RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/15265/is-nato-still-vital

Many additional countries who joined the alliance — such as Poland, Hungary and the Baltic States, which had been Soviet satellites — still consider post-Communist Russia an extremely disquieting potential threat. That is just one issue that has created friction among NATO nations….

The larger question [is] the degree to which enemy countries perceive NATO as a unified organization that would respond militarily to aggression against any member state — a crucial psychological factor in deterrence.

Its reason for being should not be written off quite yet…

The two-day summit of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) — held in London on December 3-4 to commemorate its 70th anniversary — may have been marked by controversy, but the gathering constituted an important reminder of why the international alliance was established in the first place.

Founded in April 1949 by the United States, Canada, Belgium, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal and the United Kingdom, NATO was a pact created to counter the world’s greatest threat at the time: the Soviet Union and its race for global domination.

At the time, it was clear that all NATO members were dependent on and deferred to American political and military leadership. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, however, some of the original NATO member states began to seek systems that would protect their particular individual interests.

Germany, for instance, has become Europe’s economic powerhouse, enjoying a favorable balance of trade with the US. France, no longer viewing Russia as an existential threat to the Free World, now seems more motivated to protect NATO’s southern flank from radical Islamic terrorist groups in West Africa, and from mass migration from former French colonies in North Africa.

Meanwhile, many additional countries who joined the alliance — such as Poland, Hungary and the Baltic States, which had been Soviet satellites — still consider post-Communist Russia an extremely disquieting potential threat. That is just one issue that has created friction among NATO nations, particularly with Turkey’s decision to purchase a Russian air defense system. Another internal bone of contention is the failure of some members to reach the minimum defense-spending level of 2% of GDP, a goal established by NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2019/12/what-purpose-does-nato-serve-bruce-thornton/

While the political class obsessed over act two of the House impeachment hearings while normal people ignored them, NATO met in London for an international photo-op and a celebration of the treaty’s 70th anniversary. Nothing of substance happened, and no needed reforms were discussed. Thirty years after the collapse of the Soviet Union made NATO irrelevant, no one can say what strategic purpose this bloated bureaucracy serves, nor how––despite being financed mainly by the U.S––it advances U.S. interests and security.

Of course we were treated to the usual claims that “NATO kept the peace” in Europe during the Cold War, along with the other institutions of the “rules-based international order.” This globalist marketing slogan is hard to credit. The postwar Europeans were in no condition to fight each other, because most had neither the matériel nor the morale to fight with. Nor did NATO keep the Soviets out of Europe: that was accomplished by 70,000 American nuclear warheads and 400,000 American troops. The contributions of European pygmy-militaries to American military capability were in the end comparatively minimal.

Then there were the usual petty squabbles, snarking at President Trump, and bombastic rhetoric about the “world’s oldest military alliance.” The issue of European members’ continuing failure to increase their puny military spending was brought up again. Trump-haters, of course, have used his aggressive lobbying of the Europeans on this score to buttress their claims that he is a dangerous geopolitical ignoramus unschooled in the technical and diplomatic knowledge of the foreign policy establishment and the “interagency consensus” mentioned in act one of the House impeachment hearings––finally, a confession that we do indeed have an unaccountable “managerial elite” that thinks it should run foreign policy rather than their boss, the Chief Executive elected by the people, and the Commander in Chief to whom the Constitution has given this authority.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/ukrainegatetreason-or-common-sense-11575937739?mod=opinion_lead_pos9

EXCERPT

Among the administration’s most consistent features is a belief that the U.S. should change the priority it gives to the different theaters in world politics. From this perspective, the center of gravity of American policy must move from the Atlantic to the Indo-Pacific. Latin America deserves more attention as a growing social and political crisis creates larger threats in the hemisphere—of which the chaos on the Southern border may be only a foretaste.

After Latin America, the threats of jihadist violence and Iranian expansionism make the Middle East the next-highest priority for the Trump administration. Europe, America’s highest priority for much of the Cold War, has fallen to fourth place. For the Trump administration and many of its Republican allies, Russia, because it is weaker and poorer than China, comes after Beijing on America’s list of geopolitical concerns—an important disagreement with the liberal Atlanticist foreign-policy establishment and not the only one.

