Authored by Justin Logan through Cato Inst/AntiWar,
Protection Secretary Pete Hegseth gave a terrific, bracing speech yesterday to the Ukraine Protection Contact Group that deserves reward.
For greater than two years, European capitals have been encouraging maximalism concerning the Ukraine battle, and extra usually encouraging the doddering US president’s romantic concepts concerning the transatlantic relationship.
All of it got here crashing down right now.
Hegseth made clear, inter alia, that,
- “NATO membership for Ukraine is [not] a practical final result of a negotiated settlement”;
- “as a part of any [postwar] safety assure, there is not going to be US troops deployed to Ukraine”;
- a return to Ukraine’s 1991 borders, an official Ukrainian battle purpose, is “an unrealistic goal”;
- “stark strategic realities stop america of America from being primarily targeted on the safety of Europe”; and that,
- “america will not tolerate an imbalanced relationship which inspires dependency.”
For too lengthy, US coverage on Europe has been pushed by ethereal romanticism, not by a chilly, arduous evaluation of the strategic surroundings.
As Joshua Shifrinson and I wrote in Overseas Affairs final 12 months:
With no candidate for European hegemony lurking, there isn’t any longer any want for america to take the dominant position within the area… U.S. coverage doesn’t have to purpose at formal withdrawal from or continued membership in NATO; it merely must clarify that Washington’s tenure as Europe’s pacifier is coming to an finish, and if European protection planners really feel that leaves a gap to fill, they have to fill it themselves.
Hegseth’s speech suggests the Trump administration agrees. The division of labor within the transatlantic relationship wants to vary now.
On this single passage, JD Vance makes manifest the core lie driving US/EU international coverage for many years: we declare all the pieces we do is for “advancing democracy” when the aim is commonly the precise reverse.
By no means imagined a senior US official saying this:pic.twitter.com/xHxhRAS611
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) February 14, 2025
Vice President JD Vance and Protection Secretary Hegseth each have vital speeches to come back through the the rest of this journey. We should always hope for related themes to be raised – and for coverage to comply with.
