose.

[Camerus]

What other benefits would there be?

It depends on how you percieve your treaty obligations.  If you think the obligation is to send as many armed men as you're in the mood for, then the benefits are nonexistent.  On the other hand if you think you're obligated to send enough men to repel any invasion of a member state, then the benefits are nontrivial.

Well, that is a debatable statement.  For one, as enumerated earlier, there are a variety of benefits to maintaining the alliance beyond that of direct defence after an attack. 

Secondly, in the event of an attack, it would be better to have an existing command structure and defence system in place than nothing at all. 

Thirdly, apart from the US' invoking of NATO after the Twin Towers were attacked - an attack which wasn't committed by a state and which certainly posed no serious existential threat to the US - there hasn't been a single instance of a NATO country being seriously threatened by an outside foe.  What's more, NATO nations have participated in that (perhaps somewhat pointless) war.  So it may be unwarranted to assume that, in such an event, EU countries would do nothing. 

Lastly, if Russia were to become resurgent again, would it really be in the US' interest to sit back and let the EU be dominated by Russia?  An existent NATO would be a deterrent against that type of problem in the first place.

Anyhow, I've still yet to see many benefits put forth that would justify the US' abandoning NATO...

[CountDeMoney]

I don't know about Germans, but it certainly true in Spain, especially since Ceuta, Melilla and the rest of our African possessions are excluded from the Treaty so we can't expect help where we're actually vulnerable.

Like the subway?

Classy.

It's not like their Socialists wanted to be in it anyway;  I'm fine with Spain remaining in the African hemisphere, where they belong.

[CountDeMoney]

Anyhow, I've still yet to see many benefits put forth that would justify the US' abandoning NATO...

Listening to all the Euro static about it would be one.

[Berkut]

The benefits are obvious, aren't they?

We save giant piles of cash.

I don't think you guys understand the pressure the defense department budget is under right now, and is going to be under for the next decade. Gates has done a pretty good job of cutting a lot of stuff that needed to be cut - but now, in order to cut more, they are talking about carving away meat, not fat.

They are talking about the need to start reducing active ships, active airplanes, and active boots on the ground. Well, maybe not the boots.

One way to do all that is to re-define what the US actually needs. Right now, the definition of how many planes, ships, and tanks we need includes a presumption that the US be prepared to go to war in Europe if necessary. You can cut a lot by just assuming that is no longer the case.

I am convinced that Europe does not need the US to defend them. Period.

The US commitment to NATO as it historically existed is non-sensical. What I am hearing is that expanding the role of NATO beyond a strictly defensive alliance is a non-starter. If that is the case, the US should get out of NATO.

[Camerus]

Except you assume that the one cannot happen without the other.  I am still not clear about why the US can't significantly reduce spending in Europe (just as the Euros themselves have done) - and reduce, as you say, active ships and planes - without leaving NATO wholesale? 

Saving $$$ is important, and you'll find no greater a proponent for balancing the budget than me, but you are throwing the baby out with the bathwater.  There are all kinds of benefits derived from the US maintaining NATO (just look at earlier comments in this thread to see them) that out-weigh the potential feel good "fuck you!" that ending NATO would provide.

[Berkut]

I don't hold a toothless alliance as something worth keeping around for forms sake. If an alliance does not impose anything on its members beyond words, why bother? If anything, it simply creates a false sense of security which restricts the ability to enter into more meaningful security arrangements.

I don't think anyone has cited any potential feel good of saying "fuck you" as one of the reasons to get out of NATO. Not sure why you are mentioning it.

[Berkut]

It seems like your basic argument is that we should practically ditch NATO, while keeping up the pretense of it. Which is fine, I guess - but I think the US gutting their practical commitment to NATO certainly falls under "reevaluating our commitment". If the pols decide that the figurehead of NATO has some value, I can certainly live with it stumbling along - can't be much worse than what we have now. But only as long as it is made perfectly clear that European security is 100% dependent on Europeans. They can have exactly as much as they are willing to pay for.

[Berkut]

Here are a few things that make sense to me:

    Being in a formal alliance reduces the chance of long term drift into strategic rivalry.

I don't see this - or rather, I think this is a bad deal for the US. What does "strategic rivalry" mean? Military rivalry? Yeah, I don't see that as being an issue since the fundamental problem is that the EU won't spend more than token amount son defense.
Economic rivalry? That is already happening, with the EU making it clear that they consider themselves an economic rival to the US.
Political rivalry? We all basically have the same political system - I don't think the US and EU are going to ever become enemies in the traditional manner, and that has nothing to do with NATO, and everything to do with a shared culture and political ethos.

    Maintaining a common command structure framework, procurement standards and so on makes co-operative operations of various sorts easier to pull off in the future.

This would be an excellent reason, except that the basic problem is that it is clear that the only possible way there can be actual cooperation with most NATO countries is if Russia invades Poland. Absent that, NATO as a whole is not interested in cooperation, so what is the benefit of maintaing this supposed "common command structure"?

    It's a good forum for coralling political and diplomatic support.

Apparentlly not really though - 100% of the NATO members voted in favor of the intervention in Libya, and yet most countries still refuse to do anything. So yeah....doesn't seem so useful. Would rather just deal directly with countries actually willing to do something when needed.

