Showing posts with label Baltic States. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Baltic States. Show all posts

Thursday, March 15, 2018

Joel C. Rosenberg's Blog: First, did Putin order nerve agent attacks in the U.K.? Second, are NATO allies like the Baltic States at risk of a Russian attack?

Putin-phone

New post on Joel C. Rosenberg's Blog

Two critical questions: First, did Putin order nerve agent attacks in the U.K.? Second, are NATO allies like the Baltic States at risk of a Russian attack? (My new column for The Jerusalem Post.)

by joelcrosenberg
(Dallas, Texas) -- First, a few thoughts on the situation unfolding in the U.K.
  • The poisoning of a Russian father and daughter -- opponents of Vladimir Putin -- on British soil by a military-grade nerve agent was reprehensible. It must be condemned by every world leader. The number of Putin critics murdered or severely injured in Great Britain is in the double digits and continues to rise. This is absolutely unacceptable and must not go unpunished.
  • I applaud British Prime Minister Theresa May for announcing an immediate series of punitive measures against the Russian government, including the expulsion of 23 Russian diplomats suspected of being spies, the largest number of such expulsions in thirty years. 
  • NATO HQ also just issued a statement on these attacks on British soil, which reads in part: "The UK confirmed the use of a military-grade nerve agent of a type developed by Russia and briefed Allies that it was highly likely that Russia was responsible. The UK also confirmed that this was an indiscriminate and reckless attack against the United Kingdom, putting the lives of innocent civilians at risk....NATO has repeatedly condemned the use of chemical weapons in Syria and called on those responsible to be held to account. NATO regards any use of chemical weapons as a threat to international peace and security."
  • This is a start, but it's not nearly enough. NATO leaders need to develop and urgently implement a far more comprehensive, robust and unified set of strategies to confront and counter rising Russian military, intelligence and cyber aggression under Putin. This should include but not be limited to tough sanctions on Moscow.
  • Most importantly, President Trump needs to speak out forcefully against Putin and take the lead on imposing sanctions on Russia for a growing list of Kremlin aggressions, including efforts to subvert U.S. elections in 2016, invasions of multiple countries, murder of dissidents, etc. Congress overwhelmingly passed a new Russia sanctions law last year. It's time for the President to put it to use.
Second, allow me to address the growing danger to the Baltic States.
Sixty-one percent of our Americans in our exclusive new survey say they are concerned Vladimir Putin is preparing to invade another country -- possibly a small NATO country in Europe, or a Middle Eastern state -- given that in recent years he has already invaded the Republic of Georgia, southern Ukraine, eastern Ukraine and sent Russian military forces into Syria.
Are the Baltic States -- Estonia, Latvia and/or Lithuania -- specifically vulnerable to attack? I believe the answer is yes. I discussed this last week over breakfast with Lithuania's Ambassador to the U.S..
Let me explain why in more detail in this new fact sheet, "Does Vladimir Putin Pose a Threat to the Baltic States and the Rest of NATO?"
Also, I address this sensitive subject in a new column in The Jerusalem Post. Here are excerpts. Please click here to read the column in full.
  • Last week, the foreign ministers of all three Baltic nations were in Washington, laying the groundwork for an April 3 summit between US President Donald Trump and the presidents of their countries to discuss the Russian threat.
