Leiden University
Crisis And Security Management
Master’s Thesis
Has the Trump administration triggered a fundamental change
in US-EU transatlantic security relations?
An analysis of change and continuity in the US-EU
security relationship
Bosse Loosveld
June 2019
S2411202
b.h.loosveld@umail.leidenuniv.nl
Supervisor: Prof. Dr. J. A. Koops Second reader: Dr. T. Abbas
Abstract:
This master’s thesis is an evaluation of change and continuity within the security relationship between the United States and the European Union. An evaluation is made whether president Trump and his administration have fundamentally changed this security relationship. Focus has been on three specific issues: burden-sharing in NATO, US attitudes towards the International Criminal Court, and the Iran Nuclear Deal (JCPOA). The rhetoric and policies of previous US presidential administrations are compared to those of Trump and the European Union. It is concluded that despite president Trump’s blunt rhetoric, his actual policies have not (yet) departed significantly from those of his predecessors. Only with Trump’s withdrawal from the Iran Nuclear Deal, can one argue that Trump’s administration has broken with the policies of the Obama administration and that this could potentially threaten the US-EU security relationships in a fundamental manner in the years to come.
Despite president Trump’s isolationist tendencies and his blunt rhetoric, a modern democratic nation like the USA with strong legal and political checks-and-balances and strong (independent) institutions, facing a world with many transnational security issues, cannot implement an overarching isolationist doctrine. This confirms the theory of Dombrowski and Reich (2017).
Acknowledgements:
I would like to thank Prof. Dr. J. Koops for providing direction when needed. I would also like to thank my parents for their unending support and encouragement, and for enduring untold hours of political discussions.
Table of Contents
1.0 Introduction
...
4
1.1 Problem Outline ...5 1.2 Research Question ...6 1.3 Relevance ...62.0 Theoretical Framework
...
8
2.1 Concepts ...8 2.2 Causal Relationships ...133.0 Methodology
...
15
3.1 Data Collection ...153.2 Data Evaluation Methodology ...18
3.3 Data Limitations ...18
3.4 Research Layout ...19
4.0 Data
...
20
The US-EU Security Relationship ...20
4.1 Case One: North Atlantic Treaty Organization ...22
4.2 Case Two: International Criminal Court ...33
4.3 Case Three: Iran ...37
5.0 Evaluation
...
42
5.1 Case One: North Atlantic Treaty Organization ...44
5.2 Case Two: International Criminal Court ...48
5.3 Case Three: Iran ...50
5.4 Is President Trump Fundamentally Different? ...52
6.0 Conclusions
...
56
7.0 References
...
59
8.0 Appendix 1
...
68
1.0 Introduction
This research will assess whether the international relationship between the United States of America (US/USA) and the European Union (EU) has fundamentally changed since the handover to the Trump administration, or whether, rhetoric aside, the actual policy changes have been relatively minor. Ever since World War One, well before there was a European Union, the United States and the western countries of Europe have had a very close relationship. Throughout the decades, the US and these European countries have been steadfast allies and have jointly faced many international crises, the main ones being the two twentieth-century World Wars and the Cold War, but also many smaller, regional challenges (Fig. 1). While this international relationship has endured tumultuous times, with regular political tensions and disagreements, it has been stable throughout. Both the US and many EU member states refer to it as ‘the transatlantic relationship’ (Jones, 2004; Bindi, 2019). This transatlantic relationship, documented in the Transatlantic Declarations on EC-US Relations (Transatlantic Declaration, 1990, 1995), has driven development of democratic values, human rights, peace and stability, and economic prosperity across the world, and its importance is therefore hard to overstate.
Given the vast complexity of both the US and EU governments, their relationship and the relationships between the individual EU member states and the US, this research has been limited to the international security aspect of the US-EU relationship. The bedrock of the transatlantic security relationship is formed by integrated policy ambitions, joint policy development, official treaty ratifications, military cooperation. However, political rhetoric has also continuously played a role, as it can act as an effective policy tool stirring other parties into action. Rhetoric by itself can drive change, and as such it can be a powerful policy tool by itself.
There is a widespread perception that president Trump’s public, non-diplomatic and often inflammatory rhetoric has disrupted many international relations including the transatlantic relationship. This thesis sets out to differentiate the rhetoric and short-term, reversible, incremental and minor disruptions from the fundamental, i.e. the more material, more long-term and more irreversible, policy changes. It is important here to differentiate the external changes which would have led to policy changes irrespective of the Trump administration versus changes solely due to the transition of the Obama administration to the Trump administration.
Serious international security issues of interest here are, for example, those dealing with Iranian nuclear proliferation, North Korean nuclear disarmament, Syrian post-war stability, energy security for northern Europe, NATO member states’ commitment to contribute a minimum of two percent of national budgets (GDP) on defense, potential regime change in Venezuela but also underlying security tensions that may exacerbate the current economic trade conflicts between the USA and China. Policy data, but also rhetoric from US presidents and their administrations, has been collected, both for the current Trump presidential term and for the periods before that. An evaluation of this data, carefully checking whether
any potential changes are fundamental, provides a clear picture of change versus continuity within the US/EU security relationship during the Trump presidency.
1.1 Problem Outline
There has been a growing perception that the relationship between the United States and the European Union has been steadily deteriorating since the election of Donald Trump as president of the USA. We no longer seem to have the strong, stable and mutually beneficial relationship that grew from the aftermaths of the First and Second World War. The willingness to cement collaboration in international institutes and treaties, and take joint actions seems to be on the decline.
Events like Brexit and the election of Donald Trump to the presidency of the US have resulted in, at the very least the appearance of, a more volatile political climate with more inward-looking, nationalistic and isolationist tendencies. There clearly are significant disagreements and tensions within the political leadership of both the US and the EU. In the USA, the 2016 election campaign between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton was widely considered to be the most heated and divisive in recent decades. They held very different viewpoints, but it is important to note that they also each represented a part of an already strongly divided electorate: political polarization of the USA had been an ongoing process for decades, and, as such, Trump may represent an evolutionary trend rather than a revolutionary break. In Europe, many EU member states are currently dealing with internal political issues, rising anti-EU sentiments and growing frustrations with what is seen as a lack of political representation. Many EU member states have seen changes to their governments and parliaments, reflecting growing euro-skeptic electorates.
