Washington Should Support NATO Against Russia and Its Indo-Pacific Allies Against China at the Same Time

It is reported this week that a senior Pentagon official intensified the feathers of his colleagues by requesting controversial policy decisions, including cutting aid to Ukraine, without approval of the White House. However, unlike many reports, this is not just a story about the characters or the process of politics, but about the major strategy.

How can the United States and its allies face simultaneous security challenges throughout Eurasia? The Pentagon official, Elbridge Colby, envisions the division of labor in which Europe takes care of Europe, while the United States wanders in dealing with the most challenges in the Indian Pacific Ocean.

But this approach will not work. The best strategy is for the United States to continue to lead its European allies while they are escalating and contribute more throughout Eurasia.

There is no doubt that the United States and its allies face a deteriorating security environment. Russia is involved in an aggressive war in Ukraine that can leak across the border and lead to a clash of the NATO bus directly Russia. China is conducting regular military coercion against its neighbors and threatening to invade Taiwan. Then there are the ongoing threats posed by North Korea, Iran and international terrorism.

How, then, should the United States and its allies retreat, and if necessary, the defeat of these simultaneous threats?

There are three possible models. The first is for the United States to talk about a good game of investigation to Asia while stumbling in Europe and the Middle East, while the allies are free from Washington’s efforts. There is a large -scale agreement that this model, which is often reflected in past American foreign policy, will not work.

The second approach is for the United States to provide leadership with its global allies assembled to contribute to multiple efforts across Eurasia. President Donald Trump adopted this approach during his first term, and the effort continued during the era of former President Joe Biden. Washington has made a lot of progress in helping its allies to understand the global and interconnected nature of these threats and sew North, European, ethnic and Pacific allies together in new frameworks. The allies adhered to intensify their own defenses with also contributing to global efforts.

Trump raised the quarter to the ministerial level and called on South Korea, Australia and India to attend the Group 7 summit. The European allies persuaded to increase defensive spending, but also to ban Chinese 5G technology. In Biden years, Aukus and Nato-IP4 collected the free world. The European allies called for peace and stability in the Strait of Taiwan and committed to the dangers of China, while Asian allies joined Russia and providing weapons to Ukraine.

Many Trump 2.0 officials and Republicans in congress want to build on this successful legacy.

The third vision – which will be a radical break from previous American policy – is the division of extremist labor. Under this model, the United States will significantly reduce its participation in Europe so that the husband’s resources can be able to threaten the greatest threat to China. In the absence of America, Europe was ascending, taking care of itself and avoiding deviations in Asia and other places. After all, logic goes, Europe has its full hands with Russia. Why should the military forces be sent to the Indian Pacific Ocean? Asian allies are similarly encouraged to stop concern about NATO and Ukraine and focus on the threat of China near the house.

This third vision is defended by only a small minority, but some of its followers, including Colby, occupy influential sites. It is also the vision that motivated the recently shocked policy decisions that shocked the feathers, including the sudden stop of American arms shipments to Ukraine, AUKUS review, and asked that the United Kingdom wander around a warship heading to the Indian and the Pacific. What these moves share is that they are designed to reduce the participation of the United States in Europe and contain European allies in their neighborhood.

These are not isolated accidents. Officials from several European countries told me that the Pentagon also asked them to stay outside Asia and the Middle East. For the first time in years, it did not include the NATO summit environment in 2025, a male of China, Indian and Pacific.

The maximum partition strategy of the two outlets may be logical in theory, but it will not work in practice, for three reasons.

First, and most importantly, Eurasian threats are interconnected. China’s challenge is not contained on the Taiwan Strait. It is global. We see this more clearly in Russia’s war in Ukraine. Iran and North Korea sends the weapons of Russia, and China provides Moscow everything you need to maintain the war effort, including the economic lifestyle, super hard trucks, and excavation equipment that Russia uses to literally dig itself in East Ukra. Taiwan leaders understand this and have argued that the most effective way to deter China from attacking their country is that the free world is the defeat of Russian President Vladimir Putin in Ukraine.

