NATO’s ‘Open Door’ Presents Risks for America

In the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Sweden and Finland are considering the pros and cons of joining the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. America should weigh the decision with equal care or risk weakening our own peace and security.Vladimir Putin has threatened to nuclearize the Baltic Sea in the event the two nations join — an empty threat, since he already has bombs in the exclave of Kaliningrad, sandwiched between NATO members Poland and Lithuania.We can’t fall prey to reverse psychology or allow the would-be tsar to dictate to our friends. However, America can be anti-Putin while following President George H. W. Bush’s wise policy of not dancing on the ruins of the Berlin Wall. The trouble is, Washington has long viewed NATO as a club with few requirements for membership — one with “an open-door policy,” as the Biden State Department affirmed this week. Only NATO isn’t the Water Buffalo Lodge, it’s a military alliance whose members pledge under Article V that an attack on one nation means war for all. As the only nation able to project power, that means America does the heavy lifting.Western European nations love to lord their massive welfare states over Americans, never mentioning that our taxpayers free them from spending on defense, leaving plenty of Euros to lavish on social programs.The result is a weaker team in wartime, diluted by members with little incentive to train, maintain, and prepare to fight, and counting on the Kremlin respecting the might of America’s nuclear umbrella.Take tiny Montenegro, the newest NATO member. Overnight in 2017, it became the pipsqueak strutting into a biker bar and telling everyone a hulking big brother has his back.Yet if some drunk sucker-punches Uncle Sam, Montenegro lacks the heft to throw fists. America gained little from pledging to fight for a place few could find on a map, but pledge we did.The student body suffers when colleges offer open enrollment. A third of NATO members fail to meet the threshold of investing 2 percent of gross domestic product on defense: Who wouldn’t join a club that gives so much and asks so little? Sweden and Finland’s defense spending falls below the 2 percent GDP threshold now. They talk about increases in the wake of the war in Ukraine, but why pay when simply signing up for NATO puts the Arsenal of Democracy at their disposal?Once a nation is in NATO, no mechanism exists for removal, which is how we find ourselves committed to the defense of a budding Islamist dictatorship in Turkey, one that’s inching closer to Vladimir Putin.There are definite benefits to relationships with these Nordic nations. Finland’s outstanding conduct in the Winter War against the Soviets and high rate of private gun ownership testify to that.Sweden fields one of the world’s best air forces, and despite tilting toward Nazi Germany early in that conflict, meets NATO’s requirements of being a democratic state that shares our values.There would be nothing to prevent us from supporting them against a Russian attack exactly as we’re aiding non-member Ukraine, or as we defended Kuwait and Kosovo.In his Farewell Address, George Washington suggested just those sorts of “temporary alliances for extraordinary emergencies” while warning posterity to “steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world.” Our first president aimed his warning specifically at the NATO neighborhood: “Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor or caprice?”The question is as important to ask today as it was more than 200 years ago, especially since failing to achieve NATO membership would encourage Swedes and Finns to beef up their militaries.That means more of those feared Finnish snipers that gave the Russians fits, and continued investment in the Swedish armed forces to augment our own, with NATO member Norway acting as a firewall next door.In the past 20 years, America has seen the limits of being the world’s policeman. Let’s think long and hard before adding two new nations to our beat.

NATO’s ‘Open Door’ Presents Risks for America

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