NCA, the conclusion on Russia's meddling in the 2016 election was reached by only 3 intelligence agencies: CIA, FBI, NSA. But then if you stop to think about it, what would Coast Guard Intelligence, the Dept of Energy, or the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency have to contribute on the subject?

Re NATO, some of them are more "active" partners than others. For example, if it's a question of dealing with Islamists in North Africa, our troops are working very closely with the French. They've always been very reliable allies in Africa. And they know the region pretty well, seeing that about half the continent once consisted of French colonies. (A lot of the rest consisted of British colonies.)

And some NATO countries are of strategic value to the alliance just by virtue of geography. I remember my former MI unit commander's paper entitled "Iceland: NATO's Unsinkable Aircraft Carrier". Shortly after he wrote that, Tom Clancy's book on WW III, "Red Storm Rising", came out. In Clancy's plot, one of the first things the Russians did was drop an airborne division on Iceland.

Last edited by L. Brown; 07/13/18 07:10 AM.