Category Archives: NATO

Islamic preacher Fethullah Glen is pictured at his residence in Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania, in 2013. REUTERS.

Ted Malloch, President Trumps presumptive pick to be ambassador to the European Union, has reportedly said that he expects the Trump administration to extradite US-based Turkish cleric Fethullah Glen. Here, for example, is a report from Sabah, a paper which Erdogan confiscated, transferred to his son-in-law, and transformed into the Turkish equivalent of the old Soviet Pravda:

US President Donald Trumps potential pick for EU ambassadorship Ted Malloch said that he believes the new US administration will likely extradite Glenist Terror Group (FET) leader Fetullah Glen, saying the new administration will have better relations with Turkey. Speaking in a live, televised interview on Turkish broadcaster NTV on Monday, Malloch said that he believes, [Trump] will get along really well with President [Recep Tayyip] Erdoan. Malloch went on to say that Turkey is a member of NATO and our strategic partner, while emphasizing the importance of Glens extradition and acknowledging that he was behind the July 15 failed coup attempt. He continued by saying that President Trump and his Turkish counterpart have held very constructive meetings over the phone and may meet in person in the coming months.

It is possible that Malloch is just speculating, projecting his own opinion onto Trump, and/or seeking to ingratiate himself with the Turkish press. If he speaks the truth, however, Trump is on the verge of a huge mistake.

Erdogans obsession with and hatred of Glen has many reasons. The basic fact remains, however: While there is much to criticize with regard to the Glen movements past actions, the Turks have yet to offer any proof that Glen himself was involved in the coup. Some soldiers involved were his followers, but others were not, and some may even have been Erdogan supporters. Many of the deaths on the evening of the coup appear to have been caused by snipers or members of SADAT, an Islamist militia run by the man subsequently appointed Erdogans military counselor.

Sacrificing Glen, however, will not bring Turkey in from the cold. The purge in which Erdogan has engaged has been immense. While the pretext might have been rooting out Glens followers, the reality is that Erdogan has used the purge to target secularists, liberals, and those officers whose training and experience in NATO he believes make them prone to oppose his vision and goals for Turkey.

Heres the problem: To appease Erdogan by extraditing Glen might seem like an easy solution to bilateral strains but, in reality, Erdogan would use his return to affirm to the public the wisdom of his purge and justify the arrests after the fact. In effect, Trump would be handing a death sentence not only to Glen but also to hundreds of officers whose only crime was service in NATO.

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Deporting Glen would undercut NATO - American Enterprise Institute

Germany is to increase its army by 5,000 soldiers, the country's defence ministry has announced, bringing the total to 198,000 in 2024, at a time when USpressure is mounting on European Nato members to raise military spending.

The German army faces demands like never before, Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen said in a statement, adding that the army had to be able to respond in an appropriate way to developments abroad and security concerns.

Germany, reluctant for decades after the SecondWorld War to get involved in military missions abroad, has in the last few years become more active in supporting international deployments such as in Afghanistan, Mali and against Islamic State militants.

In January, Germany sent a battlegroup of more than 1,000 to Lithuania as part of a Nato mission to protect its eastern border with Russia in response to its annexation of Crimea and its support for separatists in eastern Ukraine.

It will now dispatch a number of tanks and armoured vehicles to Lithuania to support its existing defence deployment in the country.

On top of the 5,000 extra soldiers, Germany will further add 1,000 civilians posts and about 500 reserves to its ranks at home.

The increase, long flagged by von der Leyen, comes at a time when USPresident Donald Trump is pushing Nato members, especially from Europe, to raise their military spending.

A map showing Nato's military buildup in Eastern Europe (Statista)

The defence alliance in 2014 agreed to end years of defence cuts and meet a target of spending 2 percent of economic output on defence by 2024. German defence spending is currently at 1.22 percent.

A defence ministry spokeswoman said provided the plan goes ahead, the increase would mean additional costs of about 955 million euros ($1.01 billion) per year from 2024.

Reuters

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Germany to expand army and send tanks to Lithuania as Nato ... - The Independent

Many fear electronic voting machines can be hacked and tampered with.