There has also been political friction with regards to each other. For example, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership proposal (TTIP) attracted strong criticism in many European countries (European Citizens’ Initiative, 2017; negotiations were finally halted in 2018 by president Trump). In its turn, the Trump administration has made certain policy changes which have challenged some foundational aspects of the US-EU relationship. For example, president Trump overturned policies from the Obama administration in having the US pull out of the Paris Agreement and the Iran Nuclear Deal (Riddervold & Newsome, 2018). Beyond actual policy changes, president Trump is also very vocal in insisting NATO membership countries ramp up their defense budgets to 2% of their national budgets (GDP), and has even questioned NATO’s article 5 (‘an attack on one is an attack on all'). The messages from Trump’s rhetoric are not always consistent, though, and his rhetoric is not always followed up by actual policy changes.
This thesis sets out to evaluate whether the Trump administration has triggered a fundamental change in the US-EU security relationship. It is important therefore to distinguish rhetoric from documented policy. Are changes dominantly rhetoric and not followed up by official policy change implementation? Are they short-term, reversible, incremental and minor disruptions or are they more
fundamental, i.e. the more material, more long-term and more irreversible policy changes? To what extent are the US and the EU drifting apart?
1.2 Research Question
This work focuses on the primary research question: Has the Trump administration triggered a
fundamental change in US-EU international security relations? ‘Fundamental’ in this respect refers to
changes which are non-incremental and significant (i.e. effect the security of multiple countries in a major way), have long-term impacts, and an element of irreversibility.
There are several secondary questions that will support the primary research question: • Which international security policies have been jointly signed by the USA and the EU? • What are the changes in rhetoric regarding the transatlantic security relationship? • What are the changes in policy regarding the transatlantic security relationship? • What are the areas of continuity from pre-Trump administrations?
• Are there elements of fundamental change in the way the Trump administration handles certain current international security hotspot issues?
• Are the USA and the European Union drifting apart? In what sense?
1.3 Relevance
Societal Relevance: are the USA and the EU drifting apart?
There is a growing concern that neither the US nor the EU can afford to appear divided and vulnerable. Russia is still widely considered a primary threat to stability of the EU. In recent years, Russian forces have militarily invaded and annexed territory from two independent sovereign nations, Georgia in 2008 and Ukraine in 2014 (Khidasheli, 2011; Gedmin, 2014). This concerned many EU member states and put several Eastern European nations in a heightened state of alert and military readiness. In Europe, some fear that Europe is facing the future alone, without as much of the historical support and backing of the US military, economic and even soft power, that it has relied on. China is also aggressively building its sphere of influence, and it may need to be held in check by strong and common US/EU policies (Weitz, 2011). And there are other international security issues (e.g. Iran, North Korea) which the USA and the EU used to jointly approach, but where during the Trump term differences have arisen between the USA and the EU. It is therefore important to assess whether the USA and the EU are really drifting apart, and if so, to what degree.
Evaluating why and to what degree the US-EU security relationship is changing, may help US and European policy-makers better design and transform their institutions, procedures and policies in order to adapt to, or reverse, these changes. It is vital for governments to constantly remain vigilant for changes to the geopolitical landscape, and to be able to adapt quickly to, or reverse, changes in international relationships. Due to the highly complicated nature of democratically accountable institutions and their
international activities, adapting to any sudden shift in direction takes time and effort. Even a relatively predictable yet politically quick change in course such as that of the Trump administration’s new perspective on the Iran Nuclear Deal is something that other governments (and companies) have to dedicate significant resources to in order to effectively adapt to in a timely manner. It is highly advantageous for any government or supranational institution to be as capable as possible at recognizing changing geopolitical conditions and relationships and to adapt to these changes. Simply assuming that the Trump administration will be short-lived, and that thereafter all will return to ‘normal’ may not be wise, given potential underlying, and more long-term, agents-for-change.
Evaluating longer-lasting trends within the US-EU relationship, will allow for a better understanding of that which binds the US-EU relationship and that which divides the US and the EU. An improved knowledge of the strengths of the US-EU relationship can then be used to better design and implement efforts to improve the components of the US-EU relationship which are not performing as well.
Academic Relevance: restrictions to fundamental change in the 21st century
Trump’s inflammatory rhetoric might suggest he is drastically breaking with the past and political observers are searching for a grand, coherent, overriding strategy (doctrine), explaining an underlying logic to US behavior. A more important question, however, should be: can any president even implement such a grand strategy at all? Dombrowski and Reich (2017) argue that implementation of such an overarching strategy cannot be achieved anymore as external events and internal checks-and-balances inevitably lead to reactive behavior. Externally, for example, Trump had to retrace on his claim that he could coerce China to reign in North Korea’s nuclear ambitions: China’s ruler Xi Jinping explained that China’s influence was limited (BBC, 2017). An internal example of checks-and-balances is the US courts curtailing a president’s capacity to use executive orders: Trump’s ban on overseas visitors from dominant Islamic countries (executive order 13769, superseded by 13780) has been only partially supported by the US Supreme Court (Shear, 2017). Dombrowski and Reich’s (2017) hypothesis is that in the globalized world with a multitude of transnational issues (terrorism, crime, migration, cyber-warfare, regional military conflicts, etc), and a strong system of internal checks-and-balances with ingrained institutions and behaviors, an ‘America-First’ isolationist policy, no matter how strong president Trump’s isolationist tendencies may be, cannot be implemented. This thesis also sets out to check that hypothesis.
Out of Scope
This thesis will not assess whether the theory that international coalitions tend to form and strengthen under duress and relax and weaken under times of (perceived) tranquility holds (McInnis, 2013; Eisentrout, 2017).
2.0 Theoretical Framework
2.1 Concepts
International Security Alliance
An international security alliance is defined here as a set of agreements between two or more states for cooperation with a focus towards mutual security concerns. Alliances can be both formal and informal. An example of an informal alliance is the Canadian–US defense and security arrangements that were active from 1955 until 2005 (Kimball, 2017). An example of a formal alliance, defined by signed treaties and cemented by annual Summit Meetings, is the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).
Transatlantic Relationship
The ‘transatlantic relationship’ is the term given to the geopolitical relationship between the United States of America and the European Union and its Member States (occasionally, this term, or the term ‘special relationship’ relates to the US-UK relations, but that is not how the term is used in this report). It has been formulated in successive Transatlantic Declarations on EC-US Relations (European Parliament, 1990, 1995) and has been instrumental in economic globalization and the development of democratic and liberal values. The transatlantic relationship between Europe and the United States has been among the most stable and positive of diplomatic relationships for most Western nations (Freedman, 1982). It dates back to the early days of exploration of the North American continent. Already during the 17th and 18th
centuries, international trade between Europe and America blossomed (at first heavily centered around the slave trade). France supported the early US settlers in the American Revolutionary War (1775-1783) and in 1778 it was the first country to recognize the new nation (Gray, 2017; Smith, 2018; The Netherlands were second). Over the centuries America and Europe developed deep and broad trading and military relationships.
