The biggest fear that the European powers have had since NATO was formed in 1949 was that the Americans, the only power that has ever mattered in the alliance, would take their ball and go home, leaving the Europeans to defend themselves.
Over the intervening decades, as NATO nations grew rich and fat by saving trillions of dollars on national defense spending, the prospect of an American exit was pushed into Europe's subconscious as they felt free to lecture the Yanks about all of our shortcomings, secure in the knowledge that we needed NATO to defend our European markets from Russian aggression.
We don't need NATO for that anymore. In fact, we're constantly looking to redefine NATO's mission to shoehorn its purpose into something palatable for the American people to digest. The political necessity for NATO to "stand up to the Russians" is not America's job anymore and can best be done by Europeans banding together for their common defense.
But this terrifies countries like Great Britain, Germany, and especially France, who know that their welfare state is built on the promise that America would always deter the Russians from expansion. If that promise is no longer valid, the 3% of GDP defense spending that NATO asked for over the last decade will seem quaint.
Representatives of the United States and Russia are in Saudi Arabia for meetings to map out a way forward to resolve the war in Ukraine. However, the meeting's primary purpose is to begin the process of resetting relations between the two nations radically disrupted by the Ukraine War. Both countries have either pulled their personnel from their respective embassies or had them sent home by the host country. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has outlined a series of steps to bring those staffing levels at embassies back to where they were pre-war.
The two sides will also "identify ways of cooperating economically and on foreign-policy issues if the war winds down and relations improve," according to the Wall Street Journal. In other words, Russia and the U.S. are doing what Europe fears the most: They're creating a roadmap for a post-Ukraine War Europe with only token input from the (former) Great Powers.
The talks in Saudi Arabia have been seen in Europe as another indication that decades of Western foreign policy are undergoing a tectonic shift. Trans-Atlantic ties, already battered by a scathing speech by Vice President JD Vance that accused European leaders of ignoring the will of their voters, have been strained further as allies confronted the fact that the Riyadh meeting would take place without their participation or Ukraine’s.
Russia was represented by Yuri Ushakov, a close adviser to Putin who served as the Russian ambassador in Washington, and Sergei Lavrov, who has been the Russian foreign minister for more than 20 years.
Russia has telegraphed that its objectives include rolling back punishing U.S. economic sanctions and expanding diplomatic ties while holding on to its gains in Ukraine. Before leaving for Riyadh, Lavrov said there could be “no thought” of making territorial concessions to Ukraine and would be no need for European nations to assume a role in future negotiations over the Ukraine conflict.
“As we’ve already seen with President Trump and this administration, things that maybe normally would take six months or a year or two years are taking a matter of weeks,” State Department spokeswoman Tammy Bruce told reporters Monday.
The primary objection from Europhiles is that Trump didn't check with our European allies before holding any meetings.
“What Trump and the administration should have done is work out details with Ukraine and the Europeans on how to advance peace and then talk to the Russians,” said Ivo Daalder, who served as the U.S. ambassador to NATO during the Obama administration.
That would "normally take six months or a year" as Bruce pointed out. NATO countries are always calling on the U.S. to lead. Well, we're leading. Will the Europeans follow?
