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SECDEF Gates lays down the law to NATO

It's nice to see US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates using the fact that he's soon due to retire to good advantage. In wide-ranging comments on NATO today, Gates threw down the gauntlet, and made clear that an "alliance" that, in practice, has really meant "reliance" on US power is not a formula for a sustainable long-term mutual-security arrangement.

"The blunt reality is that there will be dwindling appetite and patience in the U.S. Congress — and in the American body politic writ large — to expend increasingly precious funds on behalf of nations that are apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources or make the necessary changes to be serious and capable partners in their own defense," he said.

My personal take: Gates' comments are spot-on, not only on the surface of it --the American public isn't going to tolerate being "stepped forward" by virtue of our allies' stepping backward forever-- but also in light of the "multi-lateral" world that every politician and policymaker claims to want.

The bottom line is that the realpolitik Golden Rule applies, that being that if you have one country spending the bulk of the gold, you can't cry when that country also wants to make the rules.