By Finian Cunningham

December 08, 2020 "Information Clearing House" - The US-led NATO military alliance is like a war junkie – it needs to inject conflict and tensions in order to get a “fix” for its existence.

NATO’s pathological addiction was all the more apparent with the publication of its mission document last week entitled ‘NATO 2030 – United for a New Era’.

Reading between the lines, it is evident that the alliance’s planners are desperately seeking a public rationale “to stay relevant” – more than 70 years after the military bloc was founded in 1949 at the beginning of the Cold War with the Soviet Union.

And they find that “fix” for existence by talking up the alleged threats posed by Russia and China. The Cold War has to be maintained, otherwise NATO goes Cold Turkey. And the junkie can’t do that.

NATO’s civilian leader Jens Stoltenberg hammed up the aggression by accusing Russia and China of “coming closer to us” from “the Arctic to the Atlantic”. Conveniently, according the NATO chief, the remedy for meeting this “challenge” is for the alliance to deploy even more forces on the borders of Russia and presumably China as well.

By way of a reality-check, Russia’s Baltic Fleet command released data this week which shows that over the past 12 months the United States has conducted a five-fold increase in strategic bomber flights near Russia’s western borders compared with the previous year. These aircraft are capable of launching nuclear weapons. This was under the watch of President Trump who was supposed to be “soft” on Russia and trying to “normalize” bilateral relations.

In addition, the US and NATO members Poland and Romania are deploying missiles which are capable of striking Russia within minutes from launch.

Meanwhile, Washington has scrapped yet another arms control institution, the Open Skies Treaty, which means that Russia is prevented from conducting scheduled surveillance flights to monitor possible US military build-up.

That follows the Trump administration’s trashing of the Cold War-era Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty last year which could pave the way for the Americans deploying so-called “tactical” nuclear weapons in Europe aimed at Russia. Again, Trump was supposed to be a “stooge” of Russia. Give us a break!

The US and its NATO allies also intend deploying more tactical nukes near China’s territory. That would explain why Washington quit the INF treaty. While the Americans accused Russia of breaching that treaty, the real reason was Washington giving itself a free hand to deploy otherwise banned weapons in offensive positions towards China.

So, who is threatening who? The NATO “mission statement” accusing Russia and China of increasingly posing a threat is patently absurd. It is turning reality upside down and articulated with brazen double-think, or outright duplicity.

NATO is addicted to creating enemies because it needs to find a way to justify the spending of nearly $1,000 billion a year on military machines. That’s the combined spending on “defense” by the US and its NATO allies. That represents about 20 times what Russia spends and on its military and five times that of China.

The military-industrial complex is a vital component to drive Western capitalism. Industry lobbyists and lucrative donations ensure politicians in Washington and Europe are bought to merrily dance to their tune and keep the whole military-money racket going.

But in addition, NATO is the spearhead for US imperialism. Without the political cover of NATO, then Washington doesn’t have the veneer of “multilateralism” when it wants to launch wars around the planet. Keeping NATO together, or “staying relevant” as its planners euphemistically say, is essential for whitewashing the criminal operations of American imperialism.

With audacious Orwellian distortion of reality, NATO then turns around and accuses Russia and China of threatening global peace and security.

Ominously, President-elect Joe Biden is talking up strengthening the NATO alliance while pointing fingers at Russia and China. And America’s European lackeys appear to be swooning at the prospect of more NATO adventurism. America “is back”, as Biden declares, and the European minions are delighted.

The lunatics are running amok in the NATO asylum. The war junkies are craving for a fix. With Western capitalist economies tanking and social problems mounting, the danger is very real that NATO’s hallucinations about Russia and China could end up starting war.