Chapter 4, Section VII. America as Weak Link: NATO’s Braindamaged Core
- john raymond
- Jul 10
- 3 min read
At the heart of NATO’s current dysfunction lies an uncomfortable paradox: the United States, long considered the cornerstone of the alliance, is now its most volatile liability.
With Trump’s return to power, NATO is no longer merely challenged by external threats or logistical limitations, but by internal sabotage emanating from its most powerful member.
Trump has not changed. He still insults allies. He still appeases Putin. He still undermines American intelligence not because he doubts it—but because he fears it.
His fear is personal: fear of what the intelligence community might expose, of what it knows about his finances, his allegiances, and his compromises.
Every statement about NATO being "obsolete," every refusal to commit to Article 5, every delay in supporting Ukraine, is not a blunder—it is a disruption. And in asymmetric warfare, disruption is a weapon.
NATO, once the symbol of unity against Soviet expansion, is now hollowed out from the inside. French President Emmanuel Macron called the alliance "braindead" in 2019.
COVID only confirmed this diagnosis. The pandemic revealed the absence of coordinated response mechanisms. The war in Ukraine, though a stark wake-up call, did little to reverse the damage. And under Trump’s renewed dominance, it is not just Ukraine but NATO itself that is being tested—and found wanting.
Instead of resisting this sabotage, NATO’s leadership has chosen appeasement. Mark Rutte, the newly appointed Secretary-General, has prioritized placation over principle.
He courts Trump in the name of unity, assuming that consensus—however manufactured—is preferable to conflict. But this is a strategic failure. By refusing to name Trump as the traitor he is, Rutte legitimizes him.
By avoiding confrontation, he weakens the alliance.
This is not about diplomacy. This is about clarity. Trump is not a skeptic of NATO; he is an opponent of it. His entire worldview centers around transaction, loyalty to self, and allegiance to those who praise or protect him—chief among them Vladimir Putin.
In this light, Rutte’s strategy is not pragmatic, but craven. It doesn’t strengthen NATO; it erodes it. It doesn’t unify; it confuses. And it enables the very betrayal the alliance must now defend against.
The bitter irony is that Rutte likely believes he is saving the alliance from rupture. But by refusing to tell the truth about Trump’s role, he accelerates the decay.
Making Trump appear reasonable to Western audiences—even inadvertently—is one of the greatest strategic losses NATO could suffer. Because Trump’s power is derived not from tanks or treaties, but from perception.
He is a traitor general masquerading as a patriot. And every moment he is treated as a partner instead of a saboteur, the West draws closer to strategic collapse. And this collapse is sped up by burnishing Trump for his domestic audiences.
The world is not waiting for NATO to wake up. Ukraine isn’t waiting. Iran isn’t waiting. China certainly isn’t.
What they see is an alliance too scared to confront its own rot. An alliance still pretending its emperor wears clothes.
Rutte, instead of rallying the alliance to face the threat, has become the manager of optics—delivering false unity while the foundations crumble.
Without American leadership, NATO falters. But with Trump as its leader, it may not survive at all.
In this sense, the West’s greatest threat is no longer Russia’s aggression or China’s cyber warfare. It is betrayal and internal decay.
And unless NATO names the saboteur within its gates, it will soon be nothing more than a memory—a coalition that failed to defend itself from the enemy it dared not name.
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