Beyond geopolitics there is ideology. The rules-based world order means much less to Mr. Trump and to many Republican senators than it does to liberal Atlanticists. The president isn’t a believer in the application of the broken-windows theory of foreign policy—that a violation of one rule in one place materially increases the chance of other rules being broken in other places. A “realist” in the jargon of international relations, Mr. Trump thinks that national power matters much more than international law.

U.S. President Donald Trump is to be praised for his withdrawal from an agreement that would pave the way for Iranian nuclear power within 15 years, and his imposition of sanctions, writes Howard Rotberg.

In 1943 to 1945, Hitler’s costly obsession with killing every last Jew in Europe took precedence over military and economic basic needs in wartime. There came a point in the course of the war, when the resources used in rounding up and murdering European Jewry could have been used to strengthen a failing military.

And now we see another evil empire, Iran, prioritizing aid to its terrorist proxies, such as Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad and others to kill civilians in Israel, when the economy is in such straits that protesters are hitting the streets. The Iranian people see huge sums of money leaving the country to assist these terrorist groups in genocide of the Jews when American sanctions over the Iranian nuclear program have caused shortages of gas and oil and even rationing.

People also must question the cost of Iran propping up Syrian leader and war-criminal Bashar al-Assad, and its mischief in Yemen.

This past week, many Iranians showed they have had enough. Gas rationing and price increases may have been the instigation of these protests, however, as we see in Hong Kong, once the people take the first steps to challenge authority, a revolution may start if the people have lost their loyalty to the state.

https://thehill.com/opinion/international/473200-us-should-back-irans-protesters

More than half a century ago, President John F. Kennedy re-wrote U.S. policy for the developing world with one goal in mind: to put America on the side of revolutionary forces that were seeking progressive change.

His predecessor, Dwight Eisenhower, had subjected U.S. policy in the developing world to the wishes of America’s European allies that maintained colonies across the world and often ruled harshly.

JFK, however, knew that change was coming in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, where hundreds of millions of people were growing increasingly frustrated over political oppression and stunted living standards. He also knew that the next generation of leaders on those continents would remember whether or not Washington had lent its support to their efforts. That would determine whether, in the aftermath of change, the United States found itself with new allies or new adversaries.

Washington faces that same question today in Iran, which is now home to what could be the most sustained protests since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. When the regime falls, as it surely will (whether in a month, a year, or a decade), will its successors look kindly on the support they received from Washington?

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/12/strategic-questions-for-eu-leaders-on-natos-70th-birthday/

Now is the time for Trump to press Macron, Merkel, and others on the security risks posed by China.

L eaders of North Atlantic Treaty Organization countries are gathering in London this week to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the alliance. It’s the perfect opportunity for President Trump to declare a big halftime lead in his campaign to persuade other members to meet their financial obligations to the alliance. It’s also an opportunity to meet one-on-one with European leaders and assess their readiness to confront the growing threats that China’s geopolitical expansion poses to alliance members.

France
Trump should take French president Emmanuel Macron’s call for a new EU army as a sign of interest in defending France, NATO members, and the West from new security challenges. But a few questions could help channel Macron’s vigor into efforts against more-immediate threats.

For example: Does France have any plan to evaluate the cybersurveillance risks posed by the Chinese undersea fiber-optic cable soon coming ashore in Marseille? Ironically named the PEACE cable, the fiber link will add a major new connection between the EU and China through interchanges serving Pakistan and Djibouti. The PEACE cable involved Huawei Marine Networks until U.S. attention on Huawei forced it to sell its subsea subsidiary. The buyer, Hengtong Optic-Electric Co. Ltd. is a Chinese conglomerate of more than 50 companies in telecommunications, cable systems, and electrical power. Hengtong became involved in the PEACE cable last October, when it set up a venture company for the project in cooperation with Hong Kong-based PCCW Limited, and appointed Huawei Marine to perform the undersea work. For its part, PCCW is partly owned by China Unicom Group, a Chinese state-owned telecommunications company. PCCW runs the electronic passport and identity card systems for the Hong Kong government, as well as the securities clearing system for the Hong Kong Exchange.

