New Republican visions for American foreign and national security Policy

Republican Visions for American Foreign and National Security Policy

with

Elbridge Colby
Co-founder and principal of The Marathon Initiative,
Former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Strategy and Force Development

in conversation with

Rt Hon Sir Michael Fallon KCB
Former Secretary of State for Defence

Vote of Thanks by
 
Admiral Lord West GCB DSC PC
Former Security Minister and First Sea Lord

[Warriorxpt]

Bridge has been so consistent. I cannot ignore what he says. Hopefully more and more powerful people listen to him, sincerely.

[felixf.]

Why was the USA so successful during the Cold War?

It implemented the Marshall Plan to economically strengthen its partners in Europe.

The USA was the largest economy and opened its market to the products of its allies.

The USA offered its allies a security umbrella with nuclear deterrence through NATO.

As a result, America managed to push back the influence of the Soviet Union on Europe and ultimately win the Cold War.

The alliance between Western Europe and the USA is proving difficult today.

For example, Germany follows a mercantilist economic model and is therefore dependent on cheap energy and large growth markets.

Russia and China can provide both of these for Western Europe like no other country.

The USA, on the other hand, is becoming increasingly less important as an economic partner.

And since the collapse of the Soviet Union, there is no serious military threat from Russia to Western Europe.

Nevertheless, tens of thousands of American soldiers are still stationed in hundreds of US military bases and US nuclear weapons are stationed on German soil.

If you look at the situation objectively from the US perspective, America is protecting Europe from the countries with which it has close trade relations.

Europe's core interest, however, is to further expand its economic relations with the USA's biggest competitors.

Don't be blinded by the politicians' rhetoric.

Feelings, shared history, values, culture and traditions play no role at all in whether alliances really work.

What matters is whether the interests coincide.

And it turns out that the interests of Europe and the USA can no longer be reconciled today and this partnership will soon end.

[emanuelegiannotti]

Just to remind our dear US “Republican” friends that way more British and other NATO forces have died in Afghanistan (there due to the US invoking Article 5) than Americans in Europe from 1946 onwards. Almost heart breaking now to remember the good old times when the US had (Republican and Democratic) presidents with a solid understanding of geopolitics and deterrence (just watch interviews of Richard Nixon or any other Cold War-Era US presidents to understand why in Europe and the US we don’t all just speak Russian)

[JohnSmith-vndm]

The UK just needs to learn to accept that it doesn't matter how Europhilic your elites are, Europe is simply not the most important part of the world anymore. Asia is. If you want the United States to focus more on your region, you will have to work to weaken the peer rival to the United States, which is China, or strengthen its the balancing coalition against it: states such as the US, Japan, India.

Short of that, you are going to have to learn how to defend yourself. Because no one else can afford to save you at their own expense.

[emanuelegiannotti]

Well done for a potential future national security advisor: complete failure to understand the difference between force allocation in an active conflict and need to ensure deterrence (ie to prevent a war from starting)