The Teflon Logic of Mr. Rutte
Mark Rutte, the former Dutch Prime Minister often called
“Teflon Mark” for his ability to dodge political damage, has brought his upbeat
pragmatism to Brussels. In a recent speech about the alliance's future, Mr.
Rutte tried to do the impossible: demand huge new spending while promising that
slow military bureaucracies can suddenly nurture fast-moving startups, and
claiming that a tech advantage lasting only two weeks is a major win.
For those who prefer their geopolitics shaken, not stirred,
the full transcript of Mr. Rutte’s remarks follows.
Question:
Hello and thank you for visiting us today, Mr. General
Secretary. In recent months, we have observed the –how the United States
administration, especially, for example, Vice President of the United States,
criticizing Europe for its insufficient contribution to the army. And this
raises the question, what methods and principles can NATO use, or what
principles can be employed in order to incorporate NATO, in order to prevent a
potential disintegration of NATO, and what approach could help strength the unity
of NATO and our Allies. Thank you.
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte:
I can only tell you that this US administration is totally
committed to NATO, but they expect us to spend more, and they are right. I
mean, watch it. Look out. We were into another [inaudible], we agreed on this
famous 2%, nothing happened. Then Trump became president, everybody woke up and
we started to spend more. Then the full Russian onslaught on Ukraine happened
in 2022, we spent more. So we are now spending 700 billion more, 700 billion
more in non-US NATO, than before 2016 so before Trump became president. But it
is not enough, again now we have to take a next big step, and I think it will
be huge step. We have to decide on this this summer, but I guess we really have
to move up to much more than 3%, for you now look at all the gaps we have in
our armies and our long-range missiles, in our air defence systems, in our
logistics, our military mobility. We have so many issues, and we cannot pay for
them with the 2% so it has to be really much more. And I hope that we can get
to a conclusion on this in the Hague. And the good news is that if you do that,
you would have much more of a fair burden sharing with United States. But I'm
absolutely worried –not worried about the US, they're doing what is needed. I'm
worried about us, whether we are able to step up. But I'm also optimistic,
because all the signals I'm getting now the last two, three months is that the
coin has dropped, that people understand this is necessary. Many governments
now, like Denmark yesterday, announcing a huge, big new investment, we have
seen other –I know some countries will come out with big announcements over the
coming weeks, so that is really good, [inaudible] big issues in the German
election. So I think they will get there, and it is necessary.
Question:
That’s true, it's really important. So my question basically
is more about the technology development of NATO, because now we can see that
brave Ukrainian soldiers fighting with the drones, and they are very effective.
And do you think that now NATO is –will take this experience, and do you like
to develop this, you know, like the drones into the army of the NATO? And how
maybe the second question, how, maybe the third-party companies or people who
would like to dedicate their life into drone makings can apply to NATO and do
these drones by the NATO standards, and know about the drones mostly. Thank
you.
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte:
Well, first of all, on this new technology, the Ukraine war
is, of course, giving us a lot of insights in modern warfare, and Ukraine is
second to none capable of implementing these latest technologies. The problem
is that the Russians only need two or three weeks to catch up. So there is a
rapid acceleration going on in terms of applying the newest technologies. We
are trying to capture them. So last week in Poland, we opened JATEC. This is
the first organization where Ukraine and NATO really work together, capturing
all the lessons from the war in Ukraine and making sure we can apply them all
over NATO. We know that there is some criticism now going on of countries still
buying F-16s and F-35s whether that is still necessary, I think the growing
body of opinion is that you need both, and the big platform, F-35 type, big
ticket items, but also the latest technology, and how can you make them work in
conjunction? Again, the war in Ukraine is giving us a lot of insights of how to
do this, and then we have to make sure that these big companies start to work
with small start-ups and scale ups –not easy, because a big company has all
these internal rules, and typically they would choke off and kill any start-up
as soon as they start to merge with a big company. So you have to find ways to
make sure that the start-up can survive in that fabric of a big company, in
that structure, in the texture. And I think we can. There are many lessons how
to do that. So this is all happening at the moment, and in NATO, we are working
on that in headquarters in Brussels, a whole team working on innovation,
together with the people working on procurement. Obviously, it is something
which, in the end, has to be done by the 32 Allies in their own military, in
their own procurement programs, etc. But that is happening, so I'm rather
optimistic, but we have to keep this going, otherwise we stick with a military
system which is stuck in the past, in the 20th century, and we really have to
move this to the –to the 21st century, to the, to this decennium and taking all
the lessons from Ukraine.