The hacking campaign around the US presidential election, cyberattacks against Ukrain's power grid, and even the internet crippling Mirai botnet DDoS attack all demonstrate how cyberattacks have grown to threaten the very fabric of society itself, NATO has warned.

Citing the impact of high profile incidents like these, Jamie Shea, deputy assistant secretary general for emerging security challenges at NATO, suggests that hackers aren't just a threat to individuals and organisations, but to the fundamental nature of democracy as a whole.

No smoking gun for Russian DNC hacks

The Russian government may have hacked Hillary Clinton's campaign and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) to support Donald Trump's campaign, but there's no hard technical proof.

"Cyber is facilitating more advanced and more effective psychological warfare, information operations, coercion and intimidation attacks. We used to worry about [hackers targeting] banks or credit cards or inconvenience to customers, now we worry about the future of democracy, the stability and health of our institutions," he said, speaking at the European Information Security Summit in London.

Russian-backed interference in the US Presidential election has already caused some other countries to rethink the use of electronic ballot boxes. The Netherlands, for instance, is reverting back to traditional vote tallying by hand due to fears that electronic votes could be manipulated or tampered with.

"It's quite remarkable that the Netherlands is going to have an election and they've decided not to bother with electronic counting. After what happened in the US, the credibility is too risky," said Shea. "We are essentially, with democracy, somewhat losing the faith in the very instruments we've created to spur our economy and spur globalisation."

The attacks against the Democratic National Committee aren't an isolated incident. Shea detailed cases in France and Germany where politicians have been warned of hacking campaigns looking to "destabilise organisations, publicly undermine their reputation, undermine public confidence in the democratic systems and meddle in elections".

German intelligence services have reported attempts to hack into the systems of the Bundestag and the German political parties, while Jean-Yves Le Drian, the French Defence Minister, called all of the French parties together ahead of the Presidential campaign in order provide information about hacks against French political parties.

"Only two sites needed to be hacked in order for Russian intelligence services to acquire compromising data, which they used at judicious points during the campaign to inflict maximum damage," said Shea.

"The threat was not to a bank or an institution or an individual, the threat was to society itself, its ability to function and the trust that we have in the credibility and integrity in our democratic model."

In an effort to combat the threats posed by cyberattacks and hackers, NATO has declared cyber a domain of operation alongside land, air, sea and space. It has also recognised the role it will play in the security of all of those areas, as military equipment and infrastructure will need to be continually updated in order to fight off cyber threats

"All of our current weapons programmes -- whether it be missile defence, joint information reconnaissance, drones, and so on -- have to now retrofit cybersecurity in a way that possibly wasn't planned in the outset," said Shea.

It might be a difficult task to carry out, but NATO must undertake it, to ensure that it has the ability to fight cyber attackers and remain on top.

"There's no doubt that cyber is going to have an impact on our military strategy and if we don't dominate it, then sooner or later an adversary is going to come up with a method to ensure it dominates us," Shea said.

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Cyberattacks threaten democracy itself, warns NATO - ZDNet

Edmonton Sun

Canada's commitment to NATO mission in Poland continues Edmonton Sun Since the operation began in May 2014, about 1,600 Canadian troops have rotated through the region to improve "interoperability" between NATO nations and to act as an "assurance and deterrence measure" against Russian aggression in the region. Edmonton-based soldiers head to Poland for NATO missionGlobalnews.ca all 3 news articles »

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Canada's commitment to NATO mission in Poland continues - Edmonton Sun

February 21 at 6:56 PM

The Feb. 19 editorial A time for Europe to step up noted that the United States is spending more on defense thanmostNATO members and implied that other countries need the United States more than the United States needs them.

Many of these countries came to our aid in Afghanistan after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. Moreover, Russia is building a pipeline and a nuclear power plant in Turkey.If Turkey dropped out of NATO,we couldface a situation in which Russia, whichhas a reliable client state in Syria and a working relationship with Iran, signed a defense pact with all three countries and with Iraq, where Iran has influence. That would allow Russia toextend its influence over the price of oil and could make anymilitary action in the MiddleEast by the United States or Israel extremelyproblematic.

