A senior air warrior, graduate from the Staff College, and a PG in military studies. He is qualified to write on war and allied matters.
Introduction
After World War II the monolith unity of the Allies cracked; basically, because two separate and opposing systems appeared on the global scene. There was the communist system articulated by Karl Marx and the democratic world led by the Anglo-Saxon powers notably the USA and UK. The democratic world was on a weaker wicket because of the concept of personal freedom and obviously, they were handicapped when facing an impregnable and strong Soviet state led by a strong leader, Joseph Stalin. President Truman who had taken over after the death of Roosevelt cannot be considered a great president, because his thinking was biased and in my opinion, he considered Asian people to be inferior to the west. That is the reason he carried out the experiment of the nuclear bombing of Japan, though the imperial Army was already defeated and looking for a face-saving way out to surrender.
The Western World wished to perpetuate its dominance over the world and remove any obstacles facing them. This was the reason for the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty in 1949. The aim of the military pact was to unite the West against any challenge from any other country notably the USSR. This was not all because in another few years the Americans set up a number of pacts against communism in Asia and the Middle East, like the Baghdad Pact, CENTO, and SE Asian Treaty Organization (SEATO). All the military alliances were supposed to be a counter to the expansion of communism as articulated by China and their leader Mao Tse Tung.
All the Pacts fell by the wayside because America’s priorities changed. Under Richard Nixon, they made overtures to the Chinese and gave them technology with the idea of having a vast market for their goods. This helped China take a giant leap forward. At the same time, America gained a vast market. This thinking of engaging with China not as a rival but just as a competitor has continued down the decades and the present incumbent Joe Biden has also been talking of China as a competitor and not a rival. This just shows his fallacious thinking; maybe there is more to it than meets the eye. There is some evidence available that his son Hunter Biden has some dubious financial connections with China.
In 1991 the Soviet Union collapsed because of its inherent contradictions and obviously the raison d’etre of NATO also collapsed. At that time when Bill Clinton was the President of the United States and Boris Yeltsin was the president of Russia an application was made by Russia to join NATO. Obviously, the Americans are not going to accept it because they were wondering how to make NATO a permanent feature in world politics. Basically, NATO is an engine that is piloted by the United States and all other countries are just riding piggyback on the American back.
The American think tank formulated a plan where Russia would be declared the enemy so that NATO could survive and the hegemony of the United States over Europe would be alive for the next hundred years.
The small European nations swallowed the American lie with the hope once the hot war takes place at any stage, they will be saved by the Americans.
We shall now examine the efficacy of NATO after the collapse of the Soviet Union and see whether it has any utility at all other than perpetuating American hegemony over Europe.
NATO in the 21st Century
In the 21st-century the United States has been pumping billions of dollars into Europe to keep NATO alive. It is also following an Eastward expansion of NATO as part of the scheme to perpetuate that Russia is an enemy. There have been further developments as France has left NATO and there is no other significant power on the continent now. Most of the countries are so small that in any nuclear exchange they would simply cease to exist on the world map.
One is reminded of a statement by Nikita Khruschev the First Secretary of the Soviet communist party, who had stated in 1961, that it would take only five hydrogen thermonuclear bombs to wipe England off the world map. At that time, I think the Prime Minister was Harold MacMillian and he was aware of this reality.
Donald Trump who became president had realized that NATO had become an obsolete organization and needed to be restructured but obviously if the threat of Russia had not been created the network itself would have collapsed. The Anglo-Saxon powers led by the UK and the USA would be twiddling their thumbs.
A Look at the countries that are part of NATO like Belgium, Portugal, the Czech Republic, Estonia, and other small countries is the Achilles heel of NATO. In case they’re involved in a nuclear change, these countries simply will not remain on the map of Europe.
NATO is thriving on the theory of MAD (mutually assured destruction) but that doesn’t work when you have a strong opponent. Additionally, the battle in Ukraine has shown the policy of the America and NATO is not on the same page. Most European countries have not stopped buying gas from Russia. In addition, nobody’s interested in fighting Russia. The United States is also not going to fight Russia and would just like a proxy war. It is another matter the Russian army has performed pretty poorly in the recent battles in Ukraine but that is no consolation because Vladimir Putin has achieved his aims.
From the happenings in Ukraine, one concludes that the Americans can do a lot of talking but when the brass tacks are down after the recent defeats in three major battles all across the globe from Korea, Vietnam, and Afghanistan not forgetting Iraq and Libya, the American military leadership has come to the conclusion that it’s not worth fighting in Ukraine.
The same thing is going to happen in other European countries. I will just point out that tomorrow if Russia invades Estonia; is NATO which basically means the United States going to confront Russia? I think there is a tacit agreement already made wherein certain states have been recognized by the United States as a part of the Russian sphere of influence. One can be pretty sure that no American soldiers will be in action in Estonia. The Americans know that if nuclear war breaks out between Russia and the United States, whatever be the result, one thing is clear, the American hegemony over the world will be finished and that will leave the field free for China to rise up.
Knowledgeable military soldiers who have no ax to grind have pointed out that NATO is a paper tiger. It’s thriving on the threat of MAD but then a threat is a threat and that is not a reality and one can safely say that the days of NATO are numbered
Epilogue
History is like a cycle and what goes up must come down. This is the inevitable fact. Great empires have gone into oblivion and there is no reason that the American hegemony is not going to finish. Partly it could be due to an extremely mediocre set of men who became presidents of the United States. Aurangzeb built up a great empire but his son Bahadur Shah dissipated the Empire in no time. There is every likelihood that Joe Biden has been playing the wrong cards and he may well preside over the liquidation of the American hegemony over the world.
As one of my Royal Air Force friends mentioned in the bar yesterday, the only way America can confront and beat China is to disband NATO and make Russia an ally. I think he’s correct.
References
Hegemony or Survival: America’s quest for Global Dominance by Naom Chomsky.
Americas Allies and Decline of US Hegemony Edited By Justin Massie and Jonathan Paquin (Published June 30, 2021, by Routledge)
© 2022 MG Singh emge
Originally published at https://discover.hubpages.com on April 6, 2022.
