Won't it soon be time to disband NATO? This question has been raised by a number of politicians recently, including Trump before he was elected. Since then he has come under immense pressure and in order to survive in his role has abandoned half the policies he advocated during his campaign. Whether that is a good thing or not only time will tell. One thing that it has demonstrated is the enormous pressure a politician in Washington is under to treat Russia as an enemy. Does this make the world a happier safer place? It's questionable. Apart from being an anti-Russian alliance, NATO is supposed to be a force for "freedom and democracy". However, when one reads of the devastation caused by NATO action in, for instance, Libya one has to take this with a pinch of salt. Again, NATO is gradually becoming a less stable alliance. The position of Turkey is particularly questionable.
The European powers favour NATO because they get a very good deal out of it. It enables the EU countries to have their defense costs massively subsidised by the USA. This was, of course, one of the reasons why Trump wanted to scrap it. He still wants the members of NATO to pay a larger share and they seem to be grudgingly agreeing to go half way with him on that, but that still leaves them the winners at the USA's expense. However, I'm fairly sure that were the situation to arrive where the proportion of GDP spent on armaments in the EU were the same as in the USA, NATO would disintegrate because without the economic advantage and with the EU arming itself at a similar level to the USA, the EU would no longer want to have its own military decisions compromised (or even reviewed) by Washington.
A world without NATO would be one in which the EU would move to a position more evenly balanced between the USA and Russia and China. As it is, with the EU-US alliance in place, Russia and China are moving closer together and seeking to draw in other powers such as Iran, all of which pushes us back towards the old cold war situation of a bi-polar world. Would not a multi-polar world be freer, saner and happier?
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It would, but it won't happen for a while yet because Europe's bread is still being buttered on the other side, even if more thinly than before. That's why Trump is going to Brussels - to maintain the status quo. Action and reaction. Trump builds connection with Saudi and sells arms by being tough on Iran which is bound to push Iran closer to Russia. As Russia gets better connected it gets more powerful. As Russia gets more powerful NATO can keep its grip on Europe. There is always a logic for the biggest powers to move toward polarisation, whereas a healthy world needs, I suggest, as many intermediate players as possible. When any country gets to be too powerful it starts to think of itself as exceptional. Putin has criticised the doctrine of American "exceptionalism", and quite rightly, though if Russia were ever in such a top dog position we would no doubt start to see Russian exceptionalism. These things are predictable to a fair degree. I am not a complete historicist, but big forces do shape the political landscape and often more powerfully so than ideology or leadership. Trump will be asked questions and he will say what people want to hear and then tell us that it all went off wonderfully and tell us how successful he has been. It probably does not mean much in the long or medium term. People say he is unlike any other president before and in style that could be so, but in substance somebody in his position only has a certain amount of room in which to manoeuver. What is instructive in looking at his presidency so far is, I think, the extent to which he has had to conform in order to survive and is still under great pressure to conform even more. We say that the president of the USA is the most powerful person in the world, but generally we over-estimate how much these people can do.
Well Donald Trump fresh from a big arms deal with the Saudis is off to Brussels. I suspect he will be getting asked quite a few questions. Yes, economic and military cooperation growing between China, Russia and Europe will massively change the global status quo.
I suppose it could be a block or it could be a bridge - depends how it is used. Russia has given enthusiastic support to the recent "One Belt One Road" thing. I don't think many Chinese would want to go and live in the cold north but, like you, I'm sure they would want the resources so perhaps they need a deal maker - they could ask Donald Trump to fix it up for them??!
There is a substantial blockage in the way of China and Russia cooperating ever more closely and it is Siberia... . Resource rich, population small and neighbours with resource poor and population huge China.