Dienas grauds

(..) As the United States winds down its military presence in Europe, NATO is getting weaker, not stronger. Poland is worried about this. It has started a big military modernisation, based on the (unstated) assumption that it may have to fight alone (vara bungu izcēlums) . The thinking of President Bronislaw Komorowski is that Poland should in future offer less to NATO (especially in missions overseas), and expect less too.

The outliers here are Latvia and Lithuania, which spend dismally little on defence, and Sweden, which is planning cuts to its already malnourished military. One option is to scrap all mechanised army units. Another is to save the army but give up submarines. Another is to shrink all the services even further, but modernise the remnants. If I were in charge, I’d be frowning, not yawning.

Edward Lucas, editor of the international section of The Economist.