Military officials staying course even as America’s role in NATO faces uncertainty

[Ryan Robertson]

FOR DECADES AMERICA’S ROLE IN NATO WAS UNQUESTIONED.

AS CERTAIN AS DEATH AND TAXES.

THERE WAS NO DOUBT, AGGRESSION IN EUROPE WOULD BE MET BY THE U.S. AND ITS EUROPEAN ALLIES. 

NOW, FOR THE FIRST TIME SINCE ITS INCEPTION IN 1949, THAT COMMITMENT IS COMING INTO QUESTION. AND WHILE NO ONE YET KNOWS EXACTLY WHAT THE FUTURE HOLDS, THE PEOPLE CHARGED WITH MAKING SURE NATO IS READY TO MEET ANY THREAT, REGARDLESS OF THE CURRENT POLITICAL RHETORIC, ARE KEEPING THEIR EYES FOCUSED AT THE TASK AT HAND. 

AND THAT’S THE SUBJECT OF THIS WEEK’S DEBRIEF.

DURING THE FIRST FULL WEEK OF MARCH, A PANEL OF EXPERTS GATHERED IN AN OVERSIZED BALLROOM, IN AURORA, COLORADO, NEARLY SIX THOUSAND MILES AWAY FROM THE FIGHTING IN UKRAINE, TO TALK ABOUT RUSSIA’S ILLEGAL INVASION, AND WHERE THE NORTH ATLANTIC TREATY ORGANIZATION, STANDS TODAY. 

[Tom Goffus, Asst. Sec. General for Ops, NATO]

“At NATO, the role of the ops division is three fold in six words, prevent war, support Ukraine and defend allies to prevent war that NATO has troops in Kosovo and in Iraq and NATO activities that are dynamically managed by SACEUR or on a daily basis in order to prevent Russia and all of Our adversaries from perceiving an advantage in either any geographic domain and any war fighting domain, or in readiness.”

[Ryan Robertson]

THAT’S 32 COUNTRIES, INCLUDING THE UNITED STATES, THAT HAVE SWORN TO PROTECT EACH OTHER AND DEFEND AGAINST BAD ACTORS, LIKE RUSSIA AND VLADIMIR PUTIN. AND, AS TOM GOFFUS (Goff-us) , THE ASSISTANT SECRETARY GENERAL FOR NATO OPERATIONS, DETAILED, EVEN THOUGH UKRAINE ISN’T A NATO NATION, THE RESPONSE TO RUSSIA’S INVASION DIDN’T GO UNCHECKED. 

[Tom Goffus, Asst. Sec. General for Ops, NATO]

“The Ops division underpins the pillars of NATO’s work for Ukraine, including the NATO support and training assistance to Ukraine and Wiesbaden, Germany, the $40 billion pledge for military assistance to Ukraine that all allies made last year in DC, of which in 2024 we hit 51 billion. That’s 11 billion more than was pledged. By the way, almost 60% of that was from non US allies. 

[Ryan Robertson]

BRIGADIR GENERAL ANDREW CLARK IS THE COMMANDING GENERAL FOR NATO INTELLIGENCE, SURVEILLANCE, AND RECONNAISSANCE. HE TOLD ATTENDEES, NO MATTER WHAT’S HAPPENING STATESIDE, FOR TROOPS STATIONED IN EUROPE, THE JOB REMAINS.

[Brig Gen Andrew Clark, CG NATO ISR]

“So the advantage is we provide that unfiltered intelligence to all those nations. And so what I like to tell people is that in the US. We have the DGS system, the distributed common ground system, that that peds, the information that aircraft in the air, that in our Air Force collect, but we do it all in house. We’re one stop shop. We have about 150 analysts on the ground there, and that our products put, we put out about roughly 10,000 products a year is the rate we’re at right now.”

[Ryan Robertson]

FOR OUR EUROPEAN COUTERPARTS, LIKE ITALIAN AIR FORCE LIEUTENANT GENERAL LUIGI DEL BENE (Benny), DEPUTY COMMANDER AND CHIEF OF STAFF FOR OPERATIONAL FORCES OF THE 1ST AIR REGION COMMAND, THE SUCCESS OF THIS DECADES OLD PACT DEPENDS ON MAKING SURE 32 MOVE AS ONE. 

[Lt. Gen. Luigi Del Bene, Italian Air Force]

“So one of the biggest challenge is keeping the nations involved into this process and make sure that we’re synchronized to the all different changes that secure and shape are running every day together with the components. That’s from my perspective. The good part of that is that I’ve seen through the last couple of years definitely more focused leadership on readiness, which it’s it’s a good fact that people are taking this specific function more and more seriously. ”

[Ryan Robertson]

OF COURSE, INVARIABLY, THE CONVERSATION CONTINUED TO RETURN TO UKRAINE, RUSSIA’S ILLEGAL INVASION AND WHAT’S BEEN LEARNED IN THE YEARS SINCE. 

[Brig Gen Andrew Clark, CG NATO ISR]

“Lesson number one, collective action rests on the foundation of shared awareness, and it takes real work to achieve that shared awareness. And unlike in 2014 where ambassadors were arguing, they’re looking at pictures, saying, See, the Russians are in Crimea, and the next ambassador would say, No, that looks like a hunter to me. And as a result, we didn’t do anything, because we didn’t have shared awareness of what was going on. Our 2022 response couldn’t have more been more different than the 2014 response in primary part, due to shared intelligence among allies, especially from the US. And So lesson number two is, it’s not what we do that provokes Putin. It’s what we don’t do. We should have learned that in 2014 and that’s lesson number three, which is Putin is not a strategist. He’s an opportunist. He pushes on some doors, and when nobody pushes back, he walks in what 2014 taught him was, there is no there was no significant consequence for using force. ”

[Ryan Robertson]

AS FOR PRESIDENT TRUMP’S DEMAND NATO NATIONS NEED TO BE SPENDING MORE ON NATIONAL DEFENSE, PART OF THE PROBLEM IS AN INABILITY FOR AMERICAN DEFENSE CONTRACTORS TO MEET THE NEEDS OF THEIR CUSTOMERS. 

[Tom Goffus, Asst. Sec. General for Ops, NATO]

“I talked to a Lithuanian and with their extra percentage of GDP and defense spending, they want to buy amrams for their NASAMS. Five year wait. I talked to the Bulgarian Chad. They want to buy javelins for their strikers. Seven year wait. I talked to some of the big allies who want to buy patriots 10 year wait again. That needs to get fixed. And I know the industry will tell you what we need is long term demand. Well, 10 years sounds like long term demand to me. There is something that we need to get there, in there and fix. 

[Ryan Robertson] 

GIVEN THE CURRENT POLITICAL CLIMATE, THE PANELISTS ALL AKNOWLEDGE THERE ARE NO QUICK FIXES TO ANY OF THE ISSUES FACING NATO PARTNER NATIONS. THE ONE THING THAT SHOULD BE CLEAR, THEY SAY,  IS AN UN-CHECKED RUSSIA WILL MAKE WAVES THAT REACH FAR BEYOND EUROPE, BECAUSE LETTING PUTIN OFF THE HOOK WILL EMBOLDEN CHINA, AND CREATE A NEW SET OF PROBLEMS IN THE PACIFIC.