Atlanticism
Primarily, ‘atlanticism’ is used to label support for alliances between the nations surrounding the northern Atlantic Ocean. As such, the term is referring to the close cooperative relationships between North American and European nations with regards to economic, political and military matters (Croci, 2008). More recently, however, ‘new’ atlanticism has been used to describe a system of military alliances to gain control over weaker nations: it illustrates a change within the military alliance towards “a total community, encompassing far more than security” (Sakwa, 2015).
NATO
In 1949, the transatlantic relationship was further cemented by forming NATO. It was originally formed by 12 founding nations: the USA and 11 European nations. Subsequently, 17 other western nations joined. The 29 nation signatories to the NATO alliance agreement have committed to a mutual defense policy. Originally designed to counter-act the continued threat of communist expansion coming from the USSR and its Eastern European satellite states, and specifically to dissuade a Soviet invasion
into Europe, participation in NATO is essentially a promise by member states to come to the aid of any member state that is attacked.
NATO’s Article Five
NATO’s article five of the treaty states that “[the] parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all” (NATO, 1949; Griffiths & O’Callaghan, 2002). This article is the core reason for the existence of NATO. Article 5 has only been invoked once: within 24 hours of the 9/11 terror attack in the USA, its NATO allies invoked Article 5 (NATO, 2018a).
Fundamental Change
‘Fundamental’ change in this thesis is used to describe change which is defined by three elements. First, it must be relatively significant. Second, it must have fairly long-term impacts. And third, it must have an element of irreversibility. Fundamental change does not have to be implemented abruptly: it can slowly develop (‘scope creep’). Also, fundamental change does not have to be widely appreciated. In fact, the general public may not even be aware of it: classified government work, known to only to political leaders and their top advisors, can lead to fundamental change. Fundamental change does not have to be formally documented in formal statements or agreements: rhetoric can also trigger fundamental change: “individual effort can be rendered meaningful even as it remains embedded within circumstances and institutions beyond the capacity of any one individual to control” (Jenco, 2007).
Rhetoric
It would be a mistake therefore to dismiss Trump’s strongly-worded messages as ‘just rhetoric’. Words matter. Rhetoric is a foreign policy tool in its own right. Rhetoric can be effective and persuasive and can force other countries into action, even though it may not be backed up by formal policy documents. In fact, rhetoric can trigger fundamental change. Nonetheless, crucial to this research is the distinction between rhetoric and officially documented policies. Rhetoric in this thesis is not opposed to official policy definition, rather it is part of it. According to Gottweis (2006) “[r]hetoric is broadly acknowledged as an important feature of the political process. Often associated with the art of persuasion, rhetoric is typically defined as an integral moment of policy making, and the idea of rhetoric points to the necessity to convince, persuade, and communicate efficiently in the context of shaping and implementing public policies. A highly publicized national speech given by a country’s president can set the agenda in a policy field, push decision making into a particular direction, or put pressure on policy makers of all parties”. In fact, many US presidential doctrines (Fig. 1), or grand strategies, were announced and shaped during major presidential announcements and speeches.
Policy
A government policy is a deliberate set of principles or plans. As defined above, policies can be both formal and informal. On one end of the spectrum, a policy can be cemented in legislation within a
country and/or a ratified treaty between countries, but a policy can also be implemented by an individual. For example, in the USA, policies can be initiated and executed by the president, acting within the freedom of the president’s executive mandate (by presidential decree).
Sovereignty
Sovereignty is the right of a state to govern itself. Therefore, only states (or nations) can attain sovereignty. Sovereign states must have territory, people, and a government. A state must claim its sovereignty through its constitutional independence. Other states must recognize such sovereign status under international law. In international law, a sovereign state is legally equal to all other sovereign states. This legal equality means that "[t]he fact that every sovereign member state, irrespective of differences in substantial powers, has one vote in the UN general assembly is a concrete expression of this legal equality” (Sørensen, 1999). Such legal equality between states can severely conflicts with real power inequality between them. International treaties can also cause conflict with the sovereignty of a state (see e.g. chapters 4.2 and 5.2 on the ICC).
International Treaties and their Ratifications
International treaties are agreements between governments. When formulating such agreements, government will typically send a delegation to represent their interests. Once a framework for the agreement is in place, the head of the delegation may sign their nations into the treaty. At this stage, however, most treaties are not yet legally binding (Treaty Affairs, 1994). For that, government approval is necessary. A treaty becomes legally binding only when an individual government has agreed to its ratification (NL Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 2018). International security treaties can define joint policies, such as defining the boundaries of an appeasement policy (for example the chemical weapons attack ‘red line’ of Obama during the Syrian Civil War) or imposing sanctions (such as against the North Korean regime or Iranian leadership).
Appeasement
Appeasement is the policy whereby it is assumed that (deterioration of) conflicts can be avoided by making concessions to the adversary, often a hostile nation. A frequently quoted example is Neville Chamberlain’s agreement to the Munich Accord in 1938, allowing for the German annexation of Sudetenland. Appeasement strategies are often criticized by security ‘hawks’ who argue that “capitulating to [a hostile nation’s] demands simply feeds their thirst for power” (Griffiths & O’Callaghan, 2002) and may give legitimacy to rogue nations. Appeasement, which is more readily applied by proponents of soft-power, diplomatic policies (the ‘doves’) is opposed to sanctions, which are part of a more coercive ‘hard-power’ policy toolbox.
Sanctions
Sanctions have been defined as “reactions adopted unilaterally or collectively by the States against the perpetrator of an internationally unlawful act in order to ensure respect for and performance of a right
or obligation” (Decaux, 2008). Sanctions are relatively widely used, especially in cases when direct physical military intervention is not possible or not (yet) advisable. Sanctions are often used as a means of exerting international pressure specifically because it provides another option to avoid or postpone military action. A common form of international sanctions is economic in nature. This is when a nation, or individuals within that nation, are prevented from engaging in (types of) business with other countries. Sanctions are not perfect, as one significant disadvantage is that they involuntarily may punish the inhabitants of the embargoed country and/or other countries (Hailbronner, 1992). Ultimately, sanctions are still dependent on the “voluntary cooperation of the contracting parties” (Kunz, 1960).
