> For example, it's pretty clear the US seems to have control over NATO. The whole point of NATO is for weaker countries to hand over the reins of their milita

> For example, it's pretty clear the US seems to have control over NATO. The whole point of NATO is for weaker countries to hand over the reins of their military in exchange for being under the US nuclear umbrella. The only two NATO countries that don't need the alliance as much are UK and France because they have their own WMDs together with delivery vehicles. Which is why France is always considered to be rebellious within NATO (and also because of cultural reasons, since the US-UK special Wasp relationship is a natural rival to the traditional French continental hegemony). The second order effect of NATO is to keep nuclear non proliferation down within nuclear latent European countries like Germany. Most of the richer countries in the EU (and even some of the poorer ex Soviet states) are more than capable of developing functional nuclear weapons or delivery vehicles. Without NATO, the US-EU relationship would look a lot more different.