hello and welcome to cross talk where all things considered i'm peter lavelle the nato military alliance is a relic from the cold war back then it was relevant and even necessary today it is an alliance in search of a mission that search has almost completely entailed eastern expansion towards russia but a lingering question remains is the average american and western european interested in a war over the sovereignty of dystonia and montenegro. cross

talking the atlantic alliance i'm joined by my guest luke prevail in brussels he's an independent journalist in paris we have emmanuelle gave she is a french lawyer and in oxford we cross to mark owen he is the director of the crisis research institute or across the uk rules in effect that means you can jump in anytime you want and i always appreciate it let's go to our guest in paris many well you have president mccrone just recently said that nato is brain dead how do you reflect upon that because a nato summit is coming up next week and it's been shortened to 2 days because a lot of people worried that. donald trump will start some kind of dumpster fire as he tends to do when it comes to nato so how is the nato alliance stand right now because you have jeremy corbyn and going into election mode doubting the alliance the necessity here so i mean is mccrone right is nato brain dead go ahead. well to be honest i am afraid that this time i find myself on the same page as mr

micawber just something it's something unusual cold for me stopped for me right time twice a day it's but what we have to look at is that mr michael is saying it is a brand this is true but why because what he wants in bottom line is to make an alliance with germany and to sell our french army to the german that has been agenda since the beginning their big idea is to think europe and to kind of congregate everyone in this type of imperial europe they have as an idea a kind of napoleon type of an. and this is a very big challenge for us french because that would mean obviously losing our army losing our sovereignty so he is using this nato does nato thing which is right to have he has a hidden agenda if i could say which is to bind our army with the german army and

this is something us the french have to look after because losing our army means losing our sovereignty means losing our identity so i think we're probably going to come back in the 2nd part on what is the real combat today it's not communism any more we'll know what the civilization issue is and obviously nato is not the one up for it so that's my point of view on that i would say with a lot of market in oxford but i would make the argument that all 27 united states being the 28 member of nato their sovereignty is compromised as well and if you look at public opinion polls it's been pretty. trending. more and more people in western europe in the united states have doubts about you know having a collective security treaty organization for a countries that are so far on. and that what you always france in the u.k.

in the united states want to get into a military conflict over you know a country like. a stone ian i mean is that something people are interested in to poll say people aren't go ahead mark or i think this is always the problem with a large alliance that you find that the fringe areas the border areas are remote from centers of population centers of contribution by the british the french and so on so it's true not just for eastern europe but also for the south if we think about france italy and spain in nato the the immediate security threat comes from islam missed terrorist groups operating in north africa and perhaps potentially threatening them a long way away we've heard mention of the procurement complex we have to remember that moscow is much further from the western border of russia and $812.00 than it is today and one person macro's controversial ideas from the point of view of the standard nato for is of course he's talking about reassessing the relations with russia because he doesn't feel as president of france that russia poses

a threat to firms ok well let's go to lou came in in brussels i mean you know you i'm sure you've all been following this ridiculous circus called the impeachment process in the united states and you know i watched some of the hearings i didn't know that ukraine was a national security interest of the united states and it's news to me oh my goodness it's not part of nato there are no obligations to protect ukraine's sovereignty but you wouldn't know that from the mainstream media go ahead look. ok well the collapse of ukraine it's of course started it all of course and the sanctions that were imposed both way both ways made it worse and gave nato. a reason to have aggressive language to with russia i think what happens now in the wake up call given by michael is for once excellent in the sense that by accepting to discuss with russia to discuss a memorandum on intermediate missiles so nuclear missiles. will probably

gain points in europe everywhere and he will probably come to a result because this is early 001 proposal of common european defense failed like most of his proposals actually over the last few years they failed miserably and so this one marks exceed one he said that nato was brain dead he had no no substance in the speech really about this but president putin gave him substance that by proposing to discuss by by hand by giving a hand to nato nato had said no we're not interested we can believe in it you can believe in it why don't you discuss it 1st so that's probably what michael is saying this week to worm to the nato general secretary against stoltenberg who's in paris for that precisely so nato would probably change this this course it's

