Yep, I have a couple of medical conditions (Besides getting old), I get migraines, I take a daily migraine preventors as part of my pill loadout daily to keep it in check, but with spring and pollen, it still trips, I take medicine for it but it fogs my brain and I go to work and I try to make it through the day. When I get those episodes, it zapes my creativity, I'm almost in a mental fog, I forget small things...yeah it sucks. I'm able to function through the day but as far as blog anything.....fuhgeddaboudit. Yeah that word actually is in my spell check.....I'm shocked, LOL.
I shamelessly clipped this from Michael Smith
President Trump is bringing the heat on the Euroweenies in the UK and across the Continent, and, as usual, he is doing it with all the finesse of a California framing hammer.
He is not just taking aim at Brussels or Berlin, he is lobbing a few well-placed shots toward the eastern flank of NATO as well, reminding everyone within earshot that security is not a subscription service billed indefinitely to the American taxpayer. His vituperative tone offends the diplomatic class, which prefers its criticism wrapped in passive voice and delivered at conferences with catered lunches, but like many long-delayed issues Trump has chosen to address, beneath the bluster is something more revealing than a policy dispute, it is a clash of governing philosophies, one that increasingly looks like a preview of America’s future if Democrats get their way.
For decades, the European Union has not just been a geopolitical partner, it has been a political aspiration for a certain Eurocratic wing of the American left. The EU is what modern Democrats imagine government should become once it has fully “evolved”, an administrative system run by credentialed experts, insulated from elections, buffered by layers of bureaucracy, and confident that dissent is less a signal to be heeded than a problem to be managed.
When Democrats talk about “protecting democracy,” what they often mean is protecting a system increasingly removed from the voters themselves, one that looks remarkably like Brussels with better branding. There is a profound irony in witnessing “No Kings” protests by people who want to replace individual liberty with the European model of monarchial bureaucracy.
The similarities are not subtle. Both systems elevate technocracy, process, and regulation over representation, results, and growth and both rely on a permanent administrative class that persists regardless of election outcomes, ensuring that while politicians may change, the direction of governance rarely does. Each share a quiet but unmistakable belief that ordinary citizens, left to their own devices, cannot be trusted to make the “right” decisions without guidance, nudging, or correction from above.
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
That is why the EU model has always held such appeal. It promises control without the messiness of accountability. It offers the appearance of democracy while steadily migrating real decision-making power away from voters and toward institutions. For American Democrats who find constitutional limits inconvenient and federalism inefficient, Europe represents an end state, a system where outcomes can be managed, dissent softened, and policy insulated from the volatility of elections.
The uncomfortable truth for Democrats is that many of the policies they champion, expansive regulation, growing welfare states, centralized authority, and reliance on unelected administrative bodies, are not theoretical. They are already in operation across Europe, and the results are visible in slower growth, structural dependency, a political culture increasingly disconnected from the electorate but perhaps most obvious is the dilution of European history and culture through the importation of third world ideologies, religions and social mores.
The European model is not a promise, it is a case study and if elections across the Continent are any indication, people have noticed and are beginning to push back. People are recognizing the cultural destruction and right-wing nationalist parties are making historic electoral inroads. The outrage, the insistence that questioning the model is destabilizing, points to a deeper discomfort with the possibility that the bureaucratic technocrats might be losing their grip on European governance.
Trump’s critique, stripped of its rhetoric, lands squarely on this point. The United States has spent decades subsidizing a system abroad that mirrors what many on the left would like to build at home. NATO is the clearest example. An alliance premised on shared responsibility has drifted into a structure where America provides the backbone while European nations allocate resources toward expansive domestic priorities, assuming the security umbrella will remain in place.
When Trump demands that NATO members meet their commitments, he is not just talking about defense spending, he is challenging the underlying assumption that America will indefinitely support systems that are increasingly at odds with its own founding principles. That challenge extends eastward as well. Even nations with legitimate security concerns cannot operate under the assumption that American protection is automatic. Alliances require reciprocity, and reciprocity requires shared burden.
The leaders of Europe prefer tone over substance, so Trump’s “in your face” style ensures his message will be haughtily dismissed because they prefer nuance and ambiguity. However, leadership is not about comfort, it is about confronting realities that have been politely ignored. For years, American leaders have avoided acknowledging the growing alignment between European governance and the aspirations of the American left. Trump is not avoiding the historical evidence of where the European model leads and that it is profoundly anti-American.
