00:00So President Trump's America First Outlook, shaking old friendships and forcing new thinking when it comes to defence in this increasingly uncertain world.
00:08Jamie Shea is Senior Fellow at the Friends of Europe think tank and a former NATO Deputy Assistant Secretary General for Emerging Security Challenges.
00:17Jamie, good to see you. Welcome back. Let's look at Ukraine.
00:20Perhaps Europe then can no longer entirely bank on the support of the United States.
00:25So European efforts to bring peace sees this coalition of the willing trying to forge a way ahead.
00:32How easy is it going to be?
00:35Well, there's a basic concept, Jamie, and good afternoon to you, too, that the Europeans will put some troops on the ground once there is a peace agreement signed and sealed.
00:45I'm not sure that it's going to be a particularly large force, because so far from the talks in the coalition of the willing,
00:51the overwhelming preference is not to have some sort of superarmed big NATO deterrent force on the ground to fight the Russians,
01:00but more a training force, probably about 20,000 European soldiers all told,
01:05whose job will be to really equip and train the Ukrainian army of about 300,000,
01:10up to the level where it would be able by itself to deter and fight back any Russian incursion.
01:20Some NATO countries like the UK and France, which are leading the effort, have signaled that they're willing to put troops on the ground.
01:27And I think among the coalition members, about 30 of them, there's a hope that now that President Trump has agreed that the US will participate in some shape or form,
01:35the air component that your correspondent was describing just a moment ago, this will encourage more European countries to step up and also offer troops.
01:44But of course, the Europeans will also have to look at ships in the Black Sea to keep the Black Sea open.
01:49And alongside the United States, they'll have to assume the air defense of Ukraine after a peace agreement.
01:54This strained alliance is decades old, of course.
01:58Realistically, how quickly can new security partnerships be effective?
02:03Well, the coalition has been in existence for a long time already.
02:09And as your channel has been reporting, have held lots and lots and lots of meetings, 30 countries around the table.
02:17So beyond the immediate NATO membership, because you've got Japan, Australia participating in those talks as well.
02:24And about 200 planners working on this.
02:26So at least as far as effort is concerned, the planning is well advanced.
02:30But of course, it's going to be difficult for some countries who have already made larger commitments to NATO's defense in Eastern Europe to simultaneously now find extra troops to also go to Ukraine.
02:45For example, Germany this week has sort of said, well, look, you know, we've recently upgraded our forces in Lithuania to a brigade size presence with headquarters.
02:55You know, that's been a big, big effort, and that's really exhausted us for the time being.
03:00And we probably won't be able to find extra ground troops to Ukraine.
03:04So this is, if you like it, Jamie, it's this double pressure on the one hand, you know, spending more money to reinforce NATO's collective defense posture against Russia,
03:13while at the same time making sure that there's something left in the barrel for the long term sustainment of the Ukrainian army.
03:20So how that balance is going to be affected, that's going to be the big question going ahead.
03:25If you've got a spare, for example, Patriot air defense system, do you use it for the protection of Romania or the Baltic states or Poland?
03:33Or do you agree that it's better invested by putting that on the ground in Ukraine?
03:38Jamie, good to see you.
03:39Thank you for that.
03:39Jamie Shea, senior fellow at the Friends of Europe Think Tank.
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