  • Now, an exclusive new survey reveals a majority of Americans are increasingly concerned by the threat Putin poses and worried that President Trump is not doing enough to keep the nation and her allies safe.....
  • In my new political thriller, The Kremlin Conspiracy, the fictional president of the Russian Federation is plotting a lightning-fast military attack to re-conquer the three Baltic States – Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – once enslaved by Moscow during the Soviet era. Given that all three countries have been NATO members since 2004, the move risks triggering a nuclear war with the US and NATO alliance.
  • The gamble at the heart of the Kremlin leader’s plot is that using upwards of 100,000 Russian troops, Moscow could grab one or more of the Baltic States in less than 96 hours but that in the end neither the US nor the rest of NATO would actually come to their allies’ defense. If that were truly the case – if the West really abandoned the heroic Baltic peoples – this would mean the collapse of the NATO alliance overnight.
  • There can be no alliance, after all, if no one is willing to enforce Article Five, the heart of the mutual defense pact which says that if one country is attacked, all other countries in NATO will consider themselves under attack and rush to their defense.
  • In the novel, of course, I portray a worst-case scenario. But with each passing day, I’m becoming concerned fiction could become fact.
  • Putin, after all, has directly threatened the Baltic States, among other European nations.
  • “If I wanted, in two days I could have Russian troops not only in Kiev, but also in Riga, Vilnius, Tallinn, Warsaw and Bucharest,” the Russian leader said to Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko and European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso in September 2014....
  • 51.9% [of Americans surveyed] said they were not convinced that the president fully understands the Putin threat and they want Trump to do “much more" to counter it....
  • Three examples come to mind of actions President Trump should be taking but is not:
  1. Imposing sanctions on Russia – Congress overwhelmingly passed bill last year to impose sanctions on Russian officials, but thus far President Trump still hasn’t taken action. It is time to impose sanctions on Russia for their increasingly aggressive behavior, including unsuccessful efforts to subvert US elections and invasion of multiple countries.
  2. Increasing troop levels in the Baltic states – At the moment, there are fewer than 5,000 NATO troops in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, the three NATO allies that lie right on the Russian border and feeling increasingly at risk of Russian subversion or outright invasion. President Trump could and should be sending more U.S. forces, tanks and other heavy equipment and ammunition to the Baltics to create a speed bump big enough Putin wouldn’t feel tempted to cross. So far, he has not, nor has he pressed other NATO countries to do enough.
  3. Speaking out against Putin – the president does not hesitate to tweet criticism of everyone from the leaders of North Korea to Alec Baldwin to his own attorney general, Jeff Sessions. Why then is he so quiet about Putin? I see no convincing evidence at this point that his silence has a criminal or corrupt motive. But it is odd and unsettling to many Americans, given what a grave and growing threat Putin is.
  • Given Russia’s history of invasions, aggression and interference, the poll found that 72.5% agreed that Putin and the government of Russia pose a “clear and present danger to the national security of the United States, our NATO allies in Europe and our Mideast allies, such as Israel”....
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joelcrosenberg | March 14, 2018 at 2:45 pm | Categories: Epicenter | URL: https://wp.me/piWZ7-8Fq