The real question is not whether Trump is too harsh, the real question is whether Americans recognize the trajectory. Do we continue down a path that mirrors Europe, centralizing power, expanding bureaucracy, and distancing government from the governed, or do we reaffirm a system built on sovereignty, accountability, and the understanding that freedom, while untidy, is ultimately more durable?
Europe made its choice decades ago. The only question for the American people is whether enough will ignore the obvious negative outcomes to give Democrats control.
I saw this article surfing the web during break, and it to me was spot on, for generations Europe has let their defenses laps as they focused on "Butter instead of Guns", and they relied on the United States to do the heavy lifting. During the Cold War, West Germany had a very good Military Services the "Bundeswehr" but after the cold war was over, they rapidly demobilized and now they are a shadow of their former selves. Same with the rest of the Western Europeans. Now the Eastern Europeans whom are in NATO spend in excess of 2% of GDP as is mandated by NATO charter because they know what it is like to be under the boots of the Soviets Er the Russians and have no desire to repeat the experience whereas the Western Europeans have gotten soft and in my mind I have severe doubt if they have the "stones" to defend Western Civilization as we know it.
I do know that President Trump isn't happy with the alliance because of the Europeans taking advantage of the Americans for many years, sneering about the proventials colonist then expecting us to carry the freight and then work cross purposes against us For example gutting their energy sector because of the political pressure from the "Die Grune" to chase the unicorns of solar energy and wind, so they shut down their coal and nuclear plants and to make up the shortfalls, the Germans have to buy their gas and energy from the Russians, thereby financing their war machine.....Funny that.. So the possibility of The United States Leaving NATO is possible, I doubt it, but it is there, especially if the Western Europeans out of Brussels keep trying to jerk President Trump around, I can see him totally pulling out or seriously reducing our presence especially in Western Europe. Although Poland and some of the Eastern Europeans would love to have us there on their soil. Only Time will tell.
I got this from the "Wavell Room" All credit goes to them.
As the possibility of a U.S. withdrawal from NATO increases, Europe faces not just a political crisis but a military emergency. No longer shielded by American power, it may have to stand alone against a weakened, yet aggressive Russia – forced to fight, whether it is ready or not. What would war in Europe look like without the United States? Could Europe still find a way to fight on its own terms? It must – and it can.
Fighting without the tools to win
From British Paratroopers to Poland’s GROM, from Eurofighters to German howitzers, Europe fields some of the finest professional forces and most sophisticated weapon systems; the problem is, they just don’t have enough of them. It is not that Europeans do not know how to fight. The problem is, what do they actually have to fight with? For years, defence budgets and industries have been allowed to wither away. Without the United States, European NATO members face crippling shortfalls in trained personnel, ammunition stocks, and critical military assets. Although this has already impeded European operations in the past, it would prove fatal in a peer-to-peer conflict.
Without U.S. stockpiles and equipment depots, Europe would face an immediate logistical challenge from the very outbreak of hostilities. Ammunition shortages would be catastrophic. The war in Ukraine has demonstrated that European stockpiles cannot sustain modern, high-intensity combat. Stocks of artillery shells, precision munitions, and armoured vehicle replacements would be exhausted within weeks, with no immediate means of replenishment.
Dwindling reserves and slow production
Unlike the United States, which maintains vast prepositioned stockpiles, European nations have allowed their war reserves to dwindle. Decades of underinvestment and fragmentation across national borders have meant Europe’s defence industries are too slow and unresponsive to meet wartime demand. Peacetime procurement cycles stretch across years, not weeks. The very munitions that define NATO’s battlefield superiority – smart bombs, guided rockets, and cruise missiles – are produced too slowly and in far too small quantities. In a war with Russia, Europe’s current production capacity would be overwhelmed within days.
To make matters worse, Europe lacks the military mobility to move what it currently has to where it is needed. Equipment losses would mount rapidly without a resilient battlefield repair and maintenance infrastructure. Damaged tanks, Infantry Fighting Vehicles, and aircraft would be difficult to restore to combat readiness, and many would be lost for the duration of the war.
