https://znetwork.org/category/topic/international-relations/nato/ Independent Left News, Analysis, Vision and Strategy Wed, 24 Dec 2025 19:38:23 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://znetwork.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/cropped-Z_logo_512-32x32.png https://znetwork.org/category/topic/international-relations/nato/ 32 32 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/european-russophobia-and-europes-rejection-of-peace-a-two-century-failure/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/european-russophobia-and-europes-rejection-of-peace-a-two-century-failure/#respond Wed, 24 Dec 2025 18:38:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1292724 Europe has repeatedly rejected peace with Russia at moments when a negotiated settlement was available, and those rejections have proven profoundly self-defeating. From the nineteenth century to the present, Russia’s security concerns have been treated not as legitimate interests to be negotiated within a broader European order, but as moral transgressions to be resisted, contained, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/european-russophobia-and-europes-rejection-of-peace-a-two-century-failure/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/trumps-original-28-point-peace-plan-is-the-least-bad-option-for-ukraine-and-for-europe-as-a-whole/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/trumps-original-28-point-peace-plan-is-the-least-bad-option-for-ukraine-and-for-europe-as-a-whole/#respond Mon, 22 Dec 2025 15:48:17 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1292619 US President Donald Trump has made it very clear that he is an enemy of Europe. His  administration’s recent National Security Strategy contained deranged and racist raving  about Europe facing “civilizational erasure” due to immigration from the Middle East  and Africa, while also calling for interference in Europe’s internal affairs by propping up  far-right elements [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/trumps-original-28-point-peace-plan-is-the-least-bad-option-for-ukraine-and-for-europe-as-a-whole/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/trumps-28-pt-ukraine-war-plan/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/trumps-28-pt-ukraine-war-plan/#respond Mon, 24 Nov 2025 16:30:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1291627 This past week President Trump proposed a 28 Pt. plan to Russia and Ukraine as a basis for negotiations to end the current Ukraine-Russia war, now approaching its fourth year.  What’s behind the Trump proposal? Is it a further revelation of verbal understandings agreed to between Trump and Putin last August in Anchorage, Alaska? Or [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/trumps-28-pt-ukraine-war-plan/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/natos-nuclear-threats-on-parade/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/natos-nuclear-threats-on-parade/#comments Fri, 17 Oct 2025 18:22:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1290086 NATO’s standing threat to attack Russia with nuclear weapons is put on parade every autumn. This year’s thermonuclear dry run—dubbed Steadfast Noon—got started October 13 according to NATO’s press office and the Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe, or SHAPE, in Mons, Belgium. NATO’ euphemism for its yearly doomsday rehearsal is “exercise,” and this year’s dress [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/natos-nuclear-threats-on-parade/feed/ 1 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/capitalism-and-endless-war/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/capitalism-and-endless-war/#respond Mon, 29 Sep 2025 14:38:35 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1289230 Europe is on the war path with grandiose plans for building a war economy akin to the American military-industrial complex. As always, drumming up public support for war – manufacturing consent – calls for narratives ranging from spurring ‘growth’ at home to combating threats from foreign regimes that obstruct the west’s monopoly on endless capital [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/capitalism-and-endless-war/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/what-do-we-know-about-zelensky-and-the-seven-dwarfs-visit-to-the-white-house/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/what-do-we-know-about-zelensky-and-the-seven-dwarfs-visit-to-the-white-house/#respond Sat, 23 Aug 2025 16:30:07 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1287651 With the usual qualifier that I could be entirely wrong, my sense is that both the Alaska Summit and Monday’s meeting at the White House were reality checks. They revealed that Putin was finally able to convince the “collective Trump” (Gilbert Doctorow’s term), that the war in Ukraine did not begin with the Russian invasion [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/what-do-we-know-about-zelensky-and-the-seven-dwarfs-visit-to-the-white-house/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/nato-the-no-exit-trap-of-hotel-california/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/nato-the-no-exit-trap-of-hotel-california/#respond Sat, 26 Jul 2025 15:31:52 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1286606 My analysis of the beginnings of cracks in NATO had been published with a short delay, just enough to become obsolete. I pointed to the two referendum initiatives in Slovenia -one on military spending and the other on membership in the Alliance-, when the situation swiftly changed. To the surprise of those not well acquainted with the [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/nato-the-no-exit-trap-of-hotel-california/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-first-crack-in-natos-fortress-slovenia-opens-the-referendum-conundrum/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-first-crack-in-natos-fortress-slovenia-opens-the-referendum-conundrum/#respond