George Beebe on the risks of a Europe-Russia war as the US reduces its European presence
Glenn Diesen interviews former CIA Russia analysis director George Beebe on the strategic consequences of the US military drawdown from Europe.
Summary
Glenn Diesen, professor and host, speaks with George Beebe, former CIA director for Russia analysis and current director of grand strategy at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, about the strategic consequences of the US reducing its military presence in Europe. Beebe argues that while a US retrenchment from Europe is strategically necessary, the abrupt and unmanaged way it is being executed risks increasing instability rather than reducing it. He warns that European escalation — including deep drone strikes into Russian territory — combined with a weakened US role could push Putin to conclude that normalization with Washington is impossible, removing his incentive for restraint. Beebe outlines a plausible escalation ladder from intensified Russian air strikes on Ukrainian cities, to attacks on European supply chains and weapons factories, to a potential Article 5 crisis that the Trump administration may be unwilling to honor. Both Beebe and Diesen identify a dangerous "mindset problem" in European leadership, where deterrence has entirely displaced diplomacy, and where good-versus-evil war narratives have made compromise politically impossible.
Key Takeaways
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Introduction and the US military drawdown from Germany
Glenn Diesen: Welcome back. We have the great pleasure of being joined today by George Beebe, the former CIA director for Russia analysis and currently the director of grand strategy at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. Thank you for coming back on the program.
George Beebe: Thanks for the invitation.
Glenn Diesen: You and I have spoken before about how the US has to adjust to a multipolar distribution of power — that it can't be everywhere anymore and must prioritize certain regions. The US logically prioritizes the Western Hemisphere and East Asia, where its peer competitor is located. So for the first time, Europe is not the first priority. Indeed, it appears to be a distant third. This requires the US to pivot out of Europe, and I think this is a trend we can expect to continue even after Trump. You recently wrote an article about how pulling troops out of Germany makes sense, but it can have some unforeseen — or quite predictable — consequences. How do you assess this situation, given that it came rather abruptly?
George Beebe: My point is that in order to retrench — to reduce its involvement in Europe, which I think is strategically necessary — the United States needs to prepare the ground for doing that. It needs to do so in a managed and orderly way, not in a way that leaves Europe in disrepair, unstable, and conflict-prone, as it is right now.
When the Trump administration decides rather abruptly and suddenly to draw down militarily from Europe, I don't think that actually enhances the long-term prospects of a reduced US presence and a rebalanced transatlantic relationship. It probably increases the chances of instability in Europe. And unfortunately, the reality is that unstable regions tend to draw the United States back in and make it very difficult to disentangle itself.
So I think on the surface, the announcement that the United States is withdrawing a couple of battalions from Germany — and I think the more important part of this announcement was the decision to reverse the Biden administration's decision to put intermediate-range missiles on German territory — looks like a step toward retrenchment and reduced involvement in Europe. I'm afraid it is going to end up being a step toward greater instability and thus a much more difficult situation for both sides of the transatlantic relationship.
European escalation and the risk of direct war with Russia
Glenn Diesen: On the growing instability — it appears that one of the consequences of the US pulling back, given that the Europeans aren't ready to give up on the Ukraine war, is that the Europeans appear to be escalating. They are very proudly announcing how they're doing mass production of drones to strike deep inside Russia. There's no pretense anymore that they won't supply weapons or help pick targets. It's starting to look very much like a direct war against Russia. As the Europeans respond by escalating, the Russians come under even greater pressure to restore deterrence by retaliating. And as the United States pulls back, it looks like an opportune moment for Russia to retaliate and restore deterrence. Indeed, the failure to have done so over the past four years — all that restraint — has been interpreted as weakness and seen as emboldening adversaries. So it looks as if, unintentionally perhaps, we could head into a direct war as a result of this.
George Beebe: I think that's exactly right. I wish I could disagree with your analysis, but your logic is difficult for me to argue with, which means we're headed toward a very unstable and crisis-prone period.
Just to elaborate a little on your logic: one of the reasons why the Russians have really held back from employing a lot of their military firepower in Ukraine — and I know that characterization strikes a lot of people as odd, but I think it's nonetheless true — is that the Russians have an awful lot of air power they could employ against the Ukrainians. They have not done so, at least not to the extent that they could. In part because they don't want to get into a direct conflict with NATO, and in part because they want to keep the door open to a compromised settlement and a normalization of their relationship with the United States, which I think is important to Putin for a variety of reasons, largely geopolitical.
But if we're headed into a situation where Putin judges that normalization of the relationship with the United States is just not going to happen — that it's not in the cards, that the Trump administration is not capable of normalizing relations — now, I don't think he's quite there yet. I think he still has not given up hope that there can be a normalization of the US-Russian relationship. But should he conclude that Trump is just too weak, that he is domestically hurt by both the situation in Iran and the domestic situation — which are interrelated — he may well conclude that Trump is simply not strong enough to orchestrate a normalization of relations in a Washington DC that is still very hostile to Russia overall.
