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Marco Rubio Has Discovered That NATO Exists
Marco Rubio stood at a podium recently and said, with the confidence of a man who has never read anything, that if NATO can’t be used to “project to other contingencies,” then “we have a problem.”
He is correct. There is a problem. The problem is Marco Rubio.
Article 5 of the NATO treaty has existed since 1949. It says, in language so simple a golden retriever could grasp it, that an attack on one member is an attack on all. That’s it. That’s the whole thing.
You don’t need a law degree. You barely need literacy.
What Article 5 does not say, and what no page of the NATO founding treaty has ever suggested, is that 31 sovereign European nations signed up to serve as a strategic parking lot for American military adventures on the other side of the planet.
Denmark did not join a defensive alliance in 1949 so that, 75 years later, it could help Washington bomb a country it got bored looking at.
NATO is a shield. Not a sword. Not a taxi service. Not a valet for whatever impulsive geopolitical tantrum is trending in Washington this quarter.
The Americans have now spent 15 months confused by this distinction.
Their finest minds, their cabinet secretaries, their very best people, staring at the treaty like a dog watching television. Ears up. Deeply engaged. Understanding absolutely nothing.
The good news is that Europe has finally understood something too: you cannot outsource your survival to people who find a single sentence intellectually challenging.