Wednesday, January 4, 2017

Joel C. Rosenberg's Blog: Threats To Watch In 2017

withoutwarning-joel-video

New post on Joel C. Rosenberg's Blog

Threats To Watch In 2017 — #1: Putin is massing 55,000 troops on border of Ukraine & threatening the Baltic States. NATO looks weak. What the Trump-Pence team should do immediately.

by joelcrosenberg
As 2017 begins and the Trump-Pence administration is set to take office in Washington, what are the major threats that should be on your radar screen? What could potentially hit us without warning if we and our leaders are not paying close attention?
Over the next few weeks, I'll be writing a series of columns on this topic. But as I've been doing research over the past few months for a new novel about Russia, I have come to believe that the threat Moscow now poses to the U.S. and our allies is real and growing.
One thing I'm concerned about is Vladimir Putin. I believe that Vladimir Putin and the way he's leading Russia is going to be a big, big issue over the next several years. And I must say I'm cautiously pessimistic at the moment with the way the President-elect is dealing with this.
Right now, we keep hearing very warm, kind words about Mr. Putin from Mr. Trump. This may be a negotiating tactic, right? You have a President-elect who is known for "The Art of the Deal." So he may be trying to send a positive signal early on to Putin to say, "Hey, listen, we don't have to have a bad relationship. I'm willing to start in a positive way. But we're going to have some serious issues that we're going to have to talk about."
That's possible.
I would note that it's a different strategy than Mr. Trump is taking with Iran. It's a different strategy than he's taking with China. It's a much softer approach, and it suggests the other possibility -- not that it's a negotiating tactic, but that it's really what Mr. Trump believes, that Putin is not a threat.
If that's the case, I totally disagree.
Mr. Putin is a threat. He's already invaded and seized part of the nation state of Georgia. He's already invaded and seized Crimea. He's already invaded and seized Eastern Ukraine. And now he has 55,000 Russian troops massed on the border of Ukraine and [not far from] the three Baltic States -- Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia.
Is Putin going to invade and try to seize those countries as well?
We don't know that yet, right? But there are very few NATO troops there right now in the Baltics, and yet those are NATO allies.
So, when you have a Russian leader who has shown as much aggression in recent years as Putin has, and you're not doing more to build up U.S. and NATO forces -- including mechanized ground forces, mechanized divisions -- inside the Baltics to make sure that Putin doesn't seem them as an easy grab; when you're sending messages that seem very soft and conciliatory towards Russia; then you run the risk of being blindsided by an evil you don't see.
I just hope and pray that the new President of the United States and his team will take countering that threat posed by Putin as seriously as they're taking the China, North Korea and Radical Islam threats, as well.
CRITICAL ISSUES: Ukraine is a key ally of the U.S. and the Western alliance, but it is not a NATO ally. NATO is not obligated to come to her defense. But the Trump-Pence team needs to decide how it would handle a Russian move to seize all of Ukraine.
The Baltic States, meanwhile, are full NATO allies. A Russian invasion would trigger Article V of the NATO treaty. This would require a full-scale military response by the U.S. and the rest of the European countries who are members of NATO. This could quickly escalate to a nuclear confrontation. To do nothing -- to abandon the Baltics to the Kremlin -- would mean the end of NATO. No ally around the world would ever trust their alliances with the U.S. again. It could mean the collapse of U.S. global leadership. Clearly, the stakes are high.
RECOMMENDATIONS: The Trump-Pence team have a clear domestic  agenda that involves turbo-charging the U.S. economy and creating millions of new jobs, ending illegal immigration and protecting America's borders. On foreign policy, their top priorities are dealing with China and challenges in Asia, and confronting Radical Islam. The President elect understandably does not show any interest in a confrontation with Russia.
It is important, then, that President Trump immediately and significantly increases NATO air and ground forces -- and missile defenses -- in and around the Baltics and Poland, as well as in Germany and France upon taking office. He needs to make it absolutely clear to Putin that we will fully support our NATO allies and will not countenance any hostile action against them. Should the Baltics be left essentially unprotected, Putin -- an emerging Czar with imperialist appetites -- may find himself tempted to strike.
The RAND Corporation report suggests that "a force of about seven brigades, including three heavy armored brigades — adequately supported by airpower, land-based fires, and other enablers on the ground and ready to fight at the onset of hostilities — could suffice to prevent the rapid overrun of the Baltic states." The report notes that "while not sufficient to mount a sustained defense of the region or to achieve NATO's ultimate end state of restoring its members' territorial integrity, such a posture would fundamentally change the strategic picture as seen from Moscow."
I would leave the decision for the precise force structure to incoming Defense Secretary James Mattis, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and our NATO allied commanders. But in principle I agree with the direction RAND is suggesting. We want to focus on China/Asia and Radical Islam. We want to avoid a conflict with Putin in Europe. Thus, we must strengthen NATO immediately to maintain our options.
Then the President should start a very focused process of insisting that each NATO country fully invest 2% of their annual GDP on defense spending. That's what they promised to do when they joined the alliance. It's high time each country pay its fair share.
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joelcrosenberg | January 4, 2017 at 11:11 am | Categories: Epicenter | URL: http://wp.me/piWZ7-6qR