The End Of A Peaceful World Order?

“No, I would not protect you. In fact, I would encourage them to do whatever the hell they want. You gotta pay. You gotta pay your bills.”

— Donald J. Trump at a campaign rally in Conway, South Carolina referring to another member of NATO threatened by a hypothetical Russian attack.

In recent days there have been both unserious and serious attacks on the stability of our national security policies and the international norms that have helped to stabilize the world order for nearly 75 years. The unserious attack is the foolishness surrounding the Republican majority in the House of Representatives impeachment (by one vote, on their second try) of Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas. According to the Articles of Impeachment Secretary Mayorkas “willfully and systematically failed to comply with immigration laws” and therefore “demonstrated that he will remain a threat to national and border security.” Three House Republicans voted against the impeachment and numerous prominent Senate Republicans considered the entire process to be a sham, including Senator Kevin Kramer (ND), a Trump ally, who called it “the worst, dumbest exercise and waste of time.” The House has passed nearly nothing else of significance during this session and recessed for a two week vacation after the impeachment vote without taking up important and substantive bills regarding our national security. By all objective accounts, this was purely a political stunt to satisfy the radical extremists in the Republican Party and to assuage Trump. Secretary Mayorkas will almost certainly be acquitted in the Senate, if they even hold a trial. (They may refer it to committee for investigation and never have it come forward.)

The serious attack is courtesy of Trump and his MAGA acolytes in the House. During his first term, Trump continually threatened to leave NATO. He is reported to have told the president of the European Commission in 2020 that “NATO is dead” and that the U.S. would “never” come to help Europe were it under attack. He reiterated his 2018 threat to quit NATO. His remarks in South Carolina continue to reflect his disdain for treaties and alliances as well as his ignorance on how they work.

Perhaps a little background will help. As we know, NATO was formed in 1949 to counter the threat to Europe from the Soviet Union. The original twelve members consisted of European and North American countries resolved to stop Soviet expansion in Europe. Today it consists of 31 countries — soon to be 32 when Sweden joins this year — allied in a mutual defense pact. NATO has taken on political and economic roles over the decades, in addition to its core as a military alliance. Despite the MAGA and Trump criticisms that many NATO countries do not pay their “dues,” NATO is not a club and the members do not pay dues. There are some cost sharing administrative expenses and enrichment funds but the reality — and what the MAGA crowd is talking about — is that each country pledged to spend at least 2% of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on its own defense. Throughout its existence, not all nations met that obligation. Several past presidents pushed European nations to meet that goal. In 2014 under President Obama the organization agreed that countries not spending 2% of GDP would start increasing their defense budgets. Today, 18 nations meet or exceed (by the end of the year) the 2% goal. We must also be realistic about which countries can meet the requirement. Countries such as Luxembourg and Iceland with small populations and small defense forces are unlikely to ever meet that goal. It helps to know what you are talking about.

NATO is not some kind of protection racket where you “gotta” pay the U.S. or we won’t help you. “Nice little country you’ve got there. It would be a shame if something happened to it.”

The heart and soul of NATO is found in Article Five of the North Atlantic Treaty. The article requires every member of NATO to come to the aid of any other member subjected to an armed attack. Article Five has been invoked only once, by the U.S. after the attacks of 11 September 2001. Significant numbers of forces were deployed by eighteen NATO countries under NATO command in the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan. Several countries suffered killed and wounded in combat. They were there for us when we needed them. Without Article Five, the alliance has no teeth and becomes worthless. This is the heart of Trump’s declaration that he won’t help our allies if attacked.

This time, he took it a step further.

Trump went beyond his threat to standby and watch when other countries were attacked. He openly encouraged the Russian dictator Vladimir Putin to “do whatever the hell they want.” He invited Russia to attack a NATO ally. As a long time student of national security affairs, and in my career I worked these issues, I never could have imagined that a President of the United States would invite a foreign dictator to attack a democratic ally. Inconceivable. Yet, I have every reason to believe that he means it.

