Letter to Denmark

During a recent internet wander in the general neighborhood of World War II history, I followed roughly the following path:

WWII > Postwar > Containment > NATO > Article 5 > Afghanistan > NATO casualties > Denmark

Denmark. Because of the more than 1,100 NATO soldiers who died in America’s longest war, forty-three were Danish, the largest number of any NATO member for its population of 5.8 million. Eventually I read a story about a Danish woman who, by now several years after her son’s death, still struggled daily with grief and loss.

As one does at two in the morning, I was seized by a need to write this woman a letter of condolence in the thought that no one from the U.S. had ever bothered to acknowledge our debt, at least to her, personally. I wrote feverishly, then resolved to find her and to send it. After several attempts, I finally connected with the reporter who wrote the story, who suggested I reach out to the woman’s other son, who it turns out has a listed phone number. “Let me stop you, there” he said firmly, as I explained the purpose of my call. “We would not be interested in that.” I accepted the rejection, but oddly continued to refine the letter, in the way that the act of writing one can be therapeutic even if you never send it.

By therapeutic, I mean I needed to get something out, and what I needed was to get out was anger and sadness that one third of the American public thinks NATO is a con and America First is a good idea. And fear. Fear that if Donald Trump has his way, the US will withdraw from NATO, and that would make us vastly weaker and the world vastly more dangerous.

And now there he was, boasting at a rally how he threatened unnamed NATO heads of state to desert them if they did not pay their share. He said that if Russia invaded a NATO member who was not paid up, he would tell Russia to “do whatever the hell they want,” as if Russia needed his permission.

As with many things Trump, one’s first thought is, “Wow!” Wow, as in we just witnessed another contest between bravado and reason, and bravado won, again. And wow, also, in the thought that millions of Americans channeling Trump’s views embrace America First, a theory that has never turned out well.

He seems to think NATO contributions are something akin to country club dues, the closest thing to a military alliance that he might grasp. This analog, while wrong, is easily understood and reinforces in the MAGA mind the story that the US is somehow being fleeced. To withdraw, then, is to experience payback, and who doesn’t like payback more than Donald Trump?

NATO members do not pay dues, of course. Instead, they commit to a minimum military spend of two percent of GDP. It’s true that most NATO members have not met this target most of the time, and that is a problem every American administration has called out with little effect. But with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, European members have awoken to the formerly ignored risk, but now reality, of armed conflict at the edge of Europe, and have begun to adjust their budgets accordingly. Nick of time, one hopes.

It's a strong headwind, explaining the value of NATO to people who view it as a zero-sum game. Why bother? One might try explaining that at their peak there were 190,000 NATO troops on the ground in Afghanistan fighting in an American war, the only time the alliance has invoked its Article V mutual defense commitment. One might also let them know that more than 1,100 NATO troops died there, almost one third of all casualties.

As the following table, sorted by percent of losses shows, Danish fatalities in particular were steep and virtually identical to our own.

One suspects that most won’t care, regardless, seeing it as a small price for Europe considering the many benefits they receive at our expense. I want to say, “Why don’t you write a letter, then, to one of those families?" Begin by explaining why their sacrifices were meaningless, perhaps even deserved. Perversely, that could be their therapy.

They won’t write those letters. Their knowledge of history, their common sense, their empathy, are all subducted by anger and fidelity to a man who will almost certainly make us and the world less safe. They may be patriots, but they’re also fools.

So I wrote a letter, intended for a grieving Danish mother I didn’t know, but which morphed into my own therapy session. And here is what I wrote:

Dear Denmark,

In doing some research I recently read about NATO countries who lost sons and daughters fighting in Afghanistan, and I learned that forty-three Danes were killed there. That’s the largest number of any NATO member state as a percent of its population, and it occurred to me that no one from the United States had ever bothered to say thank you, and that is the purpose of this letter.

I read some quite private and intimate stories about still-grieving families, and to them I want to express my sadness and condolences for their losses, and gratitude for their sacrifice and for Denmark’s sacrifice fighting in an American war.  I’m an ordinary American and speak only for myself, but I know that millions of Americans would say the same if they knew your price in blood and treasure.

You are certainly aware that the President of the United States, out of ignorance and animus, cares nothing for NATO and may well withdraw from the alliance, the most successful in history, one which has merely kept the peace of Europe for seventy-five years. And now we are in peril because he knows nothing and cares even less for our shared history, our shared threats, our shared values. He knows nothing. One can only hope that reason prevails.

I hope these mothers, fathers and families will find peace and that the distance of time will help them in their grief.  Thank you. God bless Denmark, and God bless the United States of America.