Perhaps we should be more grateful for our NATO partners.

Susan Altman, Washington

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America should be grateful for its NATO partners - Washington Post

U.S. Army vehicles cross the Polish border in Olszyna, Poland, Thursday, Jan. 12, 2017 heading for their new base in Zagan. First U.S. troops arrive in Zagan in western Poland as part of deterrence force of some 1,000 troops to be based here and reassure Poland that is worried about Russias activity. (AP Photo/Czarek Sokolowski)

At a time when Russia is launching cyberattacks against Europe, exploiting the chaos that is President Donald Trumps first month in office and not backing down in Ukraine, NATO seems to be needed more than it has since the end of the Cold War. Though the tone from the White House suggests Europe is a deadbeat partner not paying its fair share of the rent, the reality of the situation is a lot more nuanced.

In short: Europe may be paying its fair share in ways Washington doesnt appreciate. That may need to change as we contemplate the defense needs of the region in 2017 and beyond.

Trump has lamented that NATO is obsolete and that our European allies need to pay their fair share financially. His newly appointed Defense Secretary James Mattis said last week that alliance members must pay at least two percent of their GDPs on defense or face moderated military support from Washington. So far, only five of the 28 alliance members spend two percent or more of their GDP on defense. To be fair, the two percent benchmark was agreed upon by NATO countries themselves in 2006.

First, a few facts on spending. As The Washington Post noted last year, America pays 22 percent to cover NATO directly as an organization, with Europe covering the rest of the costs. That is far less than the lions share Trump talks about. Though when he mentions indirect contributions, he has a point, as The Post reported:

The volume of the US defense expenditure effectively represents 73 per cent of the defense spending of the Alliance as a whole, NATO says in a discussion of indirect funding. This does not mean that the United States covers 73 per cent of the costs involved in the operational running of NATO as an organization, including its headquarters in Brussels and its subordinate military commands, but it does mean that there is an over-reliance by the Alliance as a whole on the United States for the provision of essential capabilities, including for instance, in regard to intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance; air-to-air refueling; ballistic missile defense; and airborne electronic warfare.

Now, I agree that Europe could do a much better job in supporting NATO operations. For example, Belgium sent just six fighter jets and 155 people to Operation Inherent Resolve in Iraq. Many other NATO members have similar contributions that could be improved upon the military front.

That said, national defense doesnt always amount to the number of guns, tanks, fighter jets and troops a nation is ready to deploy. Another reality we have to consider is that America is the overwhelming contributor to NATOs coffers because its military objectives are far larger than, say, Estonia or Slovakia or even France. Context matters.

Heres a few points to consider when we ask Europe to pay its fair share, and what that can and does look like.

Hundreds of thousands of refugees have migrated to Europe over the past five years, most of them coming from Syria since the beginning of its civil war in 2011. In 2015 alone, Germany took in more than one million refugees. Other European countries have taken on the challenge of welcoming refugees that enter Europe by the thousands each day.

America, by comparison, has admitted more than 10,000. While plenty of research exists that shows refugees have not negatively affected the economies of the countries that host them, it still costs substantial sums to integrate this population. Helping refugees find employment, learn the host country language, and making them feel they are part of their adoptive nations society should all count as national security. Trump has complained that Syrian refugees pose a major national security risk to America. Why, then, can we not consider that Europe integrating them into society is one way to counter terrorist organizations propaganda toward them?

Also, what would the consequence be of having thousands of people in Berlin or Paris without a good-paying job? For example, a report in 2016 found that migrants committed or tried to commit more than 69,000 crimes in Germany during the first quarter of last year; most of the crimes were theft or forgery related. Making sure that people who enter Europe have jobs so that they do not resort to a life of crime is a form of security and could be argued as an anti-terrorism measure.

Most Americans cant imagine the challenges Europe has with the influx of refugees. Because of the oceans that insulate the U.S. from most of the world, the migrant crisis has little impact on us so far. Europe is picking up the heavy lifting of hosting refugees, and the continent must constantly fight any propaganda suggesting that ISIS or Al-Qaeda care more about them than their new hosts.