Some Republicans in the Congress are confident that he does not mean it, or at least that’s what they tell themselves. I am not sure why they say that, but here is the practical truth of it. In 2023 the National Defense Authorization Act included a provision that a president cannot withdraw from NATO without approval from the Senate or an Act of Congress. An elegant solution, heh? Not really. Trump, or someone like him, would not have to actually withdraw from NATO. As Commander-in-Chief he would only have to decide that the U.S. will not send or use military forces in support of the attacked country. The provision is only a feel good exercise with no practical aspect to it. I have no doubt that Trump could care less what a provision in the NDA says.

Moving beyond the promised future actions of a presidential candidate, there are practical ramifications right now. Besides signaling to Putin, Xi and Kim that they only have to wait out the current administration and hope for a Trump victory to do what they want, Trump’s MAGA supporters in the House are holding up aid to Ukraine, Taiwan, Israel and humanitarian relief in Gaza because he told them to do so. They bend their knee to Trump and he in turn bends his knee to Putin. Ukraine is suffering terrible losses. No one that knows what they are talking about thinks that Putin will stop in Ukraine. If Kyiv falls, others, primarily Poland and the Baltic States, will be in his sights. Without NATO to deter him, Putin will act. To him, the greatest tragedy of the 20th century was the break up of the USSR. He clearly espouses his desire to reconstitute it. The only thing in his way is NATO. And let’s be clear, many European nations have professional, effective, tough-as-nails military forces. But they would be no match for the Russians. Not because of their fighting ability — we have seen in Ukraine that the Russian Army and Navy are not the unbeatable foes they were made out to be — but because Russia is a large country with lots of people and resources to throw into the breach. They would eventually win by attrition as Napoleon and Hitler learned the hard way. This is what is happening in Ukraine. The Ukrainians have proven over the last two years that they are a formidable foe. But without NATO support — including from the U.S. — they will be attrited and defeated. Russia has already committed terrible atrocities against Ukrainian civilians. Putin is a convicted war criminal. Imagine the death and destruction when he unleashes his forces to wreak retribution against those that dared oppose him in an occupied Ukraine.

Speaker Mike Johnson (MAGA-LA) is an extraordinarily weak Speaker of the House who was thrown into a job he is ill-prepared to fill. Mr. Johnson takes his orders from Trump and Trump does not want to support Ukraine. He is a fanboy of Putin (one wonders why he prefers Putin over his own country, but that is a topic for another day). The Senate passed a bipartisan bill providing the desperately needed aid. The Speaker refuses to bring it to the House floor, even though all knowledgeable participants are convinced that it would pass on a bipartisan basis. Mr. Johnson claims we need to secure our border before providing aid to others, even as he refuses to bring a bill to the floor that was considered the best improvement to border security and immigration rules in decades. The hypocrisy is off the charts. Unfortunately, there is no shame anymore in the MAGA Republican Party, only loyalty to Trump.

Look. Let’s lay it on the line. Biden vs Trump is a referendum on the future of democracy in the United States and our future role in a rules based international society. Trump’s “America First” motto was originally the motto of the isolationists and Nazi supporters in the U.S. prior to World War II. Just like today, there were massive rallies, in the 1930s it was to promote fascism. In the U.S., German supporters formed the German American Bund as a cover to promote policies favorable to Nazi Germany. Tens of thousands of Americans joined. There were about 20 youth training camps to raise future fascists. In 1939 the organization held a rally in Madison Square Garden where over 20,000 people gathered to denounce “Jewish conspiracies” fomented by President Franklin Roosevelt and to support Nazi Germany. There are too many similarities to today for me to think that Trump is bluffing or just playing to the crowd. He means what he says.

Hitler vowed to invade Czechoslovakia in 1938. Desperate to avoid another world war, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain met in Munich with Hitler, Benito Mussolini, and French president Edouard Daladier and agreed to the fascist’s demands. He declared that he achieved “peace for our time.” He hoped that Hitler would be satisfied. We know the rest of that story. If we give in to Putin in Ukraine, we know the rest of this story as well.