4 ms·
I don't think the U.S. wants Europe to figure out how to protect itself, or to create a European Union army/navy/air force. It's another geopolitical block, on
by Andaith 8y ago
I don't think the U.S. wants Europe to figure out how to protect itself, or to create a European Union army/navy/air force.
It's another geopolitical block, one that could theoretically challenge U.S. dominance, what with almost equivalent GDP and levels of development and a greater population.
- zaroth 8y agoGDP is the same, but I would guess they spend significantly less on defense and significantly more on social programs than the US, and fairly unlikely to want to switch that around. In 2016, the EU's 28 Member States earmarked €200 billion of public expenditure for 'defence'. This is equivalent to 1.3% of GDP. This is much less than the amount spent on social protection (expenditure equivalent to 19.1% of GDP in 2016), health (7.1%) or education (4.7%), but higher than public spending on recreation, culture and religion (1.0%), environmental protection (0.7%) and housing and community amenities (0.6%). [1] By comparison; US defense outlays amounted to 590 billion U.S. dollars in 2017, which was about 3.1 percent of the U.S. GDP. [2] [1] - https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-news/-/DDN-20180518-1 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/products-eurostat-news/-/D... [2] - https://www.statista.com/statistics/217581/outlays-for-defense-and-forecast-in-the-us-as-a-percentage-of-the-gdp/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/217581/outlays-for-defen...