I am under the impression that the German desire for an alliance with the U.S. and the German desire for U.S. engagement in Europe is more related to avoiding open rivalry (by being official allies) than about securing against other powers.

There are some dumb politicians who buy into everything, even into the myth that the BMD program protects Europe because the bases are in Europe (it doesn't). Those fools believe what they want, but the actual political leaders rather leave the impression on me that they're pro status quo, contra experiments. Allowing the U.S:to turn away from Europe would be an experiment - and our politicians are too lazy, too unimaginative and too unskilled in 19th century-style alliance gaming for this.


I couldn't tell how U.S. military power would contribute to European national security in any way; the Russian army is down, the disunited Arabs have no real armies right now and are beyond the Med and the Turks are still allied (and not going to take on Europe anytime soon again).
I do on the other hand see how U.S. military power degrades European national security, namely its employment in action. I blame most of the (still tiny) Jihad in Europe mess on the militarised U.S. Mid East foreign policies.

There is an obligation in the North Atlantic Treaty about how all members need to deal with international crisis peacefully and in harmony with UN rules. This obligation has a much stronger wording than the actual collective defence obligation, but somehow the U.S., UK and France managed to make almost everyone forget about it.