One reason why most of Europe may not pay two percent of its GDP for defense is because its global objectives arent as robust and far-reaching. America has more than 800 military bases in more than 70 countries, making it the most global military on the planet. In comparison, France, Britain and Russia have 30 foreign bases combined.

NATO is primarily financed by the U.S., but Americans almost never go into combat alone. Americas operations in Afghanistan, for example, includes some 13,000 personnel from partner countries. A middle ground could be European nations sending more of its troops to combat missions that help U.S. objectives. This may not be as much a question of military spending as it is of deployment.

We also have to consider how Europe supports its soldiers. As Peter Layton explains in The National Interest, Europe pays for defense in ways we may not have considered:

Americas defense budget also allows for spending on unrelated items. For instance, medical spending consumes nearly 10 percent of the Department of Defense budget. Other nations pay for family and ex-service personnel medical care as part of national health systemsit is not a defense impost.

Additionally, the items within various defense budgets varies considerably. Perhaps 10 percent should be added to allies defense totals to compensate for this difference? Varying accounting approaches allow many ways to game a 2 percent benchmark, and it has already started.

The bottom line is that Europe could certainly be more proactive in contributing to NATOs finances and military missions, but it is not nearly the freeloader the Trump administration suggests it is. A new way of looking at what European NATO members contribute, how it supports its military and how they can help Washingtons long term objectives may fill the economic gap Trumpand prior administrationscomplain about.

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The Truth About Europe Paying Its 'Fair Share' For NATO - Jalopnik

It has been a nervous year, Tom Lehrer once remarked, and people have begun to feel like aChristian Scientist with appendicitis. That was 1965, and he was speaking of the escalation in Vietnam and the Dominican Civil War. With President Donald Trump steering foreign policy, Americans surely know how he felt.

The latest news is that Defense Secretary James Mattis has told NATO allies that if they dont start carrying their weight, the U.S. is going to moderate its commitment to the region. Now, as an abstract matter of principle, Im firmly behind this. Only five NATO countries actually hit their targets, and three of them are a lot poorer than the sponging grifters that have cut their militaries back while enjoying the safety of the U.S. security umbrella.

The freeloading countries dont even send a fruit basket to Washington to say thanks. In fact, as a rightish American whos spent a bit of time abroad, I can personally attest that many of those NATO members citizens feel free to disparage our massive military budget, as if their smaller budgets were some sort of moral sacrifice rather than an unearned benefit paid for by U.S. taxpayers.

There, I got that off my chest. I hope we all feel better.

Nonetheless, even for me, Mattiss statement is a sort of gulp moment. The Europeans arent the only people who benefit from the American security umbrella. The fact that the worlds biggest rich economy is willing to spend so much of its GDP on the military doesnt just mean that other countries dont have to; it also means that other countries dont bother, because they cant possibly catch up.

There are downsides to this. Countries with a big hammer will inevitably end up using it in ways that turn out to be stupid. (See: Iraq.) It also, inevitably means that the security umbrella of the world will be used in ways that the country that owns it likes. (See complaints by every country except the U.S., many of them justified.) But for all that, you can certainly imagine a country with an America-sized military advantage doing much worse things with it. Many worse things. In fact, when you think about alternative histories, were pretty far into the happy zone of the spectrum. Not all the way to utopia, mind you. But a lot better than youd imagine, if youd never heard of the United States of America and you were plotting out your science fiction novel with a dominant, heavily armed nation.

A more evenly multi-polar world would look like -- well, perhaps youre acquainted with a little tiff known to historians as World War I. You may even have read about the exciting sequel they made when the first production turned out to be so great. That was terrifying enough when the nastiest stuff in the worlds arsenal was toxic gas. It gets even more terrifying when you have bombs that can flatten a city or worse.

Unfortunately military spending is the ur-example of what economists call a public good. These provide a benefit to everyone, and once the benefit has been created, it cannot be taken away from anyone.

