Should NATO "Ditch Cold War Playbook"?

by JASmius



I know, I know, "generals are always fighting the last war," I get that.  But ditch the Cold War playbook in favor of,,,,,what?:

U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter will urge NATO allies to "dispose of the Cold War playbook" during a trip to Europe this week, as the alliance adapts to a new kind of threat from Russia in the east and Islamic State to the south, U.S. officials said.

I'll grant you that ISIS is a "new kind of threat" in Cold War context, but not in the more recent "War on Terror" paradigm, which this Regime is flatly refusing to fight because it attained power in the first place by relentlessly condemning the successful Bush43 playbook that was defeating it.

But is the threat from Putin's Russia really new, or is it simply adapted to the reality of starting from a much lower and weaker platform?

Carter heads first to Berlin, where he is expected to call for a more muscular global security role from Germany, Europe's largest economy. Germany remains hesitant to deploy troops abroad, seven decades after the end of World War Two.

"He will encourage Germany, under the firm leadership of the minister of defense, to increase their security role in the world, commensurate with their political and economic weight," a senior U.S. defense official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

I seem to recall that there was a very good reason why we wanted the Germans to not be "muscular" about their "global security role".  Two of them in the previous century, as I recall my history,  And given Germans' growing hostility to NATO itself, encouraging them to deploy troops willy-nilly doesn't sound like such a hot idea.

U.S. officials say Ukraine has illustrated the importance of being able to counter "hybrid warfare," the blend of "unidentified" troops, propaganda and economic pressure that the West says Russia has used there. NATO's historic focus had been the conventional threats of the Cold War, which ended in 1991.

....with American victory.  One brought about by President Reagan's "ditching the detente playbook" by using a blend of "unidentified troops," propaganda and economic pressure to bring down the Soviet Union in under a decade.  In essence, you could conclude that Czar Vlad is simply adapting Reagan's tactics and turning them against us now that the Gipper's mirror opposite is in the White House.

So, Ash....counter it.  Provide direct economic and military assistance to the Ukrainians.  Start exporting liquified natural gas to the Euros to break Putin's economic leverage over them.  Preposition serious military hardware in the Baltic States and the former Warsaw Pact vassal states instead of boutique forces.  Checkmate Vlad and deter him by rendering him unable to attain his strategic objectives,  And for God's sake, stop raising his sights by your boss's six and a half year pattern of relentless, feckless retreat.

But no.  Ash Carter's brilliant idea is more of the same out of the tired, discredited Obama playbook: Get everybody else to do our fighting for us, whether they're our friends or not.  More "lead from behind".  Embolden our enemies by our stubborn refusal to lead.  More global chaos which will inevitably boomerang against us.

More of the Obama Doctrine.

Thanks, but I'll take the "Cold War playbook" any day of the week and twice on Sunday.