Mon, 21 Jul 2025 18:28:51 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1286448 At NATO’s recent summit in The Hague (24–25 June), alliance leaders triumphantly announced a historic decision: all members will increase military spending to 5%  of GDP over the next decade. But behind the façade of unity lies deep unease. Hardly any member state was pleased with this decision rammed through by Washington. It’s no wonder some [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-first-crack-in-natos-fortress-slovenia-opens-the-referendum-conundrum/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-militarization-and-weaponization-of-media-literacy/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-militarization-and-weaponization-of-media-literacy/#respond Thu, 17 Jul 2025 15:58:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1286313 This Dispatch is informed by our forthcoming 2025 article, “Media Literacy in the Crosshairs: NATO’s Strategic Goals and the Revival of Protectionist Pedagogy,” from the Journal of Media Literacy Education, Volume 17, Issue 2. During President Donald Trump’s second term, education has remained a central battleground in American politics. Republicans claim that classrooms have become [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-militarization-and-weaponization-of-media-literacy/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-birth-of-the-german-fourth-reich/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-birth-of-the-german-fourth-reich/#respond Wed, 16 Jul 2025 18:42:37 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1286239 Germany today has dangerously embarked on a rearmament campaign to prepare for a supposed Russian threat. New Chancellor Frederich Merz told the Bundestag in May Germany would become the “strongest conventional army in Europe,” adding 100,000 troops as “quickly as possible.”This has been accompanied by a repression of free speech in Germany, especially the freedom [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-birth-of-the-german-fourth-reich/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/what-are-the-chances-for-peace-in-ukraine-right-now/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/what-are-the-chances-for-peace-in-ukraine-right-now/#respond Sat, 12 Jul 2025 15:03:50 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1286088 David Goeßmann: The talks a few weeks ago between Russia and Ukraine in Istanbul came to nothing. What are the chances for peace? Anatol Lieven: I see no prospect for an end to the war at present. Russia and Ukraine remain far apart on peace terms, and the Trump administration has not put forward a [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/what-are-the-chances-for-peace-in-ukraine-right-now/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/europe-puts-social-programs-on-chopping-block-to-appease-trump-on-nato-funding/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/europe-puts-social-programs-on-chopping-block-to-appease-trump-on-nato-funding/#respond Fri, 04 Jul 2025 16:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1285820 At last week’s NATO summit, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced that his country would be buying a dozen F-35A fighter jets from the U.S., each one capable of carrying a payload of tactical nuclear weapons. It marks the first time since shortly after the end of the Cold War that U.S. nuclear weapons capable of being [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/europe-puts-social-programs-on-chopping-block-to-appease-trump-on-nato-funding/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-north-atlantic-treaty-organisations-hallucinations/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-north-atlantic-treaty-organisations-hallucinations/#respond Tue, 01 Jul 2025 19:08:25 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1285693 By the end of the annual meeting of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) in The Hague in June 2025, it became clear that everything was about money. In fact, the final communiqué was perhaps the shortest of any NATO meeting – only five points, two about money and one to thank the Netherlands for hosting the [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-north-atlantic-treaty-organisations-hallucinations/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/zvideo/buy-more-u-s-weapons-daddy-trump-pushes-military-industrial-complex-on-nato-countries/ https://znetwork.org/zvideo/buy-more-u-s-weapons-daddy-trump-pushes-military-industrial-complex-on-nato-countries/#respond Sat, 28 Jun 2025 14:31:52 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=video&p=1285566 President Donald Trump has returned to Washington after a NATO summit where leaders agreed to increase their military spending to 5% of GDP by 2035, more than doubling the current target of 2%. The increase comes after years of pressure from Trump, who accuses other countries in the military alliance of not spending enough. “What he is interested in [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/zvideo/buy-more-u-s-weapons-daddy-trump-pushes-military-industrial-complex-on-nato-countries/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/natos-5-pledge-an-obscene-betrayal-of-global-needs/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/natos-5-pledge-an-obscene-betrayal-of-global-needs/#respond Thu, 26 Jun 2025 15:56:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1285493 At this week’s NATO summit in The Hague, leaders announced an alarming new goal: push military spending to 5% of nations’ GDP by 2035. Framed as a response to rising global threats, particularly from Russia and terrorism, the declaration