Pet Peeve of mine: using the term "US Ally" for states that are not in fact US Allies under any formal treaty arrangement. We occasionally work with all sorts of countries. Sometimes we engage in military cooperation with them in pursuit of our interests... 1/6
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...but we have *actual treaty obligations* to a much smaller number. I see in particular a lot of 'US Ally Does Human Rights Violation!' stories where the country in question isn't a treaty ally and the USA has no formal obligations to them. 2/6
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Now those stories are valid, important stories - there are some relationships that the USA might want to reconsider in light of the human rights violations going on. But the transactional informality of those relationships is an important point that gets elided. 3/6
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Anyway, there are two fair ways to count US allies. Option 1: Add NATO + State department designated Major non-NATO ally (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_non-NATO_ally …). Option 2: Actually look at which states the USA has treaty obligations to defend. 4/6
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For option two, you have NATO (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO ), ANZUS (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ANZUS ), the Rio Pact (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inter-American_Treaty_of_Reciprocal_Assistance …), plus bilateral obligations with Japan, the Philippines, and South Korea. Israel, Pakistan and Taiwan are less clear-cut but probably included. 5/6
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So no, Ethiopia is not a US ally, neither is Saudi Arabia, Ukraine, etc. It's fine to describe those countries as friendly, or cooperative or what have you - and argue that the USA ought to be more critical of them - but they are not formal allies and that matters. end/6
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Vastauksena käyttäjälle @BretDevereaux
How much arms do we sell them and other informal military guarantees of independence even if there is no formal agreement? What is a term that you can have for that?
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Vastauksena käyttäjälle @JohnBrownGood
Informal military guarantees are, historically speaking, worth exactly the paper they are written on and no more.
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Vastauksena käyttäjälle @BretDevereaux
Written ones aren't worth much more, too, aren't they?
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Vastauksena käyttäjälle @JohnBrownGood
The value of a written alliance is that it imposes greater costs for failure to live up to the terms of the arrangement. This is obviously not a perfect system and countries do breach treaties but reliability and credibility also matter.
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One need only look at the relative difference in current affairs between Ukraine and the Baltic states (Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia) to see the value in having a formal mutual defense treaty rather than an informal understanding.
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Vastauksena käyttäjälle @BretDevereaux
I don't disagree; but I feel like there's an obvious level here that we lack robust and accurate language to describe. Saudi arabia may not have a formal defense agreement but it would beggar belief to say that they aren't under US protection. That can change rapidly, but still
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Vastauksena käyttäjälle @JohnBrownGood
The traditional term for that is 'client state' or 'vassal state' but one may readily understand why the state department tries to avoid that phrasing.
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