A European Way of War Without the United States

Were the United States to end its involvement in NATO, what would disappear most critically is not mass but integration. Consequently, a European way of war without the United States would be built around denial-centric, attritional warfare rather than rapid manoeuvre or early dominance. It would rest on a relatively constrained and deliberate theory of victory: deny a rapid Russian success, absorb and blunt the initial offensive and shift the war into a protracted contest leveraging European mass, resilience and industrial capacity. The immediate objective would be to prevent Russia from achieving operational breakthrough and strategically exploiting seized territory. NATO would be required to hold key terrain, preserve force integrity and Alliance cohesion, and avoid collapse. The aim would not be to win quickly, but to avoid losing early. To adopt a more ambitious approach, Europe would need to develop its own integrative architecture.