In that kind of situation, the incentives for him to teach the Ukrainians a lesson, to restore deterrence as you put it, go up. And I think Putin is under a lot of pressure domestically to do something. An awful lot of people in Russia want this war over, but not at any cost. Either they want a reasonable compromised settlement, or they want to see Putin really take it to the Ukrainians and drive them out of Russian-claimed territory. That pressure is clearly growing domestically on Putin. Part of this is a reaction to the crackdown on the internet, which in turn was related to not wanting to allow the Ukrainians to exploit those channels for drone targeting.
Part of this also is that if Trump is pulling back from Europe and signaling to the Europeans that we're not going to be there if they provoke a conflict with the Russians, that also increases Putin's incentives to do something quite decisive — perhaps even against the Europeans themselves. Although I don't think he would start out that way. I think he would start out with doing something quite severe against the Ukrainians themselves, in the hope that this didn't escalate into a broader European conflict.
But I do think we're headed into a very dangerous situation, and unless the United States can use its remaining influence to steer the Ukraine conflict toward a compromise very soon, I think by the fall we're probably headed into a danger zone where the Russians will feel both a lot of pressure to do something and less concern that they would wind up in a direct conflict with the United States.
Karaganov's position and the escalation ladder
Glenn Diesen: I was hoping you would disagree with my pessimistic outlook, but it does appear there is a move toward war which essentially nobody would want. I had an interview recently with Sergey Karaganov — as you know, he has advised Putin, Yeltsin, and Gorbachev, and he was also key in influencing the Kremlin to change its nuclear doctrine. His argument essentially was that the spirit of Alaska is dead, not only in terms of the diplomatic path forward. He doesn't represent the Kremlin, but nonetheless he made the point that in his view there is a need to essentially strike the Europeans — because he considers this to be a war which the West fights against Russia using Ukrainians — and that this would initially mean something like an Oreshnik strike against Germany, but also not ruling out the use of a tactical nuclear weapon against Germany, just to punish the Europeans. His point was that he used to represent a small minority voice only two years ago when he was pushing through the change to the nuclear doctrine, but now he says the overwhelming majority is on his side and the pressure is mounting on Putin to take a harder line, as you indicated.
But how do you see the escalation ladder going? You said you would expect Russia to first escalate against the Ukrainians. Last night I couldn't help but notice the Russians used about 1,600 drones and missiles, which is by far a new record in this war. But how would they go after the Europeans? Would they do strikes with strategic ambiguity — something they could deny — or would they go direct and claim responsibility? How do you see them going forward?
George Beebe: I think step one would be something much more destructive against the Ukrainians. One of the things Putin has wanted to claim is that what the Russian military is doing in the Donbas is liberating regions from what the Russians call fascist neo-Nazi rule imposed by Kyiv. But when you're talking about liberation, that also means you don't want to leave complete destruction in your aftermath. You can't turn the fortress cities that the Ukrainians now control in Donetsk into rubble and also maintain that you're liberating the populations living there.
But as pressure goes up on Putin to do something decisive and retake Ukrainian-occupied territory, I think the first step he would take would be to use air power in a much more destructive way and turn those fortress cities into rubble. At that point, Russian ground forces could occupy them with relatively low casualties. The Russians could then say they now have military control of the territory they claim — the Donbas. At that point, the Russians would have to make a decision: do they go after the two other regions they have annexed but don't fully control, or do they at that point impose a unilateral ceasefire, dig in, and not actually settle the war with a full peace deal, but ensure that the rest of Ukraine could not be reconstructed absent concessions to Russian demands?
Whether the war escalated from that point into a more general Russia-Europe conflict would depend largely on what the Europeans do. Do they decide they want to punish the Russians by employing drone attacks from Ukraine in a much bigger campaign of deep strikes into Russian territory? If that is the response, then I think the Russians would escalate even further, and the next step would probably be massive bombing and missile strikes on Kyiv itself, perhaps other population centers in Ukraine — which the Russians really have not done on a scale they are capable of.
We have a very dangerous situation in that the Ukrainians don't have an air defense system capable of preventing that kind of more massive air strikes from the Russians. They have very little prospect of acquiring one from the United States or Europe anytime soon. So there's going to be a window for probably many months to come where the Ukrainian air defense system will essentially be non-existent and the Russians could inflict a lot of damage on Ukrainian territory.
Now, if the Europeans respond by trying to escalate even further, then I think the Russians would consider attacking supply chains and factories in Europe itself — on NATO territory, so to speak — that have been providing this capability to the Ukrainians. Not all of the drones being produced by the Ukrainians are being produced on Ukrainian territory. There are other things going into this from Europe that the Russians don't want to have to strike because it would be escalatory. But in that kind of scenario, I could see the Russians going after those sorts of facilities.