Appeasement and sanctions are only two policy tools that a nation or an alliance of nations can choose. Policy tool selection, however, will not only depend on the situation at hand but also on the overall policy direction that a nation is embarked upon (or the ‘mood’ that a nation is in collectively). End-member policies can be isolationism versus interventionism, and realism versus (idealistic) internationalism/globalism (US presidential doctrines in Fig. 1).
Isolationism
Isolationism is a political ‘introvert’ ideology central to which is the idea that the interests of a state are most effectively served by interfering as little as possible in the business of other states. One benefit to this ideology is that it decreases the risk to a state of being needlessly drawn into conflicts and tensions which could have negative consequences. Another effect of isolationism is that it disincentives a nation to be involved with economic or mutual defense agreements (Kertzer, 2013). The pros and cons of isolationism, therefore, have been fiercely debated: “the oldest issue in American foreign policy; the debate over intervention versus isolation” (Pollins & Schweller, 1999) is about the role the USA should play in the world.
(Liberal) Interventionism
The diametric opposite to isolationism is the ideology of (liberal) interventionism. This ideology revolves around the idea that a nation can, and perhaps should, intervene in the business of another nation. “[T]he doctrine of liberal interventionism states that national and international goals can be advanced by decisions by countries, individually or collectively, to intervene militarily in the internal affairs of other states” (Lipsey, 2016). Interventionism states that it is allowable to take non-defensive actions within the economy or society of another nation. Most often methods of interventionism are economical, such as utilizing national or international sanctions designed to disincentivized trade or restrict financial profits. Other forms of economic interventionism are embargoes on trade, boycotts and political pressuring. Often these forms of interventionism are applied through previously established international economic frameworks. The concept of ‘winning hearts and minds’ is an interventionist idea, aimed at drastically altering the internal politics of a nation (Fishstein & Wilder, 2012). The US military uses both civil, humanitarian and non-combat operations to intervene against asymmetric forms of warfare in the war against terror. Interventionism is not limited to economic or non-combat military options. The options of
occupation, regime-change and nation-building are all interventionist concepts. Naturally, interventionism does come into conflict with the notion of another nation’s sovereignty.
Realism
Realism is a political theory within the field of international relations which is centered around the ultimate and Machiavellian belief that the acquisition of power is the primary aim of individual and political endeavors. The term ‘realpolitik’ is also often used to imply a policy driven by practical rather than any moral or ideological considerations. Simplified, it states that ‘might is right’. Modern political realism is about maintaining national interests throughout all politics, ideally increasing the power of one’s own nation over others. While there are different strains of realism, they are all united in the belief that the politics of the world have always been a conflict between multiple political individuals and entities seeking increasingly greater power (Moseley, 2019). Realism is often linked to a lack of interventionism, simply because the intervention is impractical or does not serve the interests of the presumed interventionist: policies of appeasement, conflict avoidance and accepting relatively minor infractions are all part of the realist’s palette.
(Idealistic) Internationalism or Globalism
Internationalism, also known as globalism and sometimes as cosmopolitanism, is more idealistic. It is a political ideology which goes beyond nationalism and promotes more far-reaching political, economic and military cooperation between nations. Fundamentally, internationalists believe that the different populations of the world should be united regardless of national, political, cultural, racial, or class boundaries. The more ardent internationalists believe that uniting people in such global manner will allow the interests of all the world’s people to be advanced. Fundamentally, this ideology states that the supposedly mutual long-term interests of all people should be given precedence to the short-term interests and disputes of individual governments and nations. To the more fundamental supporters of internationalism, this globalist argument leads to support for the idea of a single world government. More moderate internationalists argue for increased cooperation and support between nation’s governments, based on a global understanding. This ideology causes tensions between the political, economic or religious beliefs of a nation’s population, and those of the internationalists (Lehmann, 1998).
2.2 Causal Relationships
In Chapter 1.3 (Academic Relevance: Restrictions to fundamental change in the 21st century), the
theory of Dombrowski and Reich (2017) was summarized: a democratic nation like the USA with strong internal checks-and-balances and strong (independent) institutions, facing a world with many transnational issues (terrorism, crime, migration, cyber-warfare, regional military conflicts, etc), cannot implement an isolationist policy, no matter how strong the president’s isolationist tendencies may be. This thesis also sets out to check that hypothesis.
This thesis sets out to evaluate whether Trump’s administration has triggered a fundamental change in US-EU transatlantic security relations. It is therefore important to not only evaluate whether changes are fundamental (non-incremental and significant, long-lasting, difficult to reverse), but also whether those changes were initiated by the Trump administration. Politics is often reactive to external factors, and upon swearing-in, presidents inherit complex dossiers. In other words, would the changes have happened, irrespective of administration, Republican or Democrat? Is president Trump the cause of the change or are his policies simply the result of political processes that originated earlier? In politics, evaluating causal relationships is difficult, particularly when rhetoric plays a role. For example, the 2019 trade war between the USA and China is supposedly about the large trade deficit of the USA with China, but a.o. Hirson et al. (2019) speculate about underlying security concerns with respect to China’s growing political and security sphere of influence. Colijn (2019) points out that National Security Advisor Bolton’s anti-Huawei campaign combines both trade and security strategies.
In this thesis, it will also be key to differentiate which policy changes (dependent variables) are due to the new Trump administration and which are due to external constraints (independent variables.
3.0 Methodology
3.1 Data Collection
This research has started with an extensive literature review on US/EU relations, particularly with respect to the subject of international security. Based on this, certain political ‘hotspots’ were identified for further examination. These hotspots were areas for security concerns where president Trump’s rhetoric has the potential to fundamentally affect the transatlantic relationship. Briefly the following cases were screened:
1. NATO: Trump’s insistence that NATO’s Member States spend at least 2% of their national
budgets (GDP) on defense, as agreed.
2. ICC: Trump’s strongly worded warning to the International Criminal Court (ICC) to not even
attempt to prosecute US citizens.
3. Iran: Trump’s withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA; commonly
referred to as the Iran Deal or Iran Nuclear Deal). The Iran Deal is an international agreement signed in 2015 to curtail and slow down Iranian nuclear proliferation capabilities.