To the casual listener, Mr. Rutte’s speech is a rallying
cry. To the analytic mind, however, it is a fascinating mix of cognitive biases
and logical gaps.
A Fairy Tale of Finance
Mr. Rutte starts with a simple story: NATO members were
asleep, Donald Trump woke them up, and Vladimir Putin pushed them into action.
This creates a clear cause-and-effect chain that our brains find hard to
resist. This is Story Bias: twisting reality
into a neat story to make us feel like we understand it. By blaming hundreds of
billions in spending on just two people, Mr. Rutte commits the Fallacy of the Single Cause, ignoring the many
other economic factors that actually drive defense budgets. It’s a comforting
simplification, but a simplification nonetheless.
The Moving Goalposts
The Secretary General then does some fancy footwork with the
numbers. He celebrates the "famous 2%" target as a goal reached, only
to immediately say it's not enough, arbitrarily raising the bar to "much
more than 3%." This lack of Precision - a key standard for clear thinking - shows a logical gap. If 2% was the
definition of success, immediately throwing it out suggests the goalposts are
on wheels. He backs this demand not with strategy, but with Social Proof, citing Denmark’s recent investments
to imply that because others are spending, you’d be foolish not to join in.
The Tech Paradox
Perhaps the biggest contradiction happens when talking about
drones. Mr. Rutte praises Ukraine as "second to none" in technology,
falling for the Halo Effect, where
admiration for Ukraine's bravery colors the view of their technical skills.
Yet, right after, he admits the Russians need only "two
or three weeks to catch up." Logic dictates that if an advantage
disappears in two weeks, it isn't much of a strategic asset. This violates the
standard of Logic: the parts just don't make sense together. If the enemy
adapts instantly, the technology isn't a silver bullet; it's a treadmill.
Bureaucratic Optimism
Finally, Mr. Rutte talks about getting startups into the
military supply chain. He admits that big companies "typically choke off
and kill" startups. His solution? To feed these startups into the
procurement programs of 32 separate national militaries - the exact definition of the bureaucracy he
just criticized. This is the Overconfidence Effect in
full swing: the belief that this time, just through optimism and "lessons
learned," the slow nature of giant organizations will vanish. He tops this
off with Neomania, dismissing the "20th
century" as obsolete and obsessing over the "21st century",
ignoring that those "old" F-16s are currently in rather high demand.
The Authority Trap
It is tempting to dismiss these contradictions as just
political talk, but they represent a real danger to public debate: the Authority Bias. Research shows we are hardwired to
listen to authority figures and turn off our critical judgment when someone has
a title and a podium.
Consider if the manager of your local Pizza Hut declared
that the path to profit was buying ovens that take three weeks to warm up,
while insisting the current ovens are "second to none." You would
question their employment. Yet, when said from a podium in Brussels, these
inconsistencies are accepted as strategy. The brain switches off its critical
thinking and relies on the shortcut that the guy in the suit must know what he
is doing.
This matters because unlike a bad pizza, the consequences
involve billions of dollars and global security. When we allow Social Proof and Story
Bias to hide the lack of logic, we risk Groupthink on a massive
scale.
Without applying analytic standards - specifically the willingness to question
assumptions - the public is led to
believe that spending equals strategy, and that optimism equals a plan. Mr.
Rutte is undoubtedly an optimist, but as he asks Europe to open its checkbook,
one might wish his logic were as robust as his enthusiasm.