http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/510f3ef6-dd20-11e3-8546-00144feabdc0.html

The Financial Times
May 19, 2014

Nato looks divided and its eastern members look exposed

By Steven Pifer

The solely American nature of the ground force is not healthy for the alliance, writes Steven Pifer

For several decades during the cold war, the US Berlin Brigade (and its British and French counterparts) defended West Berlin. What could those hugely outnumbered American soldiers have done had the Red Army attacked? As strategist Thomas Schelling bluntly put it, they could die – heroically perhaps – but in any case American military power would seek to avenge them. That tripwire deterred the Soviets and kept West Berlin free.
Given Moscow’s aggression in Ukraine, companies of airborne soldiers have been deployed to Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland to assure those countries and serve as tripwires. But the soldiers are all Americans. Where are the Europeans? Their absence could lead to miscalculation in the Kremlin and questions in the US Congress.