Bret Devereaux

Going by the IMF rankings, of the top 10 economies in the world (by raw GDP), 7 are in the US-NATO-and-Friends (henceforth, 'the West' for convenience) camp. Of the top 20, at least 12 are (one might quibble the figure as high as 14, I think). 8/20

A lot of those US-aligned countries are 'under-militarized' sure. Some of them may not enhance American military power or projection much. They may effectively be liabilities (of course some are very much not)... 9/20

...but their US alignment takes that GDP - and thus that potential military capacity, if those economies were ever militarized - off of the table. That, in turn, effects the balancing calculus... 10/20

...because it leaves too few pieces on the board for a direct challenge. The classic example of this must be the Reinsurance Treaty (1887) - by essentially taking Russia 'off the table' Bismark could ensure France would struggle at best to pull together enough allies... 11/20

...to revisit the verdict of 1871 (until they blew it) I'd contend the Romans managed the same thing in Italy from 295 to 218BC and again from 202 to 91BC; it sure wasn't that none of the Italian allies didn't want to break free (see Fronda, Between Rome&Carthage (2010)...12/20

...but absent Hannibal stomping around, after Sentinum, there wasn't enough capacity to band together around the usual discontents (Gauls, Samnites) to make balancing feasible. Roman missteps created a situation in 91BC where that was no longer true - like we're doing now 13/20

The value of NATO - of most of the US-aligned security agreements, formal and informal - is thus less what they do for us, as what they are *not* doing, in our interest. By taking so many potential powerful potential disruptors 'off the table'...14/20

One other response, a separate thought, related to this particular point. What was Rome willing to do to keep its allies and protectorates in line? And what is the US prepared to do? One of the great conceits of American primacy is that it isn’t coercive like other empires. 1/