The above three cases will be further discussed in Chapters 4 and 5. Additionally, four other cases (below) have been screened but will not be further worked out in this thesis. These were also briefly analyzed for their relevance to the primary research question. It was decided, however, to focus on the above three cases only, not only because of time constraints, but also because the other cases are still in-flux: an evaluation might be irrelevant and out-of-date by the time of printing this thesis. The four cases that will not be further worked out in Chapters 4 and 5 are:
• North Korea: Trump’s 2017 assertion to inflict ‘fire and fury’ and ‘totally destroy’ North Korea if North Korea failed to cease nuclear testing and stopped making nuclear threats (Baker & Chloe, 2018), Trump’s reference to Kim Jung-un as ‘rocket man’, the actual North Korean threats against the US territory of Guam, its missiles over Japan, its thermo-nuclear test (Panda & Narang, 2017), and Kim Jong-un calling Trump’s behavior ‘mentally deranged’ (Calamur, 2017) all suggested a rapid deterioration of the US-North Korean relationship. Trump’s apparent revival of Richard Nixon’s ‘madman’ foreign policy (a conscious, Machiavellian behavior to act dangerously irrational and volatile in order to reach your objectives) may not be effective in obtaining North Korea’s nuclear disarmament as Trump applies the policy too frequently: in fact, it may be dangerous, as the North Korean leader seems to be consistently calling Trump’s bluff (Stevenson, 2017). Various successive US administrations have struggled to contain the nuclear threat from North Korea. UN Security Council Resolutions 1695 and 1718 (both in 2006, supported by the G.W. Bush administration; Table 1) were unanimously adopted and imposed broad sanctions against North Korea. Subsequently, during Obama’s administration, the UN adopted many more resolutions (Table 1) imposing further sanctions against North Korea (UN Security Council Resolutions 1874, 1928, 1985, 2087, 2094, 2270). Under Trump, sanctions were further extended (UN Security Council Resolutions 2356, 2371, 2375, 2397), the
rhetoric has stepped up, but, apart from bi-lateral US - North Korean negotiations, actual US policies do not seem to have changed fundamentally, nor has the transatlantic relationship wavered on the North Korean issue.
Current status: talks between representatives of Trump and Kim Jong-Un are in progress.
• Syria: Already in 2013, president Obama authorized arming Syria’s opposition rebels (Mazzetti & Apuzzo, 2016). Since 2014, the USA has escalated its presence in Syria and has started to lead a mostly western combat intervention to support the Syrian opposition parties in the Syrian Civil War (Fig. 1) and destroy the ISIS and the Al-Nusra Front terrorist organizations. And although president Obama did not militarily intervene after Assad carried out a gas-attack on the Damascus suburb of Ghouta (crossing Obama’s ‘red line’), he was instrumental in setting up the successful Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW, 2014), a joint UN mission to eliminate Syrian chemical weapons (OPCW, 2014, 2014b). Subsequently, president Trump has given mixed signals. In January 2018, the Trump administration indicated a long-term military presence to oust Syrian president Assad and counteract the influence of Iran in the region (Schake, 2018). In December 2018, however, Trump first ordered the withdrawal of most US ground troops, but when European allies refused to replace US troops (DeYoung & Ryan, 2019), he ordered around 400 US troops to remain in Syria indefinitely (Oprysko, 2019). Current status: Syria remains unstable, even though ISIS appears to have been defeated. Assad is still in control of most of the country, Kurdish forces control the northeastern parts of Syria. Meanwhile Russia, Turkey, Iran and Saudi Arabia are vying for influence.
• Venezuela: In view of the “continuing deterioration of democracy, the rule of law and human rights in Venezuela” (EU, 2017), both the US and the EU have imposed further sanctions on the Maduro regime (White House, 2015; 2018a). The EU parliament, following the US lead, recognized Juan Guaidó as the legitimate interim President of Venezuela in January 2019 and urged EU countries to do the same (EU Parliament, 2019; notably Italy and Ireland, reluctant to interfere in the domestic politics of a sovereign nation, are still neutral on the issue, arguing instead for fair and free elections). Both the EU and the US are still encouraging regime change by peaceful means, although president Trump has suggested that military options are not excluded (White House, 2019). As yet, however, the Trump administration has only for humanitarian purposes deployed the military: the US-NS Comfort, a 1000 bed navy hospital ship, has been embarked since late 2018 on humanitarian missions to render aid to Central and South American nations struggling with an inflow of Venezuelan refugees. Acting US Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan called “for a peaceful transition of power to opposition leader Juan Guaido” (Kime, 2019).
Current status: there is a stalemate between Maduro and Guaidó, and the extent to which Guaidó is supported by the US and EU is not enough to realize regime change. In general, however, the US and the EU remain aligned on the desirability of regime change in Venezuela.
• Nordstream II: Transatlantic security issues can also include issues involving how to deal with China, or how to safeguard energy security for northern Europe and, on the other hand, minimize dependence on Russia. The latter issue currently revolves around the Nordstream II gas pipeline from Russia to northern Europe. Europe is in the midst of an incipient energy transition, whereby its domestic gas and coal production and coal imports are declining and its renewables will still be a small fraction of its energy consumption for decades to come. It therefore needs to import gas. Here, the US is threatening with sanctions to European companies involved in Nordstream II, as it fears Europe is becoming too dependent on Russian gas with respect to its energy security (MacKinnon & Gramer, 2019). The issue is clouded, however, by suspicions that the US also has commercial interests in blocking Nordstream II. The US has an abundance of gas, which it is exporting as liquefied natural gas (LNG) (Simon, 2019). Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall, the US deputy secretary for energy under the Obama administration already cautioned Europe against Nordstream II, as it goes against energy diversification and might give Russia too much influence over Western Europe (Crisp, 2016).
Current status: the Trump administration has dialed up the rhetoric and has pledged to put sanctions in place against companies involved in Nordstream II (Simon, 2019). At the time of writing this thesis, sanctions have not yet been imposed, LNG imports from the US have started, and construction of Nordstream II is ongoing.
The first three cases (NATO, ICC, Iran) have been analyzed at depth with regards to policy developments from both the US and the EU perspective, particularly those developments that were triggered by president’s Trump rhetoric. This started with an extensive literature review, with sources from peer-reviewed academic literature, respected policy research institutes, NGOs and from original sources from official US Federal government and European Union institutions. These sources were supplemented by newspaper articles. This is deemed acceptable in this thesis, as the subject matter is about rhetoric and politicians, almost by definition, implement the rhetoric policy tool via the mainstream press. Where references are made to mainstream media organizations, checks have been done to ensure fake news is filtered out.
For each data set there will be the US government’s position both before and since the Trump administration, as well as the European Union’s positions before and since the Trump administration (Table 1).
Table 1: Simplified example of the expected data sets. This is an example case for the sanctions imposed on North Korea (official name Democratic People's Republic of Korea, abbreviated DPRK). EU Council Regulations can be accessed via https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/policies/sanctions/history-north-korea/.
