Europe's crumbling economy leaving West defenseless?

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NATO nations struggling with economic woes are on the verge of being unable to defend themselves in a crisis, and the go-to backup of the Unites States of America is warning it may not be able to catch everything that falls, according to a report from Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin.

Informed defense experts say that the European defense challenges are so great that the current economic crisis facing members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization has greatly diminished nearly all European defense capabilities.

They say the problem is further compounded by the fact that the United States, which also is a NATO member, has its own budget crisis and problems of an overstretched military in waging four wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and a counter-terrorism war in Yemen.

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Further, there now have been calls from Congress to "get tough" with Syria, meaning military intervention, and some observers believe the U.S. even has begun to engage Iran in a proxy war, most notably in Iraq in recent months.

As a consequence, there is increasing belief that the overall economic picture has placed in jeopardy the very cohesion of NATO, which critics have called a relic of the Cold War and an alliance in constant search of a purpose to continue existing.

In a speech to NATO in Brussels in June before his departure from the Obama administration, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates was especially critical of the member countries' contributions to NATO and the questionable prospect of the alliance's future.

He said the transatlantic partnership has turned into a "two-tiered alliance" of those "willing and able to pay the price and bear the burdens of alliance commitments, and those who enjoy the benefits of NATO membership but don't want to share the risks and the costs."

In pointing to European defense cuts, Gates said that the U.S. was tired of being the heavyweight partner and engaging in combat missions if the Europeans weren't going to accept increased responsibility for sharing the burden.

"The blunt reality is that there will be a dwindling appetite and patience in the U.S. Congress, and in the American body politic writ large, to expend increasingly precious funds on behalf of nations that are apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources to be serious and capable partners in their own defense," Gates said.

Some observers believe that in discussing defense issues, there is a European misconception that security can be achieved by development aid, economic interdependence and diplomacy.

"In the final analysis, military capability remains the backbone of all credible security arrangements," according to Patrick Keller, coordinator of foreign and security policy at the Konrad Adenauer Foundation in Berlin, Germany.

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"European Union member states are far away from a common European approach that will cut costs and secure effectiveness," Keller said. "As a consequence, many European states are on the verge of losing even basic defense capabilities, despite painful reform efforts to make their militaries more efficient."

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