Some governments pay too much attention to maintaining relationships and cooperations of nebulous value.

It's as if they knew from an inexplicable source that a certain cooperation makes sense, and don't even bother to think about the "why" or even "if".
The result are expensive policies for the sake of maintaining said cooperation/prestige/relationship.

Germany had and has its strange fixation on keeping NATO and transatlantic cooperation strong, even though the value is probably zero (to cooperate prevents overt rivalry, but the latter doesn't need to happen without said cooperation anyway).
There were also expensive policies done in order to support the bid for a permanent UNSC seat (for which we have little actual use).

Same with the EU; European unification has become an ideology which tolerates no even only small step backwards. Officials rarely discuss the actual utility of additional European cooperation.

The fixation on maintaining big brother's good will is particularly strong in NZ, Australia and the UK. Maybe it's the common language which support this fixation?
Maybe it wouldbe wise to look at more relaxed, non-Anglophone countries and thier alliance policies?