ReluctantEskimo

What's clear is that your opinions will remain unmoved no matter what new evidence is presented. The Ukrainian Army, backed by the West, could be rolling into Moscow, and you'd still be here posting daily grievances about 2% self-imposed targets.

It's kind of sad, if you think about it.

ReluctantEskimo

Everyone treads more carefully in the nuclear age. Your comparison is invalid.

Excargodog

Whats sad is the US taxpayer getting taken for a ride for seven decades. The EU has ten times the GDP of Russia. Should US taxpayers subsidize them in perpetuity? What about deterrence? You can’t deter with hollow forces. Had European militaries been remotely rely up to par, Ukrainians might not now be dying. Don’t tell me EU governments don’t have a moral responsibility for this.

Yet you think it’s sad that I think they should have done their fair share to protect themselves and preserve the peace?
GMAFB.

Excargodog

Fecklessness is not “treading more carefully.” You either believe in deterrence or disarmament. Which is it.

MaxQ

As Oscar Wilde wrote "...people know the price of everything and the value of nothing"

Present day Americans tend to not understand that there are a whole lot of thoughtful people that are not in favor of Europe's largest economic power having a re-invigorated army or armaments industry. There are reasons Prussia is not displayed on today's maps.

With very few exceptions, most vocal critics of aid to Ukraine have been strong supporters of America's past use of the military in all it's foreign wars/shows of lethal force. Providing material support to a country fighting an invasion from another country, a country with whom they share authoritarian and conservative cultural values, has suddenly created a peace movement with all these former rah-rah neo-cons.

It is difficult for many who live in Europe to be sympathetic to the principal NATO partner getting a large share of Europe's military spending being poured directly into that partners economy, and then complaining constantly about how little is spent.
It is difficult for many who live in Europe to be sympathetic to the principal NATO partner lecturing them about how they are being defended by that partner, when those who will do the dying are those who live there.

Every President, at least through Reagan, understood the massive benefits bestowed on the United States by it's NATO membership. In the most recent 7 or 8 years some clueless leader, and more than a few clueless bovine followers, have tried to define shared military/economic/political/diplomatic responsibilities and benefits as some sort of mercenary transactional arrangement. Where does one even start with such a hollow and shallow understanding? It is an attitude that is outright profane.

Russian active measures directly shaped the previous POTUS understanding and sympathies regarding globalization, USA and EU relations, and USA-NATO relations. The same for Russia vis-a-vis Europe/NATO.
Due to America's two-party system, partisan commentators, bloggers and social media has successfully inserted a hostile foreign govts world view and strategic goals into the beliefs of a significant number of US citizens and it's political leaders.

Ukraine/Russia is not a proxy war. Russia invaded, Ukraine chose to not re-submit to Russian rule. They are asking for material help. They are doing the fighting and the dying. It is their country that is being destroyed.
Whining about the monetary costs of providing this material aid is disgusting.

Excargodog

Bull$hit. There was never a requirement that 2% be spent on buying American weapon systems. No one ever prohibited NATO partners from developing their own. Indeed, European countries build and field a wide variety of weapon systems both for domestic use and export. They just don’t buy enough of them themselves or enough parts and ammo (seriously? 50% in commission rates and ammo enough for three days of fighting???) to be effective.



Look at what happened in the former Yugoslavia. Europe allowed genocide on their own doorstep until the U.S. intervened.

Indeed it is. And Europe has been whining about the costs of providing for their own defense - and refusing to do so - for seventy years. It is little wonder the American taxpayer is getting tired of doing for the citizens of Europe that which they refuse to do for themselves.

rickair7777

Don't insult me, I've never made excuses and have expressed the same frustrations as any professional as to the state of NATO and I've done it on these forums. I even enjoyed watching the euros squirm 18 months ago.

Excargodog

AND THAT’S THE POINT. The professionals have ALWAYS known that our NATO allies have given short shrift to their own defense obligations and responsibilities yet even now we see them trying to accuse us of “Whining about the monetary costs of providing material aid” and claiming that our demands that they pay a far less percentage of their GDP than we do for their own defense to somehow be some Machiavellian plot to make them buy American weapons. Couple that with talk about “Prussians” and their apparent ignorance of the fact that we too lost people in both World Wars and it is really easy to see why many Americans are starting to turn more toward isolationism. Seventy years of dealing with ingrates tends to make people do that. Six different US administrations have warned the Europeans about this. Their own militaries have warned them about this. When do they take it seriously?

Excargodog

That sounds like the worst sort of diplomatic doublespeak.

drywhitetoast