This is not just a logistical issue; it directly impacts Europe’s ability to dictate the course of the war. When its reserves run out and production fails to keep pace, Europe will be unable to effectively shape the strategic environment. Yet, such shaping operations – preparing the battlefield to favour one’s own forces – are essential for modern warfare. They involve neutralizing enemy air defences, disrupting command-and-control networks, and degrading logistics and reinforcements. These operations set the conditions for manoeuvre warfare, allowing ground forces to exploit gaps and achieve operational breakthroughs. Without American air assets and stand-off capabilities, Europe would struggle to achieve air dominance or degrade enemy systems sufficiently to enable rapid and decisive ground manoeuvres.
The air domain
The inability to gain and maintain control of the air would be felt long before European troops even reached the frontlines. Russian ISR drones would detect and track their movements, enabling relentless strikes that would force European units to disperse, dig in, and hide. Without U.S. anti-air capabilities, European forces are vulnerable to threats from Russian glide bombs, Shahed drones, and loitering munitions. Unable to mass for decisive operations, mechanized assaults would become a non-starter. Frontlines would harden, forcing tanks and infantry fighting vehicles to disperse even further – acting as individual force multipliers rather than combined instruments of manoeuvre.
Royal Air Force F35 (Photo by SAC Tim Laurence, Crown Copyright)
A highly dispersed force – down to the platoon and squad level – means that core tactical tenets would start to break down. Fire and movement would no longer be mutually enabling components – the effective use of which has been central to Western warfare since the First World War. With European forces unable to shape the battlefield, to mass for decisive action and to effectively suppress and outmanoeuvre the enemy, the result would be a war of attrition, much like what we see in Ukraine today.
The Ukrainian way of war is not an option
Some argue that the war in Ukraine offers a glimpse into the future of warfare. But while it has showcased remarkable battlefield innovation, it remains a war of necessity, not choice – and one that Europe cannot afford to emulate.
Ukraine has fought with dispersed positions, drone teams, and small-unit tactics – not because they are optimal, but because they are the only available option. The slow supply of Western equipment has forced it into an attritional fight, where gains are measured in tree lines rather than strategic advances. This approach has exacted a staggering toll: entire formations lost, offensives stalled, and casualty rates in the tens of thousands. It is a brutal struggle with no clear path to victory; and as important as they may be, no number of AI-driven drones has solved the fundamental challenge of breaking this bloody deadlock of trench warfare.
2023 – a counteroffensive without air superiority
The failed 2023 Ukrainian counteroffensive revealed the harsh limits of attacking without air dominance, without deep strikes, and without shaping operations – precisely the situation European forces would face if they had to fight Russia alone. Yet, unlike Ukraine, which spent eight years adapting to Russian tactics along the demarcation line and over three years in all-out war, most European armies lack comparable experience. They also do not possess Ukraine’s extensive anti-air network, leaving European cities and infrastructure even more vulnerable to Russian missile and drone strikes. Most critically, if Europe fights without the United States, it will have no external lifeline. Ammunition shortages will not be offset by foreign aid, depleted stockpiles will not be replenished, and tank battalions will not be resupplied by allies. Europe must be able to sustain itself.
Swedish Archer artillery system (WikiMedia Commons)
Furthermore, while Ukrainians have shown enormous resilience, driven by a fight for national survival, it is hard to imagine similar determination across Western Europe. Few European nations beyond the Baltic countries and Poland have the resolve to endure the kind of high-casualty warfare that would likely follow if Europe had to go to war today. Public support for any conflict involving mass casualties and prolonged attritional warfare would likely collapse.
To understand what Europe must do now, we must recognize that Ukraine is not fighting this war on its own terms. This is why it has repeatedly pleaded and begged for more artillery, aircraft, cruise missiles, and combat vehicles. As critical as innovation and adaptability are in modern warfare, they cannot replace the fundamental need for firepower and manoeuvre. Thus, while Ukraine has adapted to sustain its fight with domestically built systems, it has not regained the operational capabilities needed for decisive action.
