Originally Posted by
West Coast
Gates was 100% correct as were the US Presidents who largely said the same. Trying to diminish a factual statement by calling it simplistic ain’t gonna hold water. Europe underfunded their defenses and then allowed itself to become energy dependent on an adversary which in turn funded their war in Ukraine.
Europe experimented with Democratic Peace Theory (based on the works of Immanuel Kant and Thomas Paine) France and Germany, long time foes, became interdependent industrial and commercial allies. This process was encouraged by the USA as part of the reconstruction of Europe. Having seen a post (WW 2) war success the same mechanism was applied to post cold war neighbours. For the most part it worked. Except with Russia which experimented with but declined the opportunity to embrace democracy which is a fundamental part of the mechanism. However, much political capital was invested in the experiment so changing policy was not, and still isn't easy.
It was seen as a more prosperous way of establishing and maintaining peace instead of threatening war to maintain peace, with the (peace) dividend that money could be diverted from the armed forces for social considerations (incidentally winning votes). Considable effort was poured into Russia to try to help them to operate in a capitalist world in the order to establish Democratic Peace.
Was this naive or optimistic? Probably both.
So yes, underfunding is simplistic in hindsight, the reasons were much more complex at the time.