speech about. the russia and the threats that russia could represent ok many many you know that's an interesting point but i mean without you know the russian bogeyman then there's even more doubts about what nato is purposes because the in my mind nato is primary mission is to exist ok that's what they want they have 5000 bureaucrats working for nato in brussels. so existence is the mission ok but that's a dangerous mission because of what something that mark said earlier is that we have a large alliance like this with divergent views and interests and actually been going to happen in and then there's some people that want that to happen here go ahead the menu and paris yes i think that's a very good question obviously it's like taxes once they all voted it's very rare that you come back on it so nato has its own existence it's a kind of artifact in itself it stays because it is and this is always

a problem we have when we create a monster you we you have walking dead frankenstein and this is what we have today but i think president trump addressed this question 2 days ago and said well i think if we had to reassign maybe a mission to nato it would be today to deal with the enemies or of our civilization and who are the enemies nowadays it's not communism anymore it's something far more real and it is something that is that isn't really a war per se we're not going to build trenches we're not going to silo my cells we have we have a civilization war so is nato adapted to that type of war is the question and the 2nd we we question we have us french as you probably have seen in the recent news we lost 13 men in mali yeah 3 days ago in an operation that promptly was.

bumping into each other or the sun to what we don't know so do we have the means of saying no to nato also if we don't put more money into our defense french i'm saying because every year the defense budget is going down and so you know there's a saying in no way i think it's an done mark if you don't have an army you have the army of the country next door you know well we don't have an army anymore in france so who's the country next door. you know you know mark of the. trump is already been mentioned here and again you know i'm agreeing with mccrone and trump on the same program i think everybody is on this one which is a landmark in itself on this program but you know he's complained about the lack of defense spending by european allies and i mean some people can say take it counter-intuitive way of looking at him saying you know make it so exorbitant that they say they don't want to pay for it ok and that will give a reason for trump to say ok if i will go home if you don't want to pay for your

own security if you're so afraid of russia why don't you pay for it i mean that's a very good argument ok and of course the europeans are not going to go along with it but i hope to get back to that dr go ahead mark in oxford. here but he also we have to remember that the europeans are primary focused on their immediate vicinity even if they dispute which is the direction of threat or concern but the americans are global one of the things i think we shouldn't perhaps obsess too much about is trump personally because i think quite often we overlook the american security establishment shows trumps dissatisfaction with the europeans probably because it wants to spend more money in asia its primary concern is the growth of chinese power and whole issues to in east asia so they want the europeans to provide more self-sufficiency so that america will still be the lead in nato but it will be having to develop came a recent mar think that's a very that's a very good point here and i think that that would erode if i was a european i would be very irritated by it so you want us to pay more money but

you're still in charge how does that work ok i can see the in the idea about that keep going mark. no i think this is where we see tensions both between washington and its allies in europe but also within europe because we can see that the if you like the 3 big players in your britain from germany are all moving in slightly different directions mrs merkel after all was the 1st to criticize trump when he became president and say that perhaps germany in the europeans would have to do more for their defense and then the germans suddenly thought we have to pay for it . we don't particularly want to and we as a culture germany has been transformed the british are moving closer to the united states leaving european union and so from speak comes the central player but as we've heard from a menu of the problem is that france wants to play a role that it can't really afford to pay for so actually all of this discussion reveals really how fragile the nato situation is at the same time it's sort of bureaucracy continues to plow forwards ignoring the fact that public

opinion domestic politics in the member states is beginning to drift more and more away from it. ok i'm going to jump in here we're going to go to a short break and after that short break we'll continue our discussion on the atlantic alliance with our.

and a very warm welcome to you you're watching us in such a. tight haven t. let's move. on. and you. could want to think about you think about it. can they. get him as all. get to be august. for me to get a feel. good children tell him with all that she wants i want to.

your industry is based on greed and greed is based on this. rush to change the latest much paper wealth as possible even though it's not genuine wealth spot actual money it's not gold like a warren buffett just hoards of money like an old brainy one or phonebooks that doesn't credible damage because it. takes it to the population this notion fully to be. welcome back across top where all things are considered i'm peter lavelle to remind you we're discussing the atlantic alliance.

