FLASH
Shkruar nga Pamfleti
This deep division is not limited to Iran...
A European official visiting Washington recently told me, bewildered, “The Iran war is like a black hole into which everything is disappearing, including NATO.” From a European perspective, it is incomprehensible why NATO is on the verge of death by war. Iran is not NATO territory, the US chose not to consult its European allies, and it could not seriously expect the Europeans to join them in what it saw as reckless adventurism.
But within the US administration, the frustration and discontent is real, and even extends beyond Maga into conservative foreign policy circles. The Europeans didn’t have to join us, but they could at least stand with us. How can refusing to use the base not be a violation of solidarity and loyalty?
This deep division is not limited to Iran. Over the past few months, I have had many conversations with officials and analysts on both sides of the Atlantic about the “disintegration” of the alliance, as Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk called it. These discussions left me worried that the alliance is ending in the worst possible way: not in what many Europeans hoped would be an orderly transition of “burden shifting” to a more equal NATO in which Europeans take on more responsibility.
Instead, it is a messy divorce in which both sides have begun to develop their respective “stab-in-the-back” myths. Although the alliance is not yet officially dead, narratives about who is to blame for its end are already solidifying. And the myths we tell about the end of an era shape what comes next.
There is a German word, Dolchstoßlegende, which describes the story a nation tells itself about how it was betrayed. It goes back to the myth claimed by the military leadership that the German army was invincible “on the battlefield” during World War I and was instead “stabbed in the back” by traitors at home, particularly the Social Democrats and Jews.
The problem with the backstabbing myth is that accusations of mutual betrayal are the worst possible basis on which to end a relationship, because they prevent building something new on common ground. This also applies to the future of NATO. From the perspective of the Trump administration, Europe’s original sin was abandoning the US at a moment of consequence and exposing the alliance as futile.
But for the Europeans, the critical betrayal was Greenland. The fact that the US threatened to annex Greenland and considered the territory of a sovereign ally negotiable is the key turning point. After Donald Trump's speech in Davos, in which he ruled out military force but called for "immediate negotiations to renegotiate the purchase of Greenland", the atmosphere in EU capitals resembled the aftermath of a state of emergency, as diplomats worked out scenarios for a showdown with the US.
In Europe, there is a “before” and an “after” Greenland. After the US crossed this line, Europeans began to plan a Plan B: protecting Europe without the US. But that is not the way it is understood in Washington. Instead, US officials downplay the Greenland episode and mock Europe. One Republican senator said that Europeans are “very emotional” about the Greenland episode.
Greenland is seen as a hot topic, one of many episodes that should not be taken too seriously. I have heard similar disbelief from business elites outside the EU area about why the Europeans would “blow up NATO over Greenland.”
The two different backstabbing narratives, Greenland on the European side, Iran on the American side, and the lack of understanding for each other will be devastating for the future of NATO.
For a while after Trump's reelection, there was a hopeful new version of NATO's future: an orderly transition in which Europeans would gradually take over more of their own defense, Americans would pivot to the Indo-Pacific with their newly freed resources, and the alliance would re-emerge more equal and powerful.
The US-Europe relationship would be organized around shared interests rather than shared values or Cold War history. But that is only possible if that shared history of NATO still exists. What is replacing it now, with the disorderly and punitive withdrawal of US troops from Germany and the announcement that the US will review its forces in Europe, is a dirty divorce, conducted with the language of betrayal. If Americans and Europeans cannot agree on why they parted ways, they may never be able to walk together again. / Adapted from “Pamphlet” by “Financial Times”
Lini një Përgjigje