3.2 Data Evaluation Methodology
In Chapter 5, the data collected regarding the NATO, ICC and Iran cases will be analyzed. Specific attention is paid to rhetoric by president Trump or by his senior members of government and the relation to any documented policy change, but also to the change of rhetoric between the Trump administration and the previous administrations. In this chapter, the primary research question (Has the Trump administration triggered a fundamental change in US-EU international security relations?) will be addressed. An attempt is made to compare the (blunt) rhetoric of the Trump administration and the (more diplomatic) rhetoric of the previous administrations and evaluate whether the difference in style signifies fundamental changes in foreign security policy. The evaluation will also differentiate between changes due to a change in administration and those changes that are driven by other, external factors.
3.3 Data Limitations
This research is limited in size and scope to a master’s thesis: a limited timeframe means that the scope and scale of this research is constrained to some extent. Firstly, this research is focused solely on the aspects of US and EU’s relationship as it pertains to matters of international security. The US-EU relationship is historic and multi-faceted, encompassing security, humanitarian, environmental, technological and other ambitions. A study of change and continuity covering the full scope of this international relationship is not feasible for this particular research.
Pre-Trump During-Trump
United States
IAEA inspections under Nuclear Programme Safeguards agreements. In 1994, DPRK withdraws from IAEA. Also,
in 1994 us-DPRK Agreed Framework. In 2003, DPRK withdraws from Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
US imposed sanctions against North Korea, implementing UN Security Council Resolutions 1695,
1718, 1874, 1928, 1985, 2087, 2094 and 2270. No direct negations at presidential level.
Further sanctions against DPRK implementing UN Security Council Resolutions 2356, 2371,
2375, 2397.
Despite fierce rhetoric from both sides, direct negotiations between Trump and Kim Jong-Un.
US skeptical of bringing EU countries into denuclearization process. Speculations about John Bolton preparing scenarios for ‘first-strike’ and regime-change.
European Union
Adopted same UN Resolutions as above, and adopted EU Council Regulation Nos. 327/2007, 1283/2009, 567/2010, 296/2013, 696/2013, 2016/682, 2016/841. EU – DPRK Human Rights dialogue followed by
EU-North DPRK Political dialogue.
EU recommends US to resume humanitarian aid (food security)
Implementing same UN Resolutions as above, aligned under EU Council Regulation Nos.
2017/330, 2017/658.
France, UK and Germany and EU offering help with negotiations/inspections/denuclearization.
Secondly, due to the nature of international security politics, some policies can be ‘unwritten’ and/ or out of the public domain. The geopolitical landscape can be strongly influenced by such ‘hidden’ policies. In fact, one of the key aspects of this thesis, the effects of president Trump’s rhetoric on the US-EU relationship, is much publicized, but frequently in a subjective, partisan fashion, while it is difficult to objectively evaluate and measure its effects. As mentioned before, when newspaper articles are referred to, such one-sided partisan, or even fake, observations and evaluations have been filtered out.
3.4 Research Layout
This research paper will have the following basic layout:
Chapter Word count
1: Introduction 1,907 2: Theoretical Framework 2,538 2: Methodology 1,798 4: Data 7,329 5: Evaluation 6,283 6: Conclusion 1,137
4.0 Data
The US-EU Security Relationship
Depending on the eye of the beholder, the ‘transatlantic relationship’, i.e. the geopolitical relationship between the USA and (the member states of) the European Union (Chapter 2), may be considered healthy or, conversely, under stress. It can be argued that the relationship is strong, having been instrumental in the establishment of the UN and NATO, having led a period of extraordinary global economic growth and having encouraged the spread of democracy and human rights across the world. In contrast, it can also be argued that with the demise of the communist threat over Europe, NATO has lost its importance, that (a still divided) Europe has also lost its role as a global superpower, that the US is focused on China, and that president Trump is merely clarifying a new world order.
In the years after the Second World War, post-war diplomatic relationships between the US and European nations were being re-established (Weiss & Daws, 2008). In 1954, the European Commission (EC, the precursor to the European Union) sent the Delegation of the European Commission as permanent representation to Washington DC. In 1961, the US reciprocated and established the United States Mission to the European Communities, now called the United States Mission to the European Union, to represent the USA in Brussels (U.S. Mission to the European Union, 2015). Subsequently, for almost three decades, the US and the EU have stood united against the spread of USSR communism (Fig. 1). After the Cold War, the cooperative relationship between the US and the EU was re-defined in The Transatlantic Declaration of 1990 and the New Transatlantic Agenda, launched in 1995 (respectively European Parliament, 1990, 1995). The Transatlantic Declaration of 1990 between the USA and the European Community already stated as common goal to “safeguard peace and promote international security, by cooperating with other nations against aggression and coercion, by contributing to the settlement of conflicts in the world and by reinforcing the role of the United Nations and other international organizations” and stated the intention to collaborate in amongst others “combating and preventing terrorism” and “preventing the proliferation of nuclear armaments, chemical and biological weapons, and missile technology” (European Parliament, 1990). Over time the cooperative relationship between the US and the EU has grown significantly with European and American military forces fighting side-by-side on many international arenas (Fig. 1).
However, currently, under the Trump administration, the transatlantic relationship appears to be severely strained, and Trump’s rhetoric seems to underscore this. In the chapters 4 & 5, it will be shown, however, that such strains are not new, but that they have developed out of long-lasting geopolitical developments spanning multiple presidential terms. Such periods of strain also occurred before, for example, during the Russian Afghanistan War (Fig. 1), Joffe (1981) writes “[i]nstead of infusing the West with a new unity of purpose, as might have been expected, the crisis over Afghanistan has left a legacy of confusion, distrust and resentment” and “[i]t is clear that perceptions and beliefs on both shores of the Atlantic are drastically out of phase. The few premises that are still shared by Europeans and Americans
are dwarfed by the many disputes where they clash not only over tactics but over Weltanschauung [worldview]”. That same year Tugendhat (1981) wrote that “[i]n the United States there is mounting impatience with what is seen as the softness and unreliability of the allies… In Europe distrust and in some circles even dislike of the United States has reached disturbing levels.”
In the opening chapter of his 1987 book entitled ‘Europe Without America?’ John Palmer makes precisely the same point, writing “[i]t is true that transatlantic friction is nothing new”, and yet “the situation today is different both in terms of the scale and complexity of those differences and in the way in which economic, political, and security policy differences interact with each other”. After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the decline and ‘glasnost’ of the USSR, more existentialist questions arose about the state, and the necessity, of the transatlantic relationship. Europe suddenly lost the importance it had as the central strategic theater. Over time, NATO evolved from operating on a strategy of containment and deterrence of the Soviet and communist threat to a much less well-defined strategy of military pre-emption (Solana, 2003).