ok let's go back to luke in brussels i want to reflect upon something that emanuel was talking about these outer area operations under the. the banner of the flag of nato here it seems to me that that's also. europe is being used as like an aircraft carrier as it were a base for american objectives going into africa i mean you know if you look back you know the chinese for whatever you think of them they are building a huge amount of ins infrastructure in africa the united states is putting in more and more military bases ok and again this is this kind of. effect the nato say in search of a mission you know what let's go to outer area right now let's go to afghanistan and see how that worked out ok i mean nato is constantly looking for something to do to justify its. self and at the same time it will not answer overtures for i'm

russia and i to be give you my opinion even if they did now i wouldn't trust them ok then with the eastern expansion all the way to russia's border and now this nonsense going on in ukraine this is not a partner you can trust because their motives are very very unclear go ahead look. well totally agree with you in the sense that. europe doesn't pay for its defense so donald trump is right about that and has other priorities than europe understandable to the the warsaw pact to be it is this appeared in the ninety's i mean why still keep nato so of course hold the military in the national armies composing nato in europe there are salivating at the idea of the shopping list that they're going to give to work in germany for example to a k k 2 on the minister of defense new minister of defense germany is accepted again in bolin presence of the of my can pay off for example that is accepted again to pay 2 percent and it will be in

a few years that they have reached out level so there will be a huge improvement of european defense potentially wherever it is as you say africa is very important for the moment i mean the french are fighting nearly alone there in mali for the moment with some help but the trickle from the u.k. from belgium from all the armies so the hope is that if europe wants to improve its defense it will not be by looking at russia as an enemy and the letter sent by president putin could well change the face of the world order in the coming years because nato now under pressure by my craw and it's good of him to do that we'll have to think again about its purpose and about what it does it's much more important to look at the southern front here of europe and the problems that are created by immigration and by thinks of the kind and so the french need help in mali we don't have logistics enough in the european armies even the french or the

british that fulfill the 2 percent request that by by the americans so we need to make a big improvement and then only can we speak about european defense so michael had a point this line isn't. last month going on france i contacted piece today and they said that they are of course curious that book will happen but that they agree with the president just like ok let's go back to paris to many well i mean the poles have talked about creating. trump the poles i lived there for many years even under communism they're one of the most pro-american countries in europe but you know showing that you know being pro-american actually has a price tag to it and it's something that i would have liked in that we had to say i mean building up european defense against what ok what do you need all these planes and tanks for is it to defend the no boundaries in the sovereignty of these

countries are they or is it just to make them spend money so these arms companies get all of these contracts i mean it seems to me that again they're. creating monsters to slay that don't exist in their real monsters out there that you're dismissing like the southern tier of nato with immigration in the mediterranean you have islamic charism it seems to me nato is a blunt object and it just expensive go ahead emmanuel. i think you are right on this point it's sufficient machine they are creating their own needs and bottom line is when you speak to persons in the army they are saying that their most of the time their planes are in really bad condition when you are in mali for example that the sand was a big problem i was talking to a european m.p. 2 weeks before the event in mali and he said to me we are going to have big problems there because our men are just trying to stay alive they knew that and 2

weeks after we see that so i found there is a decor to me between what nato asks for and what we really have to work with what the layman what down to earth men have to do when they are on missions. they have to work with the equipment they have i don't know where all the money spent on nato goes but i know it's not on our guys because they have to do with very little of it and. you know it's the saying they are tigers led by donkeys really if you think about. and i think that i think we did i think will change the title of the program just to that i think that there mark if you if again public opinion polls that the majority of germans would like to see american troops go home ok i mean that's and that's not reported widely in the mainstream media of course i read antiwar dot com and they made a big deal about it but the average american has no idea that they're not wanted in

germany anymore there's a lot of troops in germany and that's as for operations the united states is running in the middle east ok again using europe as a conduit a menu well brings up a very very good point is that you know these militaries are not high tech there's not a lot of money put into it there it's not high prestige as far as i understand but it's for washington it's an important public figure leaf you know that they have this big expensive shiny alliance but it's more for ego than anything else not for a purpose ok look what happened in afghanistan all right and again you have all of these armies and we don't fight in the snow we don't fight in the rain we don't fight it dark i mean these are all fig leaves ok the united states wants to say this is the international community well it's not the international community it's washington and its allies and the europe that's all it is it's a huge fig leaf and it's a fraud go ahead mark well certainly it's obviously true for american public opinion it is good to be able to say look we have all these are we have the mother