Another reason will not succeed in the division of labor: Europe cannot lead Europe. Effective security through the Atlantic Ocean requires an American leadership. If Washington is wandering in Asia and abandoning Europe, there is no other country that can organize allies in a way that guarantees the care of the important interests of the United States in Europe.

Europe may be relatively less important than before, but it is still not. 1 Trade and Investment Parties, and the American average benefit greatly from peace, stability and prosperity on the continent.

The idea that Europe can take care of itself depends on the conceptual error that “Europe” is present as a coherent strategic representative. no. As Henry Kissinger once said, when you want to talk to Europe, who are you calling?

Europe is a group of 30 different countries with different interests and a tendency to politics. It takes a great power to collect them around a common mission.

In the absence of the United States, there is no other country with power and goodwill to organize a coherent approach to European security. Some countries, such as France, may want to claim the European leadership, but one can only lead if others are ready to follow up.

Certainly, the image of America has been distorted in the minds of many European politicians and their components. But the security establishment in Europe-especially in cases of the weak front line-knows that Putin only respects the American power. They want the American leadership and presence and do not trust their security for their friends in Western Europe.

Instead of taking care of Europe itself, the withdrawal of the United States risks chaos. It may adopt thirty countries smaller than 30 different methods. Some may spend more on defense, but others will not do it, and others still sell American interests in side deals with Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping.

The supporters of the division of workers have the right to give the United States to give priority to the Chinese and European allies over the rise and provide the largest part of the traditional forces in Europe. But he makes a mistake in the failure to understand that Washington should continue to provide leadership, nuclear deterrence, and enough traditional military presence forward to give him the skin in the game.

American power is the glue that connects security across the Atlantic.

There is a third and final reason for the lack of work of the extremist work department: the United States needs to help Europe to face China. Certainly, Estonia cannot send a plane carrier to Taiwan in the case of World War III. However, American competition with China plays in all fields, and Europe remains an economic, organizational, diplomatic and ethical power. After all, non -United States NATO members make up approximately 20 percent of real global gross domestic product.

To cancel the effective risks from China or win the global technology competition, therefore, Washington needs the help of Brussels. Washington can implement ideal controls for export to prevent Chinese stealing American technology, for example, but if Beijing turns and purchased advanced technology from Europe, the strategy will not work.

Soft power and European moral authority can also provide the rhetorical issue against unfair Chinese commercial practices, abuse of international institutions, and total human rights violations in diplomatic forums.

Europe also helps to maintain military deterrence against China. Simple diplomatic data has stated over the past few years about peace and stability in the Strait of China, that the invasion of Taiwan will lead to problems, not only with Taiwan or the United States, but the entire free world. The threat of European sanctions can make something twice thinking about attacking Taiwan. Washington wants Europe to rise to increased industrial production of defense to arm NATO, but the European defense industry that has been reviving can also serve as a arsenal of democracy during a major war in the Indian Pacific Ocean. The symbolic offers of power, such as British warships, or the Litoian Special Operations Forces in the Indian Pacific region, are strengthening more for Xi in the world -free world against the world framework without Europe’s ability to defend itself.

But do not take it from me. US Defense Minister Beit Higseth states that the country’s military leaders in the Indian Pacific Ocean tell him that China is “unable” to the presence of European military forces in Asia, and that if this constitutes Chinese decisions, “this is useful.” Or, as Matthew Whitaker, Trump’s Ambassador in NATO, Tweet, “What is happening in the Indian professional matters of Atlantic Security. For this reason NATO works with partners worldwide.”

In short, the extremist division of work to deal with European threats is a bad idea. Threats are interconnected. “Europe” cannot take care of itself; Washington needs Europe to defeat China. Washington opponents are not subject to delusions. They are cooperating in launching a global campaign to defeat the United States. Placing threats and allies in elegant regional funds does not really work in a game risk. In the most complex real world, global superpowers with global interests must lead a global alliance to defeat the axis of Eurasian Eurasian enemies.