was hailed as a historic step. But in truth, it represents a major step backwards—away from addressing the urgent needs of people [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/natos-5-pledge-an-obscene-betrayal-of-global-needs/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-united-states-strikes-on-iran-will-increase-nuclear-weapons-proliferation/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-united-states-strikes-on-iran-will-increase-nuclear-weapons-proliferation/#respond Wed, 25 Jun 2025 18:01:48 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1285434 On 21 June, the United States struck three locations in Iran with its massive military force. These locations were Fordow, Isfahan, and Natanz – three areas where Iran has its nuclear energy facilities. To be clear, Iran’s nuclear energy facilities are legal and continue to be inspected and validated by the International Atomic Energy Agency [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-united-states-strikes-on-iran-will-increase-nuclear-weapons-proliferation/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/busting-the-myth-of-trump-as-an-anti-war-president/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/busting-the-myth-of-trump-as-an-anti-war-president/#respond Wed, 25 Jun 2025 17:50:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1285433 It’s been said that Donald Trump’s decision to join Israel’s war with Iran underscores his failures as a peacemaker. This is a preposterous statement because the idea of Trump being “a peacemaker and unifier” has always been nothing short of preposterous. Yes, long before his ascendance to the White House, Trump had managed to paint [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/busting-the-myth-of-trump-as-an-anti-war-president/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/spain-is-right-to-reject-increased-military-spending/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/spain-is-right-to-reject-increased-military-spending/#respond Sun, 22 Jun 2025 15:49:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1285309 Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, has broken ranks with other NATO leaders as he refused to commit to spending 5 percent of GDP on defense. It’s a welcome move, and a rare voice of dissent from Europe’s rush to remilitarize. On Thursday, Spain’s center-left prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, broke ranks with other NATO leaders as [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/spain-is-right-to-reject-increased-military-spending/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/nato-is-the-united-states/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/nato-is-the-united-states/#respond Sat, 21 Jun 2025 16:20:53 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1285304 On June 24 and 25, the members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) will strut around the streets of The Hague for their annual summit – the first since Donald Trump’s return to the U.S. presidency and the first under new NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte. On March 13, Rutte visited Trump in the Oval Office, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/nato-is-the-united-states/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/south-koreas-president-lee-shouldnt-attend-nato-amidst-crises-peace-is-pragmatic/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/south-koreas-president-lee-shouldnt-attend-nato-amidst-crises-peace-is-pragmatic/#respond Wed, 18 Jun 2025 16:33:16 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1285171 In his inaugural speech, South Korea’s recently elected President Lee Jae-myung declared that ‘no peace is too expensive; it is always better than war’. The words capture an idealism packaged in Lee’s pragmatism. Indeed, at a time when the US Cold War against China is turning Asia into a tinderbox, when global temperatures have exceeded [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/south-koreas-president-lee-shouldnt-attend-nato-amidst-crises-peace-is-pragmatic/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/varoufakis-how-europe-fell-into-the-arms-of-warmongering-and-what-we-must-do/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/varoufakis-how-europe-fell-into-the-arms-of-warmongering-and-what-we-must-do/#respond Tue, 17 Jun 2025 16:30:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1285133 On Tuesday, June 10 2025, I addressed a meeting at the European Parliament, an event organised by The Left and M5S Europa, on the theme of “The Economic Conditions for Peace”, alongside Jeffrey Sachs and Giuseppe Conte. [INTRODUCTION] A year ago, I would have started this speech with a lament about the hitherto unimaginable conversion of the European [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/varoufakis-how-europe-fell-into-the-arms-of-warmongering-and-what-we-must-do/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/to-preserve-the-european-social-welfare-model-we-should-resist-mark-ruttes-plans-to-increase-military-spending/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/to-preserve-the-european-social-welfare-model-we-should-resist-mark-ruttes-plans-to-increase-military-spending/#respond Thu, 12 Jun 2025 15:51:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1284900 In February of this year, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte remarked at the Munich  Security Conference that, due to the current situation in Europe, “we will have to  prioritize defense over other stuff”. More recently, Rutte declared that he would  propose a new defense spending target of 5 % of GDP at NATO’s upcoming summit [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/to-preserve-the-european-social-welfare-model-we-should-resist-mark-ruttes-plans-to-increase-military-spending/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/europes-left-must-unite-to-oppose-natos-rearmament-and-austerity/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/europes-left-must-unite-to-oppose-natos-rearmament-and-austerity/#respond Tue, 10 Jun 2025 16:00:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1284835 As Europe approaches NATO’s 24–26 June summit in The Hague, its 750 million people face a decisive strategic choice that will affect their lives for years to come – and one with far wider global impact. The policies implemented in Europe in recent years have been disastrous socially, economically, politically, and militarily. Europe is experiencing [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/europes-left-must-unite-to-oppose-natos-rearmament-and-austerity/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/new-spider-man-sequence-one-second-closer-to-doomsday/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/new-spider-man-sequence-one-second-closer-to-doomsday/#respond Thu, 05 Jun 2025 15:50:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1284590 In 2022, I was invited to participate in a book project that gathered leading scientists worldwide to address a topic that already seemed critically urgent: managing the nuclear order. In this context, we organised several online debates. As one of the few participants from the global (or European) periphery, I dared to ask: What order? Where do [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/new-spider-man-sequence-one-second-closer-to-doomsday/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-guns-are-again-ablaze-in-libya/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-guns-are-again-ablaze-in-libya/#respond Wed, 04 Jun 2025 17:44:49 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1284565 On 12 May 2025, Abdul Ghani al-Kikli, known to everyone in Libya as Ghnewa al-Kikli, was killed during a meeting inside a militia facility run by the 444th Combat Brigade in Tripoli. Ghnewa, as he was called, led the Stability Support Apparatus (SSA), which had ruled parts of Tripoli, and indeed sections of northern Libya, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-guns-are-again-ablaze-in-libya/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-time-to-consign-nato-to-the-dustbin-of-history/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-time-to-consign-nato-to-the-dustbin-of-history/#respond Wed, 04 Jun 2025 17:43:12 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1284570 As NATO’s next summit looms – against the backdrop of an escalating proxy war in Ukraine and a genocidal horror in Gaza – the sane and moral world must roar in defiance, shattering ideological shackles. NATO is a zombie alliance, lurching forward despite its irrelevance, its fangs dripping with the blood of nations it claims [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/its-time-to-consign-nato-to-the-dustbin-of-history/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/serbias-organized-chaos/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/serbias-organized-chaos/#comments Wed, 28 May 2025 17:34:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1284307 Serbia is a small country which used to be a favorite of Western Allied powers like France and Britain for its heroic resistance to Austrian and German invasion in two world wars.  They liked it so much that in redrawing European boundaries at Versailles in 1918, they enlarged it into the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/serbias-organized-chaos/feed/ 1 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-real-evil-empire-may-surprise-you/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-real-evil-empire-may-surprise-you/#respond Fri, 09 May 2025 11:02:06 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1283532 Forty years ago this month, I was commissioned a second lieutenant in the U.S. Air Force. I would be part of America’s all-volunteer force (AVF) for 20 years, hitting my marks and retiring as a lieutenant colonel in 2005. In my two decades of service, I met a lot of fine and dedicated officers, enlisted [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/the-real-evil-empire-may-surprise-you/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/russias-security-concerns-before-the-war-in-ukraine-were-plain-to-see/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/russias-security-concerns-before-the-war-in-ukraine-were-plain-to-see/#respond Mon, 21 Apr 2025 15:40:46 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1282774 Look closely, and it becomes hard to justify. It is increasingly clear that the Biden Administration made a series of policy decisions concerning Ukraine that gave the Kremlin little choice but to either defer to Washington at the expense of Russian security or resist. There is much to say about the background to this conflict, [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/russias-security-concerns-before-the-war-in-ukraine-were-plain-to-see/feed/ 0 https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/nato-was-founded-to-crush-communist-socialist-and-anti-colonial-movements-worldwide/ https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/nato-was-founded-to-crush-communist-socialist-and-anti-colonial-movements-worldwide/#respond Thu, 17 Apr 2025 15:46:00 +0000 https://znetwork.org/?post_type=znetarticle&p=1282600 NATO was never a good idea gone wrong. It was founded to crush communist, socialist, and anti-colonial movements in Europe and around the world. Medea Benjamin and David Swanson explain NATO’s supremely violent history in NATO: What You Need to Know . The organization was born on April 4, 1949, when foreign ministers from 12 nations came [...]]]> https://znetwork.org/znetarticle/nato-was-founded-to-crush-communist-socialist-and-anti-colonial-movements-worldwide/feed/ 0