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Working together with the US will always be a necessity, as will working with other allies, no country can really handle these situations alone very well. We a

• radicalbyte 5y ago
  We need an EU strategic command - who can coordinate over the existing armies.
  • cbg0 5y ago
    So, sort of like NATO, but just at the EU level, right?
  • i_like_waiting 5y ago
    No, we don't want that over here. I prefer to have US troops here than troops who are paid/ controlled by Brussel politicians that are disconnected from reality.
    • oblio 5y ago
      The US is 1 turn away from total disconnection. Their economy is less linked to the global economy than almost any other big economy, they definitely have enough resources to sustain themselves and Americans in general are becoming more inward focused.
      • adventured 5y ago
        It would take a lot more than that. There's very little support on either side politically for leaving NATO for example, which is why even Trump didn't push for it. The US could modestly reduce its global military footprint, and refocus those resources better on Europe (Russia) and Asia (China), and that would probably work out just fine. Most Americans like their big military, even though they gripe about its cost. If there were a strong majority sentiment to reduce that military or pull out of the world, Trump would have done better against Biden. Americans are tired of the stupid shit - invading & occupying Iraq; invading and occupying Afghanistan (occupying it for two decades for nothing). That money we poured into nothingness in Afghanistan, could have plausibly done wonders for Ukraine in numerous ways. Our attention and those resources would have been vastly better spent shoring up the new, fragile democracy in Ukraine than on an Afghanistan that was very unlikely to have a positive outcome. That isolationism lean, which is a modest minority group politically, will tend to come and go. It's amplified currently due to the stupidity of what we did in Iraq and Afghanistan. The US also had some of that culturally after the disaster of Vietnam. Overall it's a good thing to have that minority isolationist political wing, it might help tilt the US toward not doing the next Iraq. Some counter-weight to our rah rah rah global adventurism is important.
        • nebula8804 5y ago
          >Most Americans like their big military, even though they gripe about its cost. If there were a strong majority sentiment to reduce that military or pull out of the world, Trump would have done better against Biden. The 2020 election was a referendum on COVID so it is not a fair comparison. Trump was on track to defeat Biden before COVID hit and he totally bungled the response. In addition to that Trump increased his turnout significantly (as did Biden but I attribute that to COVID and hatred of Trump's personality). If another well mannered populist comes along during non pandemic times, I fully believe he/she would mop the floor with the establishment. Trump laid out the map for a path to break through establishment stranglehold on the white house. Its unfortunate that Bernie couldn't get past the DNC's attempts to pull the rug from under him but Trump showed that the Republican party does not have as many roadblocks so you cannot be as dismissive of populists as you are given the facts on the ground.
        • oblio 5y ago
          > Our attention and those resources would have been vastly better spent shoring up the new, fragile democracy in Ukraine than on an Afghanistan that was very unlikely to have a positive outcome. The sad part is that you didn't even gain an ally at the end. The kind of money you invested in Afghanistan, spent wisely in Ukraine, would have yielded a nation of ~45 million people eternally grateful to the US. In an immensely strategic location in the world. A Western power controlling Ukraine really does control Russia and these days the Middle East, too. And that's from a base that is culturally and stability-wise much better than toxic allies like Saudi Arabia.
      • stjohnswarts 5y ago
        There is about 30% of Americans (we'll call this generation Trumpers) that have always wanted an isolated America. Another 30% in the middle and about 40% globalists and have been for decades since WW1
• Ericson2314 5y ago
  Of course allies are necessary, but which allies and how many is the question. It depends on the situation. You shouldn't need the US for a mere deterring garrison, only if there is actual fighting to be done. The EU has many more people than the US, and is still fairly wealthy on the main. If there is a relatively big EU military, we in the US have a chance of reforming and shrinking our monster. The point of an EU army is not to appease Russia --- that indeed wouldn't work. The point is to give Europe some real sovereignty whereas today it has a hugely captive foreign policy.
  • long_time_gone 5y ago
    > If there is a relatively big EU military, we in the US have a chance of reforming and shrinking our monster. Our military's size and capabilities seem to be more a function of job-creation, rather than actual military need.
    • Ericson2314 5y ago
      Agreed a bit, there is definitely elements of instutitional self preservation for its own sake. And certainly the defense contractors are scared to have less of their main client. But getting rid of this "world police" "free world" bullshit will still help a lot. Consider, right now the US military budget is bound to balloon some more because of this war, without us doing any fighting. Military Keynesianism --- chest puffing handshake. Finally, if are allies can defend themselves, they will have more spine to call out our bullshit with things like Iraq.
      • long_time_gone 5y ago
        > Consider, right now the US military budget is bound to balloon some more because of this war, without us doing any fighting. Military Keynesianism --- chest puffing handshake. We are sending actual weapons and machinery, which need to be replaced by new weapons off the factory line. One Javelin missile costs $175k. "In less than a week, the United States and NATO have pushed more than 17,000 antitank weapons, including Javelin missiles, over the borders of Poland and Romania, unloading them from giant military cargo planes so they can make the trip by land to Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital, and other major cities." https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/06/us/politics/us-ukraine-weapons.html https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/06/us/