of all alliances taking part but coming back to a point you're making earlier about poland and you know we've both been of a generation who remember these places in the cold war and yet i did europe the huge change it seems to me is that when you have a crisis for instance over the in the issue of the cruise missiles and. and in the 1980 s. when push came to shove the german public the british public the french public all voted for candidates who supported american policy today we find even amongst quite conservative people there's an alienation from trump and in a sense ironically the mainstream media's relentless parrot against trump has actually damaged the links between the americans and their european allies because most people so trumps the american president they don't think of him as a person and the other side of this course is that when one was 1st in soviet bloc in the 1000 seventy's eighty's you never came across and western opinion even members of the communist party were not anti western whereas now in particular we see in russia but in some other countries to the disillusionment with the west

since the collapse of communism since the failures of the economic advice that went badly wrong means that we actually now have a popular base for anti western policies in some countries which didn't exist when you had a monopoly of communist propaganda but people didn't believe it now in some ways you have a kind of popular underpinning of this so we have 2 things we have. o.d.u. dissolution with its links with the americans which is growing as you say particularly germany and also the rivalry with russia has a popular base city didn't really have in the time of creation and for nixon or even reagan and gorbachev. that's a very good point because i can tell you living i've been living in moscow for over 20 years and this this illusion meant with the west is very very real because words and actions are very different they see the the hypocrisy all of the time and a lot of russians that i that i know that have known for a very long time don't understand why they have to be deemed as an enemy when they

repeatedly reach out to try to have a european house again i go back to we can go back to got a bunch of president putin when he came to power in 2000 said the same thing when president made their voice president he said the same thing but the answer is always. no or you can join the club but you have to sit at the children's table that's the deal go ahead look well i agree with you fully we can all nato is outdated and we don't need tanks because we're not going to fight tank battles like the battle in the past the. in the in the plains of poland this is ludicrous so the european defense must adapt to the threats which comes from the south as i said from africa france cannot be a long history and we should help more that are other issues with iran with pakistan and that have the bomb bore or could have it soon so i understand what europeans need their defense organized better it's probably not for the nato i

agree in the sense that america wants to go they don't want to be the umbrella protecting europe anymore the cold war is finished and so they have other issues in the far east so they want to get the military back in and free for other missions so europe must think about its own defense so i see it in 2 steps 1st nato must refocus and thanks to michael it seems it is possible all thanks to putin in a sense but one that has refocused will be on different missions to the sounds and it put it to the south it won't be nato anymore it could be a european defense force ok and as it should be many well before we were almost out of time should turkey stay in the need to allow an alliance i mean they always talk about nato values turkey in line with that real quick one minute of the thing is that if we're going to make a if if we have if we have decided that nato is outdated and we want something more of a european defense we don't want turkey it's about $130.00 in our in i mean i

don't personally so that's that well i want a i mean there's a lot you know that's very short but you know that that's what i think it's really important to mention that in this kind of conversation because we talk about values having shared values here. and we've seen since the the attempted coup in 2016 with all of these purges of the military and then you have going to going into syria as a nato member again that's a trip wire that we all have to be careful of why would we want to fight a war against syria because of turkey it's food for thought there that's all the time we have many thanks to my guests in brussels paris and in oxford and thanks to our viewers for watching us here at r.t.c. and expand remember.

young elephants have come to us. especially brutal budgeting incidents because sadly the baby elephants often do see their mother as. killed but also be caught up unfortunate. i do believe they laugh and smile i see it in these little ones the home facial expression changes. in his community there are people who believe that it's ok. it's really hard there are no jobs and you see that i've got kids and ask and as a parent. i can come up with a logical argument there's a lot of conflict in the game between the 2 most of the conflict i would say over

balls around money and most of them money is made. close one on each other's cosimo each other is good because the state of california alone makes $6000000000.00 a year of prison complex just to get some point in your life where. you don't care anymore nobody cares about your so you don't care about anything. i.

think. ever the show monday president donald trump picks thanksgiving to pay his 1st ever visit to afghanistan using the occasion to tell the u.s. troops based there the talks with the taliban. with bolivia in the grip of political instability we talked to a local man he was brutally beaten publicly humiliated by our bridles about the president's more honest. that mean he also cut off my hair. but they do want to change me and i want people to take a step back and say never mind and i believe him he does not believe like this when . the meeting between the chief of nato and french president fails to result tensions within the alliance with iran all micron still.