The Russian military has repeatedly failed to conduct basic combined arms manoeuvres or air campaigns and has yet to find a solution to the stalemate other than pressing forward with wave after wave of squad-sized infantry assaults. For now, Russia remains stuck in Ukraine, and it is highly unlikely that it can simultaneously defeat Kyiv, reconstitute its forces, and open a second front against Eastern Europe. Where Europe lacks the means to fight the war the way it wants to fight, Russia lacks the systems to conduct it effectively.
Europe still remembers what stalemates look like
This is the other good news: Europe knows how to avoid a bloody stalemate – because we have been here before: after the First World War, Western militaries adapted their operational and tactical procedures to ensure that it would never again be trapped in the kind of static, attritional warfare that defined the battlefields of Flanders. The Western Allies, the Wehrmacht, and later NATO did not adopt manoeuvre warfare out of academic preference, but out of the hard-learned necessity to avoid pointless slaughter. Despite repeated claims by some analysts, it does not mean NATO was incapable of attritional warfare. Attrition was not abandoned – it was moved away from the frontlines. Air campaigns and stand-off capabilities such as cruise missiles and long-range rocket artillery were how Western militaries sought to degrade enemy capabilities before their own soldiers ever entered the fight.
Both these core tenets were validated in Ukraine, as most recaptured territory resulted either from operational breakthroughs – such as the 2022 Kharkiv counteroffensive – or from shaping the environment into untenable conditions, forcing Russian troops to withdraw, as seen in Kherson later that year. And while the Kursk offensive has been controversial strategically, it shows that the Russian Armed Forces cannot defend in force everywhere – leaving exploitable gaps and opportunities for manoeuvre.
Russia has shown it cannot replicate the systems to conduct complex air campaigns and shaping operations – even in its own backyard. This is because NATO’s dominance in Multi-Domain Operations has never been just about tanks, stealth aircraft or cruise missiles. Rather, it came from the integration of systems—command structures, intelligence fusion, and targeting processes – that allowed NATO forces to operate with unmatched precision. In this, NATO had – and still has – no peer in the world.
European strength remains a political—not a military—question
Much of this has depended on U.S. assets, technology, and personnel. Yet Europe possesses both the institutional knowledge and technological expertise to rebuild these capabilities independently in its own area of responsibility. We know what to do, how to do it and what to do it with. Large-scale air exercises with European command structures have demonstrated this potential. Technology, both new and old, an industrial base and financial resources exist to produce, procure, and employ the necessary weapon systems – build, buy and bomb. This applies to everything from aircraft and drones to cruise missiles, long-range rocket artillery, and other critical capabilities.
Europe also has a deep well of doctrinal expertise and a large corps of staff and non-commissioned officers capable of leading the necessary expansion of forces. With a workforce more than twicethe size of Russia’s– and larger than that of the United States– Europe has the manpower to sustain and build up its militaries – if it acts now.
The crisis facing Europe means challenge is formidable. Nations – some of which may not even believe in the cause – must unite. Fragmented European defence industries have to move towards a consolidated warpath. It means convincing entire generations that this is their fight. It means spending ‘gold for iron’ today to avoid spilling blood for freedom tomorrow. Finally, it also means reconstituting European forces now, rather than being forced to send untrained conscripts into the meat grinder later. Europe needs weapons, civilian defence, hardened infrastructure, and a high state of force readiness – on a massive scale.
Conclusion
Will Europe ever be as powerful as it was with U.S. support? No, probably not. That is why one can only hope NATO still has a future – even as we prepare for the worst. But if Europe acts with determination and unity it can avoid the political and military crisis it currently faces. It can rebuild the dominant, highly integrated military systems necessary to deter or decisively defeat any Russian aggression. The challenge, therefore, is not whether Europe can fight effectively without the United States – it can, and it might soon have to. The real question is whether Europe will invest today, while it still has the choice of how it wants to fight before circumstances dictate the way it has to.
I knew back in the 90's when the Ukraine and Bill Clinton negotiated away the Ukraine's Soviet era Nuclear weapon, their security was guaranteed by the United States, it also was understood that NATO wasn't gonna get any closer to the Soviet er the Russian Homeland, but since then that agreement was broken by the Europeans in NATO with a blind eye by the clowns in Foggy bottom and by self serving idiots on both parties. Now we are where are. The Russians invaded the Crimea while Obungler was in Office and the rest of ukraine while Biden was in Office. I wonder why.
