In 1951, Dwight Eisenhower, as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s first Supreme Allied Commander Europe, gave his colleagues a warning. “If, in 10 years, all American troops stationed in Europe for national defense purposes have not been returned to the United States, then this whole project will have failed,” he said of the U.S. effort to build a new trans-Atlantic security architecture. Almost 75 years later, Eisenhower would be disappointed.
Today, Europe is still reliant on the U.S. forces stationed across the continent and in the United Kingdom, but President Donald Trump and his advisers appear ready to break with this status quo.
Europe should welcome, not fear, U.S. retrenchment. Not only will an independent defense end Europe’s abdication of its geopolitical autonomy, but it will leave Europe more secure.
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