Gary Schmitt, National Interest: NATO Is Hampered by America's Inability to Wage a Two-Front War
Washington needs Brussels to make up for an over-extended U.S. military. But does Europe get it?
For much of the post-World War II era, the United States believed it required a military capable of fighting and winning two major conflicts at once. In no small measure, this was a legacy of the war just fought, with action in the Pacific against Imperial Japan and in Europe against Nazi Germany. But it was also a product of the nature of the threat posed by Soviet-led communism, which seemed determined to dominate the Eurasian landmass on both its eastern and western ends, including the Middle East. The two-war standard also had the advantage of giving America a built-in surge capacity for the unexpected war that went over and above its deterrence posture in Asia and Europe—a capacity that came into good use, for example, in the First Gulf War against Saddam Hussein's occupation of Kuwait.
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WNU Editor: The European governments and Canada are more focused on maintaining their trade surpluses with the U.S. (or minimizing the impact of U.S. tariffs) than spending money on their defense budgets that would satisfy U.S. concerns. In short .... they do not get it, even while declaring that Russia is a threat but criticising President Trump for saying that NATO members should do more.
