Europe and NATO are facing an existential crisis

Europe and NATO are facing an existential crisis, at a time when the administration of US President Donald Trump is heading to demolish the Atlantic relations, forcing historical allies to raise difficult questions about their defensive capabilities, and the White House believes that Europe should not always depend on Washington To be its back, and at the same time the Trump administration moves to improve its relations with Moscow, and it is found for Russia the justifications in Her war on Ukraine.

There are now increasing fears in the sky of Europe, which is that Trump may move to withdraw American forces from countries throughout the continent, a possibility that US Defense Secretary, Beit Higseth, in Warsaw, last Friday, when he said: “We cannot assume The American presence will continue forever. ”

All of this comes in the wake of serious doubts in the Trump administration’s commitment to the fifth article of the Alliance Charter, and to defend the “NATO” members in the event of an attack.

The US National Security Adviser, Mike Waltz, finally told reporters at the White House: “We are completely pledged to adhere to the fifth article, but it is time for our European allies to intensify their efforts.”

The idea of ​​withdrawal

Trump raised the idea of ​​the United States’s withdrawal from “NATO” during his first term, a proposal that is still a source of concern for Europe to this day, despite the questions about whether he can do so legally without involving Congress, and German Secretary of State Analina Perbuk said, Last Saturday: “This is an existential moment, Europe must stand and think about it.”

The question that arises is: Is Europe able to do this task alone? Can Europe stand up to any attack on it? About 100,000 American soldiers are stationed throughout Europe, with the largest part of them in Germany, according to the statistics of the US Department of Defense.

This is a great deterrent to Russia, so if the United States suddenly withdraws these forces, experts believe that Europe will struggle to defend itself in the event of any attack.

warning

“The Europeans will already be when the American forces leave Europe only and no one else,” said Jim Townsand. And none of the depth, nor sufficient resources to do all the things that the American forces are currently taking there.

Townsand expressed his belief that Europe “is now looking at the abyss in front of it”, warning that “European allies are not in a very good position to take over the tasks performed by American forces in Europe, and Townsand, who is now working as an assistant colleague in the Atlantic Security Program of the Center The new American security: “If Europe understands this message 10 years ago, you do what you need to form sufficient numbers of forces and provide The equipment will be able to confront the Russians, “noting that” the Russians are not strong enough, but they have become more experienced in the battles and more modern in recent years. “

However, some, including the Europeans themselves, pointed out that pressure by the United States on the allies to spend more on the defense is not new, and they are wondering about the reason for the slow European leaders in understanding the message and behavior.

New spending

The “Citrip” website asked the Secretary -General of “NATO”, Mark Rett, last week, whether he was really interested in setting a schedule for “NATO” members to achieve a new spending goal of 3% of GDP, and his answer was that he hoped that he would be drafted Such details by the alliance summit in June.

He said: “We cannot repeat what happened in 2014 (the last time the alliance set a goal for spending), where we set 2%, but nothing happened until Trump took over the presidency, then suddenly we saw the Europeans and Canadians spend more.” The former Eastern Europe of the newspaper “Politico”: “We had years and years to enhance our military resolve and prepare for a new era with the United States, but we waste all Opportunities.

A modest budget

So what should Europe do? The alliance has a relatively modest direct budget of about $ 4.8 billion that all members contribute to its financing, as the United States and Germany lead the group, by contributing about 16% of the alliance’s annual budget for each of them, but individual spending for each country is more important in terms of the total strength of the alliance .

Trump urges the allies to spend 5% of their gross domestic product for the defense budget, and this percentage is much higher than the previous goal of the alliance, which is 2% of the gross domestic product for each member by 2024, and the United States spends about 3.4% of its gross domestic product on defense, But this percentage represents more than 50% of the gross domestic product of the alliance in general, and last year it achieved 23 out of 32 A member of the alliance targets 2%, and the alliance set a goal for members to spend 20% of the defense allocations for the main new military equipment, a standard that only Canada and Belgium allies are committed.

More responsibility

Many European countries are ready to take more responsibility to defend the continent, and the Estonian Foreign Minister, Margos, said to us, to the site “Citrip” during the Munich Security Conference: “We no longer have the luxury of sitting in the back seat and thinking that someone drives the car, should We drive the car, ”adding that the alliance countries that achieve the Trump goal of 5% put into consideration (the extent of our real understanding of the threat Russian).

But our wonders believe that Estonia and other Baltic countries are likely to reach this level of spending in the coming years, and British Prime Minister, Kiir Starmer, said the day before yesterday that Europe is facing a “gene challenge” from a security perspective, and urged the entire continent to spend more On the defense, but analysts warn that increasing spending alone may not be sufficient to solve the problem, as it requires the position on the allies Europeans are strategists about how and where they spend this money. About “Fourn Police”

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“Fast” evaluation

“It is good for Europe to recognize the need to spend more on the defense, but in many ways it was too late, and the United States’ allies were working under optimistic thinking And they delayed the changes for a long time. ”

He added that «NATO has set strong regional defense plans, but besides Europe, Europe needs a (fast) evaluation of the gaps to confront Russia if the United States withdraws, then the countries that can fill the void are determined,” Townsand continued: “What Donald Trump did ( The American President, frankly, is that he withdrew the bandage, which was very painful, ”noting that Trump revealed the cover about what was“ The Europeans Sahin. ”

. The White House believes that Europe should not rely on Washington to be a support for it, while the Trump administration is moving to improve its relations with Moscow.

. European allies have no momentum, nor depth, nor sufficient resources to implement all the affairs of the American forces in Europe.