After the 9/11 terror attacks in 2001, differences between the USA and EU became even more pronounced. The phrase ‘Homeland Security’ was coined in the US, focus was moved to the Middle and Far East, Atlanticists on both sides lost influence and it became even more apparent that the US and the EU fundamentally differed in their willingness to resort to military force (Kagan, 2003). The US has not been able to get full EU support for its military interventions in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Iran and elsewhere (Kaufmann & Lohaus, 2018). The EU generally champions ‘soft' diplomatic power rather than ‘hard’ power supremacy. Also, the relative religious US tends to classify its enemies as evil, whereas the more secular EU tends to see terror as the extreme expression of deeper societal and political dysfunctions (Solana, 2003). Then the Iraq War (2002-2004) again severely strained the transatlantic relationship. Europeans, motivated by UN reports, questioned the claim by the G.W. Bush administration that Iraq produced and stockpiled Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMDs). The USA was committed to regime change, similar to its successful accomplishment of regime change in Germany and Japan after WWII. The EU, however, was bitterly opposed to such regime change as it was perceived as risky, illegitimate, neither feasible or consistent, and there was distrust towards the motives of the USA (van Herven, 2004). Pond (2004) noted that “[i]n the past, however heated the confrontations, transatlantic quarrels tended to be over single issues…not over a whole range of topics that obstructed conciliation on any one of them and maximized ill will”.
It is in this atmosphere that Barack Obama started his presidential term in 2009. Trump succeeded him in January of 2017. Below, we will further investigate whether the Trump administration triggered a fundamental change in US-EU transatlantic security relations, or whether the Trump administration, for all its rhetoric, continued policies which were shaped well before his presidency. In Chapters 4.1, 4.2 and 4.3, US and EU policies with respect to respectively NATO, the ICC and the Iran Nuclear Deal will be presented. This data will then be evaluated in Chapters 5.1, 5.2 and 5.3.
4.1 Case One: North Atlantic Treaty Organization
“The Parties to this Treaty reaffirm their faith in the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations and their desire to live in peace with all peoples and all governments. They are determined to safeguard the freedom, common heritage and civilization of their peoples, founded on the principles of democracy, individual liberty and the rule of law. They seek to promote stability and well-being in the North Atlantic area. They are resolved to unite their efforts for collective defense and for the preservation of peace and security. They therefore agree to this North Atlantic Treaty” (NATO, 1949).
Table 3: Simplified US and EU policies on NATO before and during the Trump administration.
After the end of the Second World War, the nations of Europe were in severe economic distress, as well as militarily depleted. They were unable to defend themselves. Soviet Russia, on the other hand, commanded large and capable armed forces which overshadowed other European nations’ forces. In the years after World War Two, the USSR was rapidly increasing its grip on power and influence over Eastern European nations. Soon, Soviet control over these nations and their governments suppressed all political opposition (Haglund, 2019). Europe became effectively split in two: it was divided between the western nations aligned with the US and the eastern ones aligned with, or forcibly kept under the control of, the Soviet forces. This phenomenon would become well-known as the ‘Iron Curtain’, as quoted by Churchill in his 1946 ‘Sinews of Peace’ speech (NATO 2001). Around the same time, the political and military cooperation that existed between the US and the Soviet Union was rapidly deteriorating. Progressively, this situation deteriorated which led US president Truman and his western European counterparts to consider and begin planning towards establishing an American-European defensive alliance (Haglund, 2019; Office of the Historian, 2016).
After several years of considerations and negotiations, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was created in 1949. The original member nations were the United States and Canada as well as Belgium, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Norway, Portugal and the United Kingdom. The original purpose for this treaty was to provide collective, mutual defensive capacity against the threat of the Soviet Union (officially known as the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, or USSR). Notably, the treaty includes Article Five, which states that “[t]he Parties agree that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all” (NATO, 1949). Article Five was carefully phrased to limit it to attacks that occurred on North
Pre-Trump During-Trump
United States
NATO Member, primary supporter. Aiming to decrease reliance on US.
NATO Member, primary supporter. Signed ‘Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act’ (CAATSA) in 2017.
Aiming to decrease reliance on US. Increased pressure.
European Union
NATO Members.
Since collapse of the USSR, failing certain membership terms.
For security largely dependent on USA’s role in NATO.
NATO Members.
Still failing certain membership terms. Unease about Trump’s stance on NATO and
incipient discussions on more defence independence
American or European territory; an attack on a colonial territory would not be included. As a direct counter-threat to the Soviet forces, NATO was designed such that the European nations fell under the protection of the American ‘nuclear umbrella’ and to provide the capacity of defensive responses including against significant nuclear attacks (Kober, 1983). The threat of large nuclear strikes as a defensive policy was directly designed as a deterrence to potential Soviet hostility (Office of the Historian, 2016). In response to NATO, the USSR and seven Eastern European satellite nations (Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland and Romania) signed the rival Warsaw Pact in 1955 (NATO Declassified, 2019).
There are certain fundamental requirements for membership within the NATO alliance. One such requirement is that the NATO member states have promised to meet certain minimum standards with regards to their defense spending. NATO members are required to dedicate a minimum of two percent of their gross domestic product (GDP) on defense. The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) publishes the annual defense spending of, currently 174, countries, the share of their GDP and the per capita spend (SIPRI, 2019). During the Cold War, in the years 1949-1992, all NATO members (except Luxembourg) spent more than 2% of their GDP on defense (Wołkonowski, 2018; SIPRI, 2019). However, when the Cold War was over, NATO lost some of its original relevance, and European defense budgets declined (Figs. 2 & 3; Appendix 1).
US defense budgets initially declined even faster than those of the EU, but after the 9/11 2001 terrorist attacks, the US defense budget increased again, whereas the combined EU defense budget kept declining (under the Obama administration, after the 2008 global economic crisis, the US defense budget started declining again). In 2017, only 5 countries met the 2% requirement (Wołkonowski, 2018): USA, France, Greece, Turkey and Estonia. Also, between 1949 and 2017, the USA contributed 65.5% of NATO’s countries defence budget (Wołkonowski, 2018). In Appendix 1, the spending per NATO member per year is recorded (from Wołkonowski, 2018). In absolute terms (expressed in US $), the USA has by far the largest defense spending from all NATO countries (Figs. 4 & 5), and consistently outspends all other NATO countries combined (Figs. 2-6). Figures 5 and 6 show the contribution of individual NATO countries. Germany, with its large European economy, spends only 1,2% of its GDP on defense, is therefore singled out by critical US ‘hawks’.