And let me make something clear at the beginning. I like the Ukrainians. I trained them and they were with us when I deployed. I would like them to be able to win their war. I would also like to have a pony. Wishing doesn’t make things so. It’s time to get hard-nosed and real about what’s going on so we can stop this nightmare before it spins completely out of control. And when two nuclear-armed powers are facing each other, spinning out of control can be really bad.
1. Russia is absolutely in the wrong for invading Ukraine. Nothing Ukraine did excuses or justifies Russia’s actions.But we still need to understand why they did it. They had reasons, even if you and I don’t agree with their reasons. It’s not simply because Vladimir Putin is Mr. Burns, tenting his fingers and planning evil deeds for the sake of doing evil. There is much more going on in this conflict than in the portrait painted by the media and establishment. It involves history, ethnicity, and other factors we Westerners do not and cannot understand. Some of those facts include that Ukraine used to be part of Russia, and Russia believes it should be in the future. Also, there are huge numbers of ethnic Russians, who Ukrainians do not like – Ukrainians get mad at you if you speak Russian to them – in those areas that Putin has captured. Further, Russia is paranoid, and not without reason, about an invasion from the West. Look at Napoleon, look at Hitler. We may not think that it should be upset about Ukraine joining NATO, but Russia thinks it should be. Again, this isn’t to justify what Russia did. We need to understand why it did it even if we don’t agree with its motivations.
2. Ukraine is not going to be able to win the war if the definition of winning the war is recovering all the conquered Ukrainian territory. A continued stalemate will result in many thousands of additional deaths. The idea that somehow, Ukraine, which has been nearly bled dry, is going to come up with the combat power to throw the Russians off its soil is just insane. That’s never going to happen. I would like it to happen, but it won’t. So, we’ve got to deal with the reality we’re facing.
3. Zelensky will have to accept the reality that America will need to be paid back for its aid, which means, as a practical matter, access to Ukraine’s mineral reserves. The establishment has been scandalized that Trump expects to be paid back, but why should America pick up the tab? It’s not our war. Zelensky, who stupidly has gotten himself crosswise with the new American government, stated that he would not require ten generations of Ukrainians to pay America back. So, does he propose that ten generations of Americans pay back the money America has to borrow to give to Zelensky? That’s just not going to fly with normal Americans.
4. Ukraine is an unbelievably corrupt country, and the idea that no substantial portion of our aid money has been stolen is ridiculous. There are going to be a lot of people getting very rich off the American aid, including many Americans. The fact that much of the establishment is so resistant to attempting to audit those funds indicates that they understand this, too.
5. The American people are, by and large, tired of subsidizing Ukraine’s end of this war. They are absolutely against American forces being involved. There is a lit fuse on America’s patience, and trying to stamp it out by shouting that anyone questioning perpetual subsidies of this war is Putin’s pal is not going to cut it. The fact is that Trump is probably Ukraine’s last chance to retain American support. The guy who follows Trump is going to be worse for Ukraine.
6. China is a substantially greater threat to the United States than Russia in the macro. The fact is that right now, we can’t confront both powers. We need to focus on China. That’s the major threat to the United States.
7. The Europeans should be taking the lead in supporting Ukraine and should be taking the lead in defending Europe. They are freaking out about this. It’s hilarious that their answer to Donald Trump telling them they need to step up and take charge of their own defense is to step up and take charge of their own defense to show Donald Trump what for. Typically, a threat involves promising to do something the person you’re threatening does not want you to do instead of exactly what he wants you to do.
8. The campaign to insult critics of past Ukraine policy by calling them Putin’s puppets and so forth is a lie and is going to result in enmity towards the idea of helping the Ukrainians. You cannot insult Americans into obedience. You cannot fail to address their legitimate concerns and expect them to agree with you.
9. Some of our NATO allies are participating in internal repression, including suppression of free speech and the right to organize and participate in elections via non-establishment parties. This dangerously undercuts the moral argument in favor of NATO. Americans have no desire to spend blood and treasure defending countries that arrest people for speaking. And the Europeans refuse to accept the judgment of their people. Just this week, the allegedly conservative German party that came in first in the election after promising to close German borders announced the very next day that it would not be closing borders. That’s bad. Why again should we spend money on these people? I mean, it’s only been 80 years.
