Europe should “quit whining” about the threats it faces and “act like the superpower” that it is, according to a former senior US army officer.
Ben Hodges, a retired lieutenant general who led US forces in Europe from 2014 to 2017, also said European Nato members including Germany should prepare for future Russian air strikes on their air and sea ports.
Mr Hodges, who was addressing a gathering of foreign affairs experts in London on Thursday, said the missile defences of European countries in the US-led Nato alliance are “completely inadequate” to protect transport infrastructure.
He told the event, hosted by the Chatham House think tank, that Germany could in the years ahead face the same sort of air strikes Ukraine has endured since the Russian invasion in 2022.
Mr Hodges told the conference that European Nato states should focus on preparing their citizens for the possibility of war with Russia.
“There is a threat. Explain it to your population like adults.”
In the event that the US pulls back from defending Europe under Donald Trump, Mr Hodges said he felt the continent “of course has the capability of defending itself”. But he also suggested European states lack the political will to do so.
Europe needed the “self confidence” to be more assertive in the face of Russian threats, he said. A “true deterrence” of Russia would require it to be convinced that European societies, at every level, were prepared and willing to deal with military action against president Vladimir Putin’s nation.
A journalist from LBC radio station asked for the retired lieutenant general’s response to the assertion that the British public does not take seriously gloomy threats of the potential for war with Russia.
The broadcaster suggested this was because people were cynical after being duped into believing Iraq had weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) in 2003, which was used as a pretext for war but turned out to be untrue.
Mr Hodges said it was a “fair question” and recalled his own experiences looking in “bunkers with flashlights for WMDs in Iraq” and finding to his surprise that none existed.
He said Russia had yet to feel enough pushback from Europe and also the US over its war against Ukraine. He suggested Russia’s oil and gas infrastructure should be put under “pressure” and said Mr Putin had, in effect, already “attacked” Nato states by, for example, launching air incursions over Estonia.
A conference attendee challenged Mr Hodges by suggesting that diplomacy with Russia might achieve better results than war posturing, but he replied that Russia could not be trusted to uphold any diplomatic agreement and hard pressure was the only way to keep Mr Putin in check.