Such complexity is par for the course with Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs). But it should not confuse Macron, himself an investment banker trained in unraveling opaque corporate structures to get to the real decision-makers. The bottom line is that a Chinese technology SOE will soon have what French telecom operator Orange called a “gateway” into the EU data network, through the new digital window that Orange is building for the Chinese in Marseille.

Indeed, Marseille has become a major site of Chinese strategic expansion. The ancient port city is home to CMA CGM, a shipping and port operator that is the main partner in the Ocean Alliance with China’s COSCO Shipping — which now dominates global container shipping, port operations, and logistics services. Despite capital infusions from Chinese state lenders over the past several years, CMA recently announced it was selling its stake in 10 port terminals to China Merchants Port Holdings Co. Ltd., which already owns about half of CMA’s terminal business. The French line also sold two container ships to Shanghai Pudong Development Bank for an undisclosed price, and leased them back. The cash will help CMA finance its $1.7 billion purchase of CEVA Logistics, which operates one of the largest logistics businesses in the U.S. The stress on CMA’s financial resources prompted one rating agency to downgrade CMA’s debt, but more importantly, the bailout meant that Chinese operators had taken over the hard assets of a Western company in a strategically important sector.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2019/11/time-support-iranian-protestors-bruce-thornton/

While we continue to waste our attention on the carnival attraction known as the impeachment hearings, protests against the mullahcracy have engulfed major cities in Iran. Rather than repeat Barack Obama’s appeasing silence in 2009, and his ignoring explicit calls for support from the beacon of liberty, we need to be bold in our support for the protestors, and even bolder in actions that will back up our words.

The precipitating event that has intensified long-running protests has been a 50% increase in fuel prices. This blow to everyday people’s budgets comes a year after President Trump withdrew the US from the Iran deal, and imposed tougher sanctions on the regime, reducing revenues from the sale of oil. But it’s the actions of the mullahs that are to blame. They took Obama’s bribes to sign the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, and have squandered them on developing missiles, spinning centrifuges, and financing jihadists in Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, and Iraq under the noses of American troops.

For Iran, this geopolitical jihadist adventurism is nothing new. Indeed, for 40 years it has been at the heart of Iranian foreign policy. The architect of the revolution, the Ayatollah Khomeini, proclaimed, “We shall export our revolution to the whole world. Until the cry ‘There is no god but Allah’ resounds over the whole world, there will be struggle,” i.e. jihad.  His successors have been true to that goal, one dismissed by our foreign policy savants who blame Israel or the sins of colonialism instead of recognizing this 14-century-long religious motive documented in Islamic law, doctrine, and long record of invasion, conquest, colonizing, slaving, raiding, and occupation. True to Khomeini’s words, for forty years the mullahs have shed the blood of Americans with impunity.

The JCPOA that opened the road to Iranian nukes has been a disaster, an appeasement whose consequences still may, if Iran obtains nuclear weapons, rival that of the French and British at the Munich conference in 1938. Trump’s withdrawal from that malign agreement was an important first step. But NATO allies like France and Germany, whom the devotees of the “rules-based international order” ritually praise, have been sluggish, if not obstructive, in participating fully in our efforts to rein in the regime.

For example, they have tried to create financial work-arounds to lessen the effectiveness of the sanctions. Just this July, our Treasury Department had to warn the Europeans to stop developing Instex, “designed to avoid using international financial institutions that could be vulnerable to U.S. sanctions. Instead, it avoids sending money to Iran by using a virtual ledger to match imports and exports. Thus, a European company wanting to import Iranian oil would pay a second European company exporting a product to Iran, such that dollars need never be sent to Tehran,” according to the Washington Examiner. Even more despicable, France has talked about giving Iran a “$15 billion line of credit to allow Iran to sell its oil abroad despite US sanctions,” the AP has reported.