Most of Anatol Lieven’s post at The American Conservative is devoted to some clarifications of Russia’s recent provocative air activities but I thought his concluding paragraph was worth taking note of:
Instead of trying to trap the U.S. into a commitment to Ukraine involving the permanent risk of war with Russia—with all the long-term dangers and costs to the U.S. that would follow—European governments should be steadily and sensibly building up the defenses of NATO within its existing borders while at the same time developing a viable peace settlement by which Russia would abandon its impossible demands to Ukraine in return for a new European security architecture guaranteeing Russia’s own legitimate security interests. Of such European thinking, however, there is at present very little sign.
The following graph, courtesy of the World Bank, illustrates Germany’s defense spending over the last 65 years.
In 2024 Germany spent 2% of its GDP on defense for the first time in more than 30 years. The area I’ve shaded illustrates the shortfall in Germany’s spending.
There is such a thing as defense infrastructure. Spending 2% of GDP in one year is not enough. I don’t know that Germany needs to spend 2% every year to make up for more than 30 years of neglect. It might. But it’s surely going to require something.
Now repeat that exercise for all of NATOs members. The sums involved are daunting.
Also, see Wolfgang Munchau’s post at UnHerd:
The Cold War was a period of relative stability not only because of balance-of-power politics, but because politicians who experienced the horrors of the Second World War wanted to secure peace. Most of that generation is no longer with us. Like Weber, today’s European elites have missed out on the opportunity to fight a glorious war. The difference is that they would prefer to let others do the fighting for them.
The likelihood of an escalation into a hot war is big enough to be taken seriously. Apart from a general war-hungry disposition, the biggest risk today is that we, like those Germans in 1914, are misjudging the enemy. Putin, too, misjudged the Western response to his invasion of Ukraine, and the resilience of the Ukrainian army. But the Western misjudgements are more persistent.
The biggest of all was that Russia’s economy was weak and would ultimately buckle under Western pressure. This misjudgement has several layers. It started off with a statistical lie — that Russia was really only a small economy. If you measure the size of the Russian economy by its annual output in US dollars, that would have indeed been the case. At the start of the war, the Russian economy was approximately the size of Spain’s if measured in US dollars. But this is not a good way to judge a country’s capacity in times of war. What matters is the spending power of their money — how many tanks their money can buy. The answer is they can buy a lot more tanks than us.
Of course, the Russian economy was never as small as Spain’s. It is the fourth largest economy in the world, after China, India, and the US, and ahead of Japan and Germany (both of which are shrinking).
Moreover, in the economy of real things, not services, e. g., ores, metals, food, lumber, energy, manufactures, et al., Russia’s economy is 4 to 5 times that of Germany, 10 times that of the UK, and at least 70% of the US’.
The Russian manufacturing sector is about the same size as ours, and it is autarkic in all necessary items. The US’ manufacturing sector is an incoherent mishmash of products. The US military imports parts for its “advanced” weapons from China. That is a significant step backwards from a generation ago, when the then new F15’s depended on Japanese chips.
And yet, our leaders, embroiled in a proxy war with Russia, are eager for a war with China, too. They think Russia and China are separate problems. Pace Palin, but Russia is less than 3 miles from the US, a Pacific power, and a Chinese ally.
Our own policies have helped wreck European economies, and are on the verge of wrecking American agriculture—no beans, corn, or sorghum to China. We are in the backseat, cheering Tina and Louise as they drive off the cliff.
Don’t whine to me about Trump. No President has controlled foreign policy since Kennedy was killed for trying. This is a Deep State fiasco.
Another factor in building Fortress Europa, is that many Europeans don’t want to serve in the military nor are they interested in dying for it. Remember patriotism is very much frowned upon except for Eurovision and Sport.
Meh. Russia’s central bank rate is at 17% and has hovered around 20%. Inflation has been between 8%-10% over the last year. I dont think those numbers are sustainable for too long. Their saving grace is they started with lower debt levels.
Steve
Russia indeed maintained a large defense industry, but it’s not big enough for the level of attrition this war is inflicting. The level of autarky Bob mentions is helpful, but far from sufficient for Russia’s needs. And there are real trade-offs when so much of Russia’s GDP is allocated to the war effort.
They are dependent on China for key technology and components, and have turned to “allies” like North Korea and Iran for weapons, munitions, and even personnel.
And, like a lot of countries in war, they went to war with the military and industrial base they had, not the one they turned out to need. They certainly didn’t plan or intend for this to be a multi-year meatgrinder.
As for NATO’s commitment to self-defense, we’ll have to see what happens. The US has been telling NATO that it cannot continue to be both the primary frontline force and the strategic reserve for a very long time now. The Trump shock factor and the Ukraine war seems to have broken some sclerosis, but as Dave mentions in the OP, the commitment must be sustained to be real and serious.
The more I look at Europe and NATO, the more I’ve come to conclude that it is primarily about maintaining peace within NATO and among NATO members, with the US as the linchpin. If the US plays a significantly smaller role and is no longer the dominant power and leader, then infighting begins. That’s the fear, anyway. I take that more seriously now than I used to.
Let’s not forget that so much of the Russian economy is still built on their oil/energy industry. By report, Ukraine is hitting that pretty hard and Russia now has gas lines and rationing with rising prices in some places. Ukraine’s drone industry is accelerating and they are now successfully attacking refineries a thousand kilometers away.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/czx020k4056o
Steve