That would of course create a crisis within the transatlantic alliance. At that point, you would have allies turning to Washington saying, "The Russians have now attacked us. We want to invoke Article 5 of the Washington Treaty." And that will be a very interesting situation should it arise, because then I think the Trump administration would have a fundamental choice to make: do we want to get into a direct military confrontation with the Russians?
I don't know how that's going to turn out. That would be a very difficult decision under the circumstances, particularly because there's a perception in Washington — and I think the perception is justified — that the Europeans have not been working to bring peace to Ukraine. They are not in favor of a compromise with the Russians. They seem to be very staunchly in favor of increased pressure — military, economic, and diplomatic — simply to make the Russians capitulate. Given that perception, I'm not sure there's going to be a lot of sympathy in the Trump administration for getting involved in a conflict with the Russians.
Europe's mindset problem and the failure of deterrence-only thinking
Glenn Diesen: You've more or less summarized the key headlines across Europe these days, which is that now is the time to mount more pressure on Russia. It sounds like a suicidal and crazy thing to do, but that's why it's good to also shift focus and look at the European part of this. When you look at the future of Europe, it doesn't necessarily look very bright. You can measure many things of a declining region — economy, military — but when you see countries in decline, you often see political instability and a very changing mindset. I get the impression our leaders in Europe are becoming much more radical. There's this obsession with taking war to Russian territory without recognizing that the Russians could respond in kind. Indeed, the idea of German leaders arguing for how they have to mass-produce long-range missiles to bring pain to Russia — I don't think they appreciate how the blood is boiling over in Moscow at the moment.
I'm wondering what's happening in Europe, because here I often make the point that with these escalations we're inviting war, but this is considered a pro-Russian argument because it undermines support for the war. It's very black-and-white thinking. All caution has been thrown out. Europe used to be the cautious one — they used to look at the Americans as being the reckless and aggressive ones. The way Bush pushed for membership for Ukraine in 2008 was seen as way too reckless. But now the Europeans seem to be much more radical. What is happening here?
George Beebe: I think that's right, and I'm not sure I can offer you a very logical explanation for what's going on in European thinking. There seems to me to be some sort of mindset problem. It's almost like a mass hypnosis where people simply believe that the only way they can deal with Russia is through more pressure, more deterrence. The notion that you would engage at all diplomatically with Russia to try to mitigate threats and reduce the likelihood of conflict and crisis is simply anathema, I think, to the bulk of Europeans right now. And I think it's a major mistake. It's a very dangerous mindset to approach this situation with. It increases the chances of escalation and conflict.
I'm not going to argue that some element of deterrence isn't necessary — I think it is, and it's got to be part of the equation. But if you approach this problem solely through the prism of deterrence, you end up exacerbating an escalatory spiral that could easily get out of hand. It's an extremely dangerous way to approach this. There has to be a mix of deterrence and diplomacy, and right now I'm not sure the Europeans are thinking clearly enough to engage in that sort of approach.
It requires pragmatism. It requires some coolheaded approaches and some self-confidence that you can engage with the Russians productively, and that in doing so you won't undermine unity and stability in Europe itself. I see a lot of fear in Europe that if they even agree to talk with the Russians, that very active engagement will somehow be destabilizing inside Europe. And I think that's a dangerous mindset to approach things with.
The Lippmann trap: war narratives that make peace impossible
Glenn Diesen: It might actually be true that it's destabilizing, because when you have 27 countries in the EU, it's very difficult — how are they all going to agree on one foreign policy? The Irish, the Greeks, the Latvians have very different interests and security concerns. So it seems like the way consensus was gained in the EU was simply to portray the situation as black and white — this is good and evil, you have an evil Russian Empire, the new Hitler coming — and essentially dissent became immoral. By presenting it as good versus evil, they got everyone in line. But once they begin to open up diplomacy and discuss Russian security concerns, the whole unity might fall apart.
This makes me think of Walter Lippmann, because he wrote about this. He argued that when states want to mobilize the public for war, it's common to portray everything as good versus evil. But when it's time to make peace, this same propaganda fails — a workable peace is no longer possible because you can't compromise with evil. And I'm wondering if that's where we are, because we built a lot of our narratives around the idea that this was an unprovoked war, an unprovoked invasion, which means anything we give the Russians is now appeasement and emboldening them. We also put people like Kaja Kallas in place — someone who openly talks about breaking Russia into several pieces. We can't talk to the Russians. We got some of the most extreme people to lead the EU, and now that it's time to make peace, what is actually possible? How do you see the narratives trapping us here?