10. It is in America’s interest that this war ends. We want to draw Russia away from China and closer to the West. It is not in our interest to have a war going on where our proxy is fighting with a nuclear-armed enemy, regardless of how moral the cause of Ukraine is. The only way this is going to happen is if the United States takes the lead and forces Ukraine to make painful concessions in order to end this dangerous bloodbath. In the harsh calculus of international politics, it’s critical that we bring the Russians into our orbit and get them away from the Chinese. Putin has an interest in that – the sparsely populated Siberian wilderness is right there north of China, full of all sorts of resources that China will eventually grab. Putin can’t stop it. He needs allies. Yes, Putin’s a bad guy, but this isn’t about good guys and bad guys. This is about protecting America’s interests. And it’s in America’s interest to stop this war and strip China of a major ally.
Follow Kurt on Twitter @KurtSchlichter. Get the newest volume in the Kelly Turnbull People’s Republic series of conservative action novels set in America after a notional national divorce, the bestselling Amazon #1 Military Thriller, Overlord! And get his new novel about terrorism in America, The Attack!
I was getting "Red Storm Rising" feelings when reading this article that I saw on Bongino Reports. Remember that quote, "Amateurs talk tactics, professionals talk logistics." NATO has lost the skill and the manufacturing base they used to have, thanks to the environmental movement that wanted no industry and pollution, so it was either shut down or throttled, and a lot of it was outsourced to the 3rd world because it is ok if they pollute, it is in the name of "equity" or something. as long as the western based world doesn't pollute. Also they have until recently not even met their 2% of GDP as required by treaty obligation because the provincial Americans will do it and defend them, so the Europeans spent their money on their social system and sneered at the backwater Americans. Now the piper is coming due and they are scrambling. The eastern Europeans are being serious about it, they still remember the Russian threat, whereas the Western Europeans have forgotten, and viewed the Soviets er the Russians as friends, and started buying their gas from them, thereby financing Putin's war against Ukraine. Funny that.
I shamelessly clipped off "Responsible Statecraft"
Summer Exercise between American, Polish and Latvian forces (from Duck,Duck,Go)
In 2024, reflecting a popular Western belief, former Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said: “NATO is the most powerful and successful alliance in history.” Yet just two years earlier in 2022, after a 15-year campaign, NATO was defeated by the Taliban, a rag-tag group of poorly armed insurgents.
How can NATO’s humiliating defeat and Austin’s view be reconciled?
Of course NATO was never the most powerful military alliance in history — that accolade surely goes to the World War II Allies: the U.S., Russia, Britain, and the Commonwealth nations. Nevertheless, after 1945, NATO did its job, did it well, and those of us who served in it were proud to do so.
Since the Berlin Wall’s fall, though, its record has become tarnished. Satisfactory in Kosovo. Humiliated in Afghanistan. Strategic failure looming in Ukraine. Are we really sure NATO is up to the job of defending democratic Europe from a supposedly expansionist Russia in the doomsday scenario of a conventional NATO-Russia war?
The doomsday NATO-Russia war scenario is the defining way to explore this question. “Amateurs talk tactics, professionals study logistics,” and our strategic analysis needs to start all the way back in NATO’s logistics rear areas, then work forward to a future line of battle on the continent of Europe.
First, unlike Russia, no major NATO nation is industrially mobilized for war, as evidenced by the fact that Russia is still outproducing NATO on 155mm shells for Ukraine. Which, incidentally, gives the lie to the view that Russia is poised to take more of Europe — if we in NATO truly believed this, we would all be mobilizing at speed.
More importantly, it is not clear that NATO could mobilize at the speed or scale needed to produce the levels of equipment, ammunition, and people to match Russia. And certainly not without a long build up that would signal our intent. This is not just about lost industrial capacity, but also lost financial capacity. Of the largest NATO nations, only Germany has a debt to GDP ratio below 100%.
Second, to have the remotest chance of success in this doomsday scenario of a NATO-Russia war, U.S. forces would need to deploy at scale into continental Europe. Even if the U.S. Army was established at the necessary scale — with a 2023 establishment of 473,000, under one third of the current Russian Army, it is not — the overwhelming majority of American equipment and logistics would have to travel by sea.
