Top NATO official Adm. Rob Bauer warned Thursday that a larger war with Russia and other adversaries is a real threat amid the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.
Bauer, chair of the Western security alliance’s Military Committee, said “not everything is going to be hunky dory in the next 20 years.”
“I’m not saying it is going wrong tomorrow, but we have to realize it’s not a given that we are in peace,” he said at a press conference in Brussels. “That’s why we have the plans, that’s why we are preparing for conflict with Russia and the terror groups if it comes to it.”
Bauer emphasized the security alliance is defensive and does not seek conflict or a wider war.
“But if they attack us, we have to be ready,” he added.
Even so, NATO wouldn’t kerb-stomp Russia.
Completely obliterating its government, industrial capacity, trade, and military would lead to a collapse of that country, fracturing of its territory, and probably heaps more political headaches down the road as the power dynamic is altered.
NATO would aspire to remove Russia from non-Russian territory in most areas, probably including Transnistria but excluding Syria and Africa. They would probably seek regime change, but the old guard of Russian politics would be preserved. They want to return the status-quo ante bellum.
The US and NATO would always seek the Japan option and not the Iraq option. Japan surendered and basically became an autonomous industrial client state of the US for a long time. Iraq dissolved into civil wars and became an unhealing wound that continually sprouted infections like ISIS and became a playground for bad actors like Iran.
Even after the collapse of the soviet union, the US financially propped up some industries in Russia, like their spaceflight industry.
Nobody wants to own Russia either. As our eloquent former president said, it’s a ‘shithole country’ with few redeeming qualities. But Russia might have a lot to gain in terms of plunder and valuable land in a war with more geographically blessed neighboring countries. Particularly ones with warm water ports. It’s good to keep the fight up. Plus, unlike some countries, Ukraine really does want to be a sovereign country with a vibrant democracy. And it has the balls to go for the gold, too.