United States and Canada

Czech Republic pulls out of US missile shield plan

By Karel Janicek, the AP

From Karel Janicek, the AP:  The Czech Republic is withdrawing from U.S. missile defense plans out of frustration at its diminished role, the Czech defense minister told The Associated Press Wednesday.

How serious is the split between the US and Europe over defense spending?

By James Blitz, the Financial Times

From James Blitz, the Financial Times:  Europe’s declining interest in paying for global security is becoming a serious anxiety for policymakers in Washington.

Response to Gates: Dead? Not Likely

By Lawrence S. Kaplan, the New York Times

From Lawrence S. Kaplan, the New York Times:  Burden sharing has been a problem for NATO since the beginning of the alliance.

Response to Gates: A Crisis of Ambition

By Alexis Crow, the New York Times

From Alexis Crow, the New York Times:  For the most part, American statesmen have tended to see NATO as a collective defense community built on Western values, ideally harboring the ability to carry out operations across the globe to secure these values — in essence, a "global NATO.

Response to Gates: We Need New Partners

By James Goldgeier, the New York Times

From James Goldgeier, the New York Times:  Europe will, however, have to do more for its own security as time goes on.

Response to Gates: Europe’s Waning Influence

By Kori Schake, the New York Times

From Kori Schake, the New York Times: Defense Secretary Robert Gates’s speech was less a slap at Europeans to spend more (a case he has made consistently during his tenure) than a warning that their influence is waning.

Response to Gates: Alliance of the Unwilling

By Josef Joffe, the New York Times

From Josef Joffe, the New York Times:  The French defense budget is 1.8 percent of G.D.P., the British is 2.2 percent — a long way from the 3 percent to 4 percent in the cold war.

Gates to NATO: Drop dead?

By Stephen Walt, Foreign Policy

From Stephen Walt, Foreign Policy:  NATO has been on borrowed time ever since the Soviet Union collapsed, because military alliances form primarily to deal with external threats and they are hard to hold together once the threat is gone.

Russian submarine mates with U.S. sub rescue system in NATO Exercise

By Allied Command Operations

Bob Gates’s sermon to Europe applies at home as well

By the Editors of the Washington Post

From the Editors of the Washington Post:  [Secretary of Defense Robert] Gates rightly blamed European governments for being “apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources or make the necessary changes to be serious and capable partners in their own defense.