    While the US military is obviously the most advanced, NATO allows the US to maintain contacts with and influence several of the closest runners up.
    Sharing tech and intel is much easier, I expect, within an alliance structure than outside of it. Once in a while, Europeans do develop things you might want to have a look at and I'm pretty sure that European intel comes in handy once in a while.

I don't see NATO as being necessary for any of that though. In fact, having an alliance where the bulk of the members aren't actually willing to do those things just means you have to spend time dealing with them rather than just dealing directly with the ones who DO want to do something. And again, there are plenty of ways to share intel without some giant alliance structure. The US does it all the time with countries outside of NATO.

[alfred russel]

What I don't think Berkut understands is that if the US pulled out of every military engagement it is involved (Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and any other minor countries we are bombing on a semi regular basis) and cut our military spending down to 2% of GDP, many if not most Europeans would see that as a positive development. You would get some concerned editorials from European conservatives, but most Europeans see us as too trigger happy with too large of a military. The sky wouldn't fall and there wouldn't be a radical ramp up in European military spending.

[Admiral Yi]

Anyhow, I've still yet to see many benefits put forth that would justify the US' abandoning NATO...

I thought I did that.

[Jacob]

I don't see this - or rather, I think this is a bad deal for the US. What does "strategic rivalry" mean? Military rivalry? Yeah, I don't see that as being an issue since the fundamental problem is that the EU won't spend more than token amount son defense.

Economic rivalry? That is already happening, with the EU making it clear that they consider themselves an economic rival to the US.

Political rivalry? We all basically have the same political system - I don't think the US and EU are going to ever become enemies in the traditional manner, and that has nothing to do with NATO, and everything to do with a shared culture and political ethos.

It means that the fewer areas where there is explicit co-operation and the fewer fora there are for communication and resolution, the greater the scope for conflict.

Being intimately familiar with each others doctrines and capabilities and having extensive communication between militaries, and having a fair bit of transparancy, lessens the chance of paranoia and the resultant tension.

This would be an excellent reason, except that the basic problem is that it is clear that the only possible way there can be actual cooperation with most NATO countries is if Russia invades Poland. Absent that, NATO as a whole is not interested in cooperation, so what is the benefit of maintaing this supposed "common command structure"?

Let's say, for some reason, the US has the need to be involved somewhere and the best staging point is in Europe. If the Europeans are familiar with US requirements, because they're similar to their own, the logistics will be easier than if the Americans have to set everything up from scratch.

On a higher level, if the complaint is that the Europeans don't provide enough concrete support for expeditionary forces, it would seem counterproductive to degrade the ability for them to do so. If there's a common command framework in place, shared logistics network, shared specs and similar doctrines then it's much easier for the Euros to actually provide this support if and when the political will to do so is existent.

For example, I doubt you'd have the Danes and Norwegians flying sorties over Libya if their airforces didn't fit within the NATO framework.

Apparentlly not really though - 100% of the NATO members voted in favor of the intervention in Libya, and yet most countries still refuse to do anything. So yeah....doesn't seem so useful. Would rather just deal directly with countries actually willing to do something when needed.

I'm pretty sure it's politically a lot easier for several NATO countries to provide concrete support under the NATO aegis than due to bilateral arrangements. Again, I'm pretty certain that the Danish and Canadian commitments to Afghanistan would've been much smaller or non-existant if they had not happened within the NATO framework.

Similarly, I'm pretty certain that the practicalities of getting them there and working with the US forces there would have been much more complicated if the NATO framework wasn't already in place.

I don't see NATO as being necessary for any of that though. In fact, having an alliance where the bulk of the members aren't actually willing to do those things just means you have to spend time dealing with them rather than just dealing directly with the ones who DO want to do something. And again, there are plenty of ways to share intel without some giant alliance structure. The US does it all the time with countries outside of NATO.

But why throw out what you have if you're just going to replicate it anyhow?

I'm not saying that NATO shouldn't be restructured and repurposed to better fit the current needs of the members, but it seems silly to just get rid of it. There's decades of understanding, established lines of communications and inter-military goodwill already there. Why trash that?

[Jacob]

Anyhow, I've still yet to see many benefits put forth that would justify the US' abandoning NATO...

I thought I did that.

It seemed pretty abstract, to be honest.

[Admiral Yi]

It seemed pretty abstract, to be honest.

A loan guarantee is pretty abstract too until it's excercised.

[Martinus]

Precisely. Gates (and Americans here) seem to equate the ability to send troops to Afghanistan or Libya with an ability to defend the NATO countries against an external invasion (i.e. NATO's purpose). It's apples and oranges.

And since the defense against external threats is meaningless any more, NATO has served its purpose and should be folded, if that was its sole purpose.  I don't see why you (and Euros here) don't see this.

Fine, but that's not what the premise of the article was.

The premise was that the NATO members now are just not pulling their weight enough, so the US is doing all the heavy lifting (except for a handful of other states that chip in).

It seems to me the following is true, however: the US wants the NATO to become something else than it was originally intended for, and this is where other member states disagree. So the US wants to withdraw from its earlier commitments seeing them as not being worth the expenses any more (whether they are right or not is another matter).

So please don't structure this as "others are not upholding their side of the deal", while it seems to be that the US is trying to find a way to withdraw from the deal itself.