There, they would be vulnerable to Russian submarine-launched torpedoes and mines. As a former underwater warfare specialist, I do not believe that NATO now has the scale of anti-submarine or mine-warfare forces needed to protect Europe’s sea lines of communication.
Nor, for that matter, would these forces be able to successfully protect Europe’s hydrocarbon imports, in particular oil and LNG so critical to Europe’s economic survival. Losses because of our sea supply vulnerability would not only degrade military production, but also bring accelerating economic hardship to NATO citizens, as soaring prices and energy shortages accompanying an outbreak of war rapidly escalated the political pressure to settle.
Third, our airports, sea ports, training, and logistics bases would be exposed to conventional ballistic missile attack, against which we have extremely limited defenses. Indeed, in the case of the Oreshnik missile, no defense.
An Oreshnik missile arriving at Mach 10+ would devastate a NATO arms factory, or naval, army and air force base. As in Ukraine, Russia’s ballistic campaign would also target our transport, logistics, and energy infrastructure. In 2003, while I was working for the British MOD’s Policy Planning staffs, our post 9/11 threat analysis suggested a successful attack against an LNG terminal, such as Milford Haven, Rotterdam, or Barcelona, would have sub-nuclear consequences. The follow-on economic shock-waves would rapidly ripple across a European continent, now increasingly dependent on LNG.
Fourth, unlike Russia, NATO nations’ forces are a heterogenous bunch. My own experience, while leading the offshore training of all European warships at Flag Officer Sea Training in Plymouth, and later working with NATO forces in Afghanistan, was that all NATO forces were exceptionally enthusiastic but had very different levels of technological advancement and trained effectiveness.
Perhaps more contemporarily important, other than a handful of NATO trainers forward deployed in Ukraine, our forces are trained according to a pre-drone “maneuver doctrine" and have no real-world experience of modern peer-to-peer attritional warfighting. Whereas the Russian Army has close to three years experience now, and is unarguably the world's most battle-hardened.
Fifth, NATO’s decision-making system is cumbersome, hampered by the need to constantly communicate from Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe to national capitals — a complexity made worse each time another nation is admitted.
Worse still, NATO cannot do strategy. Shortly after arriving in Afghanistan in 2007, I was shocked to find that NATO had no campaign strategy. In 2022, notwithstanding numerous Russian warnings about NATO expansion constituting a red-line, NATO was wholly unprepared, strategically, for the obvious possibility of war breaking out — as evidenced again by our inability to match Russia’s 155mm shell production.
Even now, in 2025, NATO’s Ukraine strategy is opaque, perhaps best summarized as "double-down and hope.”
In summary, NATO is positioning itself as Europe’s defender, yet lacks the industrial capacity to sustain peer-to-peer warfighting, is wholly dependent on U.S. forces for the remotest chance of success, is unable satisfactorily to defend its sea lines of communication against Russian submarine, or its training and industrial infrastructure against strategic ballistic bombardment, is comprised of a diverse mix of un-bloodied conventional forces, and lacks the capacity to think and act strategically.
An easy NATO victory cannot be assumed, and I am afraid that the opposite looks far more likely to me.
So what? Conventionally, we could now work out how to redress the manifest weaknesses revealed. Strategic audits to confirm the capability gaps. Capability analyses to work out how to fill the gaps. Conferences to decide who does what and where costs should fall. Whilst all the time muddling on, hoping that NATO might eventually prevail in Ukraine, notwithstanding all the evidence to the contrary.
But without unanimous agreement of the NATO nations to increase military investment at scale, we would be lucky to solve these capability shortfalls within ten years, let alone five.
Or we could return to consider — at last — the judgement of many Western realists that NATO expansion was the touchpaper for the Russo-Ukraine War. The Russians warned us, time and again, that such expansion constituted a red line. So too did some of our very greatest strategic thinkers, starting with George Kennan in 1996, Henry Kissinger, Jack Matlock, even Bill Burns in his famous ‘Nyet means Nyet’ diplomatic telegram, and most recently John Mearsheimer with his 2014 forecasts. All ignored.
The truth is that NATO now exists to confront the threats created by its continuing existence. Yet as our scenario shows, NATO does not have the capacity to defeat the primary threat that its continuing existence has created.