George Beebe: Your Lippmann reference is exactly right. That is part of the problem here, and I think it's a bigger part of the problem than trying to maintain unity within the EU itself. The reason I say that is that what has traditionally happened in Europe is that the big players — the French, the Germans, the Italians — have been leaders in all of this and have not allowed fundamental engagements with other great powers to be held hostage to the consensus of smaller powers. They're not doing that in this case.
If you look at Germany and France, they are not really pushing very hard to engage with Russia. You're just beginning to see talk about talking — perhaps maybe we ought to engage with the Russians — but this is at a very early stage and there's not a lot of momentum behind it right now. And if that momentum is going to come, it's not going to come from the Estonians or the Poles. It's going to come from the big heavyweights in Europe. And right now there's not a lot of energy behind those calls.
I also think that if you look at the UK — they're not part of the European Union, they're not held to the requirement for consensus in the common foreign and security policy of the EU. So the notion that they have to be careful about maintaining consensus within Europe doesn't apply. And you don't see the British pushing for engagement with the Russians. Just the opposite — the British are among the most staunchly opposed to engaging diplomatically with Russia over all of this. That leads me to think this is much more of a mindset problem than it is an EU rules and consensus problem.
The strategic case for a negotiated settlement and redefining the transatlantic relationship
Glenn Diesen: That's a great point. The British aren't part of it, so I often get the impression they're overcompensating a bit to find a new role in Europe after Brexit. The military role — the one confronting the Russians, replaying Churchill — could actually make things worse. But how do you see the American interest here? If I were advising Washington, what would be the ideal outcome? Would it be to put an end to the war in Ukraine because it's preventing the US from pivoting to Asia and the Western Hemisphere? Or would it be better to just outsource it to the Europeans at a lower level, since right now it's a bit too high-intensity and a wider war could break out?
George Beebe: I strongly believe it's in America's interest to orchestrate a compromised settlement of the war in Ukraine. If we don't do that and essentially outsource this conflict to Europe while reducing America's involvement, I think the chances of escalation into an extraordinarily destructive conflict between Europe and Russia go up immensely, and I don't think that's in America's interest at all.
I think the continuation of a broader Europe-Russia conflict, even if it doesn't escalate dangerously, only encourages the Russians to align themselves more closely with China. I don't think that's in America's interest. I think it's in our interest to have a more autonomous, more independent Russia that has relations both with China and with the United States and the West. That makes dealing with the challenges that China poses a lot simpler for the United States than if Russia and China are closely strategically aligned against the United States and the West.
And I think just from the point of view of prioritization, if Europe is conflict-prone and weak, that makes the United States much less able to focus on other higher priorities in the world — much less able to focus on the Indo-Pacific from a military point of view. And strictly from a time management point of view, our White House, our leaders, cabinet officials only have so much time and attention they can devote to things, and any crisis in the world that in some way touches on American interests certainly distracts from their ability to focus on what I think should be higher priorities.
The last thing I would say is that the nature of the transatlantic relationship and the purpose of NATO need to change. They need to focus much more, I think, on facilitating high-technology cooperation between the United States and Europe. The nature of the geopolitical challenges we're going to be facing in the next several decades has a lot to do with things like critical minerals, chips and supply chains, space, quantum computing, and artificial intelligence. China has some advantages of scale that it is bringing to bear in this competition. The United States working with European allies together can help to mitigate some of those advantages of scale that the Chinese have, and I think lift all of our boats in the West technologically. It could bring greater prosperity to Europe and more economic growth that Europe desperately needs right now.
If Europe is essentially in perpetual conflict, that kind of cooperation becomes much less possible over time. So I'm strongly of the opinion that the United States needs to bring this conflict in Ukraine to a compromised settlement to facilitate all of these things that I think are strategically vital.
European war narratives and the danger of believing your own propaganda
Glenn Diesen: I would like to see some kind of reconceptualization of the US-Europe relationship, because it seems to always be all or nothing. And to be honest, that's very much in the European mentality as well — they can't imagine not living without the US and having everything subordinated to that, or they become viciously anti-American. It seems like the goal should be to redefine the relationship for a multipolar era, where the US can't be there to the same extent but both sides still seek the benefits from a partnership that has lasted all this time.
Meanwhile, I'm pessimistic at the moment about Europe and Russia, because the headlines in Europe now are that the tide has turned and Ukraine is winning again. We're going back to this. Apparently the reason why the Russians didn't have any heavy weaponry in the May 9th parade was not to avoid inviting an attack on the parade, but rather a sign of weakness — that they didn't have any. And of course, Putin is apparently dying again from some disease. All of these are narratives to build up support for war, it seems.
George Beebe: I think that's a case of believing your own propaganda. That's a dangerous thing to do.
Glenn Diesen: Very much so. Anyways, as always, thank you so much for taking the time.
George Beebe: My pleasure. Thank you.