Article 5

I've lived my entire life in a world where NATO existed. I haven't paid attention to what Article 5 is, but now I know it's the collective defense clause of the charter that says, if one member is attacked, it's an attack against all, and requires military assistance from the other members.

The only time it has been invoked was after September 11, when other NATO members joined the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan.

Of course, in a world where Russia was seen by the European members as — rightly — their biggest threat, the U.S. was the primary counter-balancing military power against it.

And now here we are with the U.S., under Trump, threatening more than one NATO country with invasion or annexation. Which would immediately abrogate the NATO treaty and deliver Vladimir Putin's top goal of destroying NATO.

I could never have imagined the U.S. threatening Canada (laughable) or Greenland/Denmark. I have generally not focused on foreign policy much since some courses in college, aside from protesting the war in Iraq.

But here we are. There are many people with the power to stop this madness but none of them show signs of doing it.