Richard Haass: If Russia Want To Do a Probe Into Some European Country, Europeans Are Not Confident We’re Going To Be There

EXCERPT:

HAASS: "A couple of things. One is whether the Europe — whether there’s any sense that the Europeans have confidence in the United States. Quite honestly, the biggest issue is a lot of Europeans will tell you privately, Willie, they think of this as a crisis. If Russia want to do a probe into some European country, they’re not confident we’re going to be there. So that’s one thing. And there’s nothing this president has done to reassure them. Second of all, very specifically, will he provide Ukraine some of the air defense systems they need? They are getting pummeled by Russian missiles. And will we provide Patriots? To what extent do we have, and will we provide them? Thirdly, I actually find this whole conversation about how much the Europeans are spending really old. The real question in defense is not how much you spend, it’s how you spend it. That applies to us. It applies to them. So it would be really good if someone on the U.S. side who knew something about defense policy made that pivot, because, again, the Europeans spend a lot on defense. The problem is, they don’t spend it in the right ways. By the way, same thing applies to us. That'd be a much more productive conversation."