Imagine a public health campaign that eliminates HIV, wiping it off the face of the planet. Thats an enormous benefit to the world. But if I pay to get rid of HIV, I have no way to charge you for the benefit I provided. Once Ive gotten rid of HIV, you benefit from my investment, whether you pay me back or not.

Public health, defense, crime control -- these are classic public goods because for some people to get the benefit, everyone has to. Unfortunately, the optimal self-interested strategy is therefore to let other people pay for the stuff, while you free ride. If everyone practices the optimal strategy, no one gets the benefit. Enter government, which has to secure these things, if were going to have them, and force everyone to pay the bill.

Thats fine for crime, because its effects are local and the cost of management relatively moderate. If the Topeka City Council figures out a way to wipe out crime, theres probably very little spillover effect in San Luis Obispo, and zero cost to San Luis Obispoans. But in the case of plagues and national defense, we can run into a problem, which is that the effects are very large, and the investment required can be huge. Imagine that we didnt treat national defense as a federal responsibility, and handed it to the states. Maine and Texas would have gigantic militaries; places like Connecticut and Oregon might have sizeable Coast Guards. But the rational military budget for a place like Nebraska would be pretty close to zero. Because border states are of limited size and financial capacity, the militaries of those places would probably be smaller than everyone would like, even as the proud people of Montana labored under gruesome taxes to protect Coloradans from the fearsome Canadian horde.

In fact, you see this problem with NATO. Of the five countries that are actually pulling their weight, only two can be said to be doing so for reasons that arent strictly rational self-interest (the U.S. and Britain). The other three -- Greece, Poland and Estonia -- border non-NATO countries and are pretty worried about future conflict with a military power that meets or exceeds their own. The problem is that neither Poland nor Estonia could ever even remotely hope to repel a Russian invasion. If the U.S. gets fed up with its NATO partners and withdraws, Germany would be depending on the Poles to fend off any Russian aggression -- or hoping that Russia got sick of all the winning after they took Poland and stopped there. (See: World War II.)

Military capacity takes time to build up; even the famous mobilizations of the 20th century were built around a core of officers who had spent their lives thinking about little things like the best tactics to repel invasions, and how to transport large numbers of troops and supporting items to the front while keeping them in condition to fight, and how to get people to overcome their self-interest to pick up a gun and run into harms way.

Only the U.S. has consistently invested so much in this buildup. Because the U.S. has decided to provide this public good of military protection to much of the world, other countries have let those skills atrophy. If the U.S. actually decided to become isolationist, other countries might quickly become willing to assume its military roles, but would not immediately be able to. Pouring money into the defense budget now will not create the majors and lieutenant colonels and generals you need; those arise only if you invested in lieutenants years back.

All of humanity now benefits from this public good: a world in which major wars are pointless. No government except the U.S. can possibly provide that. (Even if you think youd fancy a world policed by China better, its economy does not yet throw off enough surplus to play lone superpower, and neither does Russias.) Multilateral institutions can step into the breach somewhat, but multilateral institutions dont have the same taxing power that a territorial state does, and it shows. All NATO can really do is complain that members arent meeting their targets. The U.S., as the member picking up the tab, can threaten to pull out if other states don't contribute more. But following through on that threat would hurt us as well as them.

Given those two choices, Ill grit my teeth and pay the taxes and practice my frozen smile for my next trip to Europe. But if Trump makes the other choice, then I, like everyone else in the world, will have to live with the result.

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

To contact the author of this story: Megan McArdle at mmcardle3@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Philip Gray at philipgray@bloomberg.net

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Tragedy of the Public Good: Why the U.S. Shouldn't Quit NATO ... - Bloomberg

PRISTINA, Kosovo A senior NATO commander has assured Kosovo that the military alliance will maintain troops in the Balkan country "for as long as it's necessary."

NATO's Supreme Allied Commander for Europe, Gen. Curtis Scaparrotti, met with local officials and Western ambassadors during a visit Tuesday to Kosovo.

Some 4,500 troops from 31 countries have been deployed in Kosovo since June 1999, after NATO's 78-day air campaign to stop a bloody Serbian crackdown against ethnic Albanian separatists. Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, but Serbia has not recognized it as a country.

