“If we are talking about strategy, we have to understand the politics behind it”.
The essential message to Allies of National Defense Strategy (NDS 2026) is that whilst it pursues a narrow American national interest it is essentially to their benefit. The conclusion of this essentially US debate is that “he language does not foster the desired outcomes” and that the tone of NDS 2026 is not only disrespectful to allies but positively self-harming to the US because it is a “A boorishly delivered strategy that in places is just plain wrong”.
NDS 2026 “contains too much MAGA thinking” with President Trump presented as “saviour”. It is also a form of collective PTSD after two “forever wars”, brings the culture wars into defence and reflects a real resentment about ‘free-riding Allies’. It also reveals the overarching influence of an all-powerful president who mistakenly believes the business of nations can be reduced to a business transaction.
Priority 1 is to defend the homeland to include the extension of US commercial hegemony over the Western Hemisphere with a re-imagined Monroe Doctrine. Priority 2 is to deter China through strength (albeit with Allies). Priority 3 is to improve the sharing of burdens with ALL Allies both in Europe and the Indo-Pacific in return for “critical but limited support from the US”. Priority 4 is to “supercharge the US defence industrial base.
NDS 2026 also reflects a political conflict in the US AND a deep divide with Canada and European Allies over the purpose of defence – to maintain the rules based order from which all benefit or the pursuit of a narrow national/Trumpian interest (any distinction is unclear). As such, NDS 2026 is not “tough love…but aggressive national commercialism”.
Whilst NDS 2026 suggests Trump is not an isolationist it will dilute the American capacity to “defend forward” with US forces in Europe possibly reduced to as few as 60,000. There is also a “woeful undervalu[ing] of the Russian threat” in NDS 2026. Such is the impact of NDS 2026, allied to comments by Administration officials in Munich, that it has even sparked a debate in Poland about the need for nuclear weapons.
One question concerned the willingness of “the US to do more in Europe today to do less tomorrow” by helping European Allies become more militarily capable. The implications of NDS 2026 are that the US will confront China through deterrence by denial which will put immense pressure on an already over-stretched US force structure.
For Europe, NDS 2026 raises as many questions as it answers. Does the US wish to remain engaged in Ukraine or is it now a European responsibility? Does the US wish to remain the lead in NATO? Is the US still a European ally? Can Europeans still trust Americans? Is the US turning from a global into a regional superpower? Judgement is needed and whilst “Europe must respond it must not over-respond”. Most Americans still support the Alliance and Trump is not America.
First, NDS 2026 is self-harming to the US “because Europe will remain the most important US partner for the foreseeable future and it is worth our involvement”. Second, if Europeans and other Allies become more militarily capable the Americans will lose control over an Alliance that is more not less important to the realisation of American interests.
Dr. Julian Lindley-French