This is basically an admission of treason.

NATO benefits the US *far* more than it benefits any other member state. It underpins US global influence and is what makes us a superpower.

All that talk about how the US is the only global power because of it's logistical capabilities is only possible *because* we have strategic partnerships like NATO that let us have bases and prepositioned stockpiles across the globe in securely defended allied countries.

Strategic partnerships allow things like the joint funding of the F-35, which skyrocketed its production so that it's not only the most advanced system flying, but that there are more of them than all other stealth aircraft on the planet combined, and now only costs *less* to produce than a modernized F-15.

It gives the US defense complex a massively larger pool of capital and investors and manufacturing partners to draw from. It gives the US a millions strong collection of modernized armed forces from allies to rely on to hold ground abroad. It gives the US-led alliance an economic base that makes up *most of the world's economy*.

And all of this adds up to deterrence, which adds up to stability and a peace dividend, which leads to faster and more effective economic growth, which an aggressive and dictatorial adversary cannot hope to match long-term.

War is fucking hell, and the way you avoid it is by making alliances so that your pool of resources is simply so great that no one can ever hope to win a stand up fight against you, and the US has actually achieved that with NATO.

The only hope of autocrats like Xi and Putin is that they can turn NATO members against each other through interference campaigns, and they have to do it in the next decade or two, or they will have lost almost any hope for a superpower bid and for a realignment of global norms away from democracy and towards aggressive expansionist autocracy.