Figure 3: NATO’s defense spending versus time, in percentage of GDP. From Dowdy (2017). When Canada is not lumped in with Europe, spending for Europe is slightly higher than in Figure 2, but still, since 2002, Europe spent less than 2% of its GDP on defense.
Techau (2015) writes: “Europeans are still dependent on U.S. services for their security, and they are not too bothered by that fact. At the same time, Americans eagerly want Europeans to do more but can’t really sanction them in any painful way because, in the end, Europe is too strategically important for the United States to abandon it and leave its defense to the Europeans alone.”
Figure 4: Defense spending of the USA versus all other NATO members combined (NATO, 2018d). Important here is to note that not all US defense spending is strictly in relation to NATO (North Atlantic focus). For 2018 and 2019, the USA is expected to cover ~22% of NATO’s Common-Funded budgets (NATO, 2018b).
Figure 5: Defense Spending per NATO country in 2017, in absolute terms (million US $) and in percentage of GDP. From McCarthy (2018). Of course, the 2% norm is not a perfect metric of the effectiveness of defense spending. Techau (2015) states that ”[t]he relevance of 2 percent, in reality, also does not depend on all 28 member states -just on a small handful. An increase in defense spending would only have a meaningful impact in terms of increased military capabilities in NATO if it came from the top six spenders (the United States excluded). These are, in descending order, as of 2015: the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and Canada [Techau, 2015, did not mention Turkey in this list]. In all other countries, with the possible exception of The Netherlands, the small volume of their defense spending indicates that an increase to 2 percent would not constitute a
Clearly then, for the last two to three decades, many NATO members have consistently underspent with respect to the two percent norm. Naturally, this has attracted criticism from the countries that did abide to the norm. Already in 2006, the US ambassador to NATO referred to the two percent policy of GDP spending as the “unofficial floor” on defense spending in NATO (Techau, 2015). After a NATO leadership summit held in Wales in 2014, NATO published the Wales Summit Declaration (NATO, 2014). In this declaration NATO member nations confirmed that many had been lacking in their financial commitments. In the Wales Summit Declaration, it was reiterated that “[w]e agree to reverse the trend of declining defense budgets, to make the most effective use of our funds and to further a more balanced
Figure 6: Defense spending per NATO member in 2014 and 2017 (NATO, 2018d). Because of the size of its GDP, specifically Germany is attracting the wrath of the Trump administration for not meeting the 2% norm (possibly exacerbated because of the US trade deficit with Germany). Conversely, Poland is treated more accommodatingly by the USA. Poland is almost meeting the 2% norm and is exceeding the norm of spending at least 20% of defense spending on equipment (Figs 7 & 8). In line with the requests for additional military support and cooperation, during a meeting with president Trump the “Polish head of state strongly underscored that Poland wants a permanent US military presence on its soil in order to deter Russia” and that Poland would allocate at least two billion dollars in support of this (Czulda, 2018). The Polish president offered to have the base, once built, be named ‘Fort Trump’, as an added incentive (Sonne & Gearan, 2018).
sharing of costs and responsibilities”. With respect to NATO members which had been contributing the required 2% funding, the declaration stated that “[a]llies currently meeting the NATO guideline to spend a minimum of 2% of their Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on defense will aim to continue to do so”. With an eye to future financial contributions the declaration states that “[a]llies whose current proportion of GDP spent on defense is below this level will halt any decline in defense expenditure, aim to increase defense expenditure in real terms as GDP grows and aim to move towards the 2% guideline within a decade with a view to meeting their NATO capability targets and filling NATO's capability shortfalls” (NATO, 2014).
Of course, the 2% norm is not a perfect metric of the effectiveness of defense spending. At the 2014 Wales NATO Summit, the members also stated that they aimed to spend at least 20% of the defense budget on major equipment and capabilities (NATO, 2018b). The 2018 NATO Brussels Summit Declaration (NATO, 2018b) states that “[f]air burden sharing underpins the Alliance’s cohesion, solidarity, credibility, and ability to fulfill our Article 3 and Article 5 commitments. We welcome the considerable progress made since the Wales Summit with four consecutive years of real growth in non-US defence expenditure. All Allies have started to increase the amount they spend on defence in real terms and some two-thirds of Allies have national plans in place to spend 2% of their Gross Domestic Product on defence by 2024. More than half of Allies are spending more than 20% of their defence expenditures on major equipment, including related research and development [Fig. 7], and, according to their national plans, 24 Allies will meet the 20% guideline by 2024” (NATO, 2018b). Figure 8 shows that indeed after the 2014 NATO Wales Summit, most NATO members significantly increased their percentage expenditure on equipment. Nonetheless, the USA remains the largest contributing source of NATO funding. Data taken from the NATO Cost Share Arrangements for the beginning of 2018 until the end of 2019 show that the USA will be expected to financially support over twenty-two percent of the Common-Funded budgets (NATO, 2018b).
In recent years, Russia, under the leadership of Vladimir Putin, has acted increasingly hostile and this has raised European regional tensions (Emerson, 2008). In 2008, Russia invaded and annexed significant portions of Georgia (Khidasheli, 2011). Russia has also increased its efforts to support and influence pro-Russian political factions within eastern European nations (Helmus et al., 2018). In 2014, Russia invaded Ukraine, and annexed the Crimea, essentially restoring the relevance of NATO in the eyes of many (e.g. Mandelbaum, 2017). The Wales Summit Declaration (NATO, 2014) uses language reminiscent of the Cold War: “[a]n independent, sovereign, and stable Ukraine, firmly committed to democracy and the rule of law, is key to Euro-Atlantic security. At a time when Ukraine's security is being undermined, the Alliance continues its full support for Ukraine's sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity within its internationally recognized borders. The broad support for United Nations General Assembly Resolution 68/262 on the Territorial Integrity of Ukraine, demonstrates the international rejection of Russia's illegal and illegitimate 'annexation' of Crimea. We are extremely concerned by the further escalation of aggressive actions in eastern Ukraine. We see a concerted campaign of violence by
Figure 7: Defense spending per NATO member in 2014 and 2017 (NATO, 2018d). With respect to the US-EU relationship, it has to be noted that 81% of EU weapons expenditure is spent with US manufacturers (Colijn, 2019).
Figure 8: Defense equipment expenditure as a percentage of total defense expenditure per NATO member in 2014 and 2017 (NATO, 2018d). Almost all countries are increasing their