So perhaps this is the time to have an honest conversation about the future of NATO, and to ask two questions. How do we return to the sustainable peace in Europe that all sides to the conflict seek? Is NATO the primary obstacle to this sustainable peace?
(Ret.) Royal Navy Commodore Steve Jermy commanded warships in the 5th Destroyer Squadron and Britain’s Fleet Air Arm. He served in the Falklands War and in the Adriatic for the Bosnian and Kosovo campaigns, and retired after an operational tour, in 2007, as Strategy Director in the British Embassy in Afghanistan. He is the author of Strategy for Action: Using Force Wisely in the 21st Century and now works in offshore energy.
I clipped this from my work email, The B737 platform is getting a workout, I didn't know about this one.
Credit: Boeing
NATO allies have approved a decision to modernize the alliance’s airborne early warning (AEW) capability using Boeing’s E-7 Wedgetail platform.
Following in the footsteps of the UK and U.S., six E-7s will be acquired to replace the current 14-strong NATO fleet of Boeing E-3 Sentry aircraft to meet its initial Alliance Future Surveillance and Control (iAFSC) capability. Initial operational capability is planned for 2031.
The decision to select the E-7—by a consortium of nations including Belgium, Germany, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Romania and the U.S.—follows the December 2022 publication by the NATO Support and Procurement Agency (NSPA) of a request for information for alternative AEW platforms.
Various airframers responded: Saab offered their GlobalEye, Northrop Grumman proposed the E-2 Hawkeye and L3Harris offered a conformal AEW conversion of the Bombardier Global 6500.
However, it seems that the E-7 won out, with NSPA telling Aerospace DAILY that the E-7 was judged as the “only known system currently capable of fulfilling the strategic commands’ essential operational requirements and key performance parameters and also being available for delivery within the timeframe required.”
Other considerations that favored the E-7 include its endurance, crew size, number of work stations and crew rest areas, as well as surveillance coverage capability, growth capacity and risk associated with design and delivery.
The aircraft is also a known entity. Another version of the platform, the E-7T operated by the Turkish Air Force, regularly flies alongside the E-3s from Konya, Turkey, while an Australian E-7 is currently operating in Europe on a six-month deployment monitoring and protecting supply routes from Poland into Ukraine.
“Surveillance and control aircraft are crucial for NATO’s collective defense and I welcome allies’ commitment to investing in high-end capabilities,” says NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. “This investment in state-of-the-art technology shows the strength of transatlantic defense cooperation as we continue to adapt to a more unstable world," Stoltenberg adds.
The number of aircraft is eye-opening. A fleet of six represents less than half the number of NATO E-3s currently in service, but according to NSPA, six is the “minimum number of aircraft that the strategic commands state is required to deliver the minimum operational capability for Supreme Allied Commander Europe’s day-zero airborne air battle management capability.”
By comparison, the UK Royal Air Force is buying three E-7s to replace a fleet of originally seven E-3s, while the U.S. Air Force plans to buy 26.
Entry into service of the UK aircraft is running behind schedule, however, and service entry is planned for 2025.
Delivery by 2031 will ensure there is no capability gap when the E-3 fleet is finally retired from service in 2035, replaced by the wider AFSC multi-domain surveillance system, currently in development, which is expected to include uncrewed airborne surveillance systems.
In an emailed statement, Boeing says it appreciated the confidence from NSPA and participating NATO nations in the proven capabilities and interoperability benefits of the E-7.
“We stand ready to support this Foreign Military Sale and deliver this exceptional capability that will enhance NATO’s readiness,” the company’s statement reads.
Just like the E-3s, it is likely the E-7s will be manufactured by Boeing, although there are no details about whether the aircraft will be supported by European industry. The E-3s, for example, undergo maintenance and upgrades with companies such as Airbus and Leonardo.
Saab appears less than impressed with the decision, however.
In a statement, the company says it has noted NSPA’s decision, but it would “welcome further dialogue” on the agency’s decision process.
“From a technological point of view, GlobalEye is meeting or exceeding all capabilities set forth in the [request],” the Swedish company states, adding, "GlobalEye is pushing technology to levels that legacy thinking will miss out on."