"We will keep in place a flexible, determined presence and will make changes only when the security situation allows. KFOR remain a robust and credible force, capable of carrying out its mission for as long as it's necessary," Scaparrotti said.

He also expressed concern about Russia's attempted influence in the region "particularly in the media with disinformation, political influence, etc."

Earlier this month, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg also visited Kosovo to urge it and Serbia to normalize their ties. Tensions between Kosovo and Serbia have been building again after a series of inflammatory incidents.

Serbia, backed by Russia, has also sought to maintain influence in Kosovo's north, where most of the country's Serb minority lives.

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NATO general: Troops will stay in Kosovo as long as needed - Minneapolis Star Tribune

The US is preparing to deploy 1,000 troops and vehicles to northeastern Poland by the end of March to reassure Nato'sEastern European allies in the face of rising tension with Russia.

The unit, which will be part of 4,000 US troops deployed in rotation along Nato's eastern flank, will be located at Orzysz,Deutsche Wellereports.

The town sits 85 miles from Russia's Kaliningrad exclave, which is wedged between Poland and Lithuania.

Poland's leaders hold ceremony to welcome US troops as part of Nato build-up

It comes after Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov described NATO as a "Cold War institution" whose expansion had led to unprecedented tensions in Europe over the past thirty years.

Worried since Russia's 2014 seizure of Ukraine's Crimea that Moscow could invade Poland or the Baltic states, Nato is bolstering its eastern flank with troops, war games and warehoused US equipment ready for a rapid response force of up to 40,000 personnel.

A map showing Nato's military buildup in Eastern Europe (Statista)

The first German troops have arrived in Lithuania, where Berlin is leading a battalion of some 1,000 troops.

From around April, Britain will head the deterrent force in Estonia, while Canada is deploying in Latvia and US troops are arriving in Poland and across the Baltics.

Kremlin officials claim the build-up is the largest since the Second World War andsayit threatens the stability of central Europe.

Russia has some 330,000 troops amassed in its Western military district around Moscow, Nato believes.

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US to deploy 1,000 troops to Poland as Russian foreign minister ... - The Independent

Nikki Haley, US Ambassador to the United Nations, speaks at a Security Council meeting on February 21, 2017 at the UN Headquarters in New York City (AFP Photo/KENA BETANCUR)

United Nations (United States) (AFP) - US Ambassador Nikki Haley on Tuesday said the United States is ready to improve ties with Russia but will not compromise on its support for NATO and the European Union.

Haley told a Security Council debate on conflicts in Europe that "Russia's attempts to destabilize Ukraine" were among the most serious challenges facing the continent.

"The United States thinks it's possible to have a better relationship with Russia - after all, we confront many of the same threats," Haley said.

"But greater cooperation with Russia cannot come at the expense of the security of our European friends and allies."

The remarks came as European governments are seeking reassurance after US President Donald Trump applauded Britain's decision to leave the European Union, criticized NATO members over burden-sharing and praised Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Haley said the United States was committed to "the institutions that keep Europe safe" and that it "will not waver" in its support for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

The United States wants to deepen cooperation within NATO while "keeping the door open to new allies," she said.

Enlarging NATO has been a major bone of contention with Russia, which sees any expansion of the military alliance in eastern Europe as a policy of containment directed against Moscow.

Haley described US ties with the European Union as "deep and enduring" and said differences with European governments should not be seen as a shift in US support.

"No one should misinterpret occasional policy differences and debates as a signal of anything less than total commitment to our alliances in Europe. That commitment is strong," she said.

The ambassador stressed that the US and the EU were united in the view that sanctions against Russia would remain in place until Russia returns Crimea to Ukrainian rule.

A recent flareup of fighting in east Ukraine "show the consequences of Russia's ongoing interference in Ukraine," said the US ambassador.

Haley said Russia's decision to recognize passports issued by separatists in Ukraine's Lugansk and Donetsk regions was "another direct challenge in the efforts to bring peace to eastern Ukraine."

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Trump's envoy at UN warns Russia US stands firm on NATO, EU - Yahoo News