NBC: Pentagon goes into 'damage control' mode to reassure NATO allies
“One thing you need in this alliance is predictability,” one diplomatic official said.
WASHINGTON — Hours after President Donald Trump departed NATO headquarters Thursday, U.S. military leaders embarked on a full-scale “damage control” operation with calls to their counterparts across Europe to reassure them that America will abide by its defense commitments in the region.
The outreach, directed by the Pentagon leadership, came after Trump threatened to reassess those commitments during a gathering with NATO allies in Brussels, according to multiple current and former diplomatic and military officials familiar with the calls.
The overall message from senior military officials in a series of phone calls to members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization has been that U.S. military bases in their countries will remain open and American troop levels in the region will not be reduced.
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Update: Pentagon calls on allies for ‘damage control’ after Trump NATO trip: report (The Hill)
WNU Editor: I am skeptical of this NBC report. French President Emmanuel Macron made it very clear after the meeting that President Trump had not threatened to draw down U.S. cooperation levels with NATO .... so why should Pentagon officials need to call NATO member states later? I think what made almost everyone uncomfortable in this summit is that President Trump made it very clear that he wants member states to do more than what they are doing now, and that they cannot state one thing (i.e. Russia is a threat), but do another (make billion dollar energy deals with Russia).
7 comments:
and Trump a Democrat...The Hill is highly regarded by political people, and simply dismissing it because a founder was a Democrat is stupid...worse, slander does not work among the educated
The Washington Times founded by a convicted felon
There isn't anything that POTUS said that was inaccurate. There is no reason for damage control over telling the truth unless one wishes to maintain a façade. The trouble with facades is they eventually come crumbling down anyway.
I have long said the CIA and other US (un)intelligence services need to be disbanded, purged, and we need to start over from scratch with these. If the Pentagon feels they need to go into damage control to preserve a façade and if they wish to continue to overburden the American people with commitments we lack the ability to keep, then perhaps it needs to be purged in the same manner.
IF Russia is a threat, then it makes no sense to do these energy deals with them. IF they are NOT a threat, then it could well be argued that these energy deals need to be done. Keep in mind this is an "argument." I'm NOT suggesting this is necessarily my belief. It is merely to suggest a case could be made for this IF certain educated assumptions are correct.
Oil and oil related products are necessary for the functioning of a semi modern economy let alone a modern one. As such, any nation state would be reasonably expected to act to ensure that they and their citizens have access to a stable and reasonable priced supply of this that is sufficient to meet there needs and a bit more. IF Russia is not a threat, perhaps it makes more sense to deal with Russia than America in this regard. 1.)Russia is far closer. This should make the transport much less expensive than US LNG. Furthermore to change the infrastructure to accept US LNG figures to be extremely costly. As such, Russian supplies may be better priced. 2.)Given the massive social divisions in the US, massive national debt, the fact that we seem to have pretty much every major world power in the world arrayed against us right now, failing infrastructure, and I could go on, just how stable is America? Why deal with a country that may not even exist in 5, 10, 15 years etc? Also, US leadership is subject to change. We may soon have leaders who are hostile to the oil industry in general and the fracking in particular. This would likely result in a disruption in supply as America would no longer be able to meet the need. In contrast, Russia and its leadership is very stable. The country has existed as a major European and Asian power for centuries, is well positioned for the future, and is likely to be a major power for centuries more. As such, in terms of stability it may well make more sense for the Euros to deal with Russia.
IF this is the analysis that has been made by them, then the next step would/should be a formal withdrawal from NATO while requesting all US military and other support personnel to vacate their countries forthwith. At this point, America can then begin to deploy its armed forces in such a manner that actually makes sense for American national defense having now been freed of the burdens of having to defend the Euros.
I suspect the Euros want a geopolitical conflict with Russia. As things are currently, it is going to be the American people who are going to bear the brunt of a Russian reprisal should things go awry. They will be unscathed. When presented with something that has huge potential benefit to them along with minimal to no costs and the hated Americans will bear all of the costs both financial and in terms of loss of life they may well think why not pursue this course?
President Trump was right to call the Euros out on this. If the Pentagon doesn't like this, they need to be replaced. I will admit that my analysis of this may be flawed.
I'm seeing very little benefit to America of arrangements such as NATO combined with enormous costs and significant risks. It appears that POTUS is seeing the same things. As such, he and I appear to have reached the same or similar conclusions. Actually I recognized this problem about 25 years and am pleased to see that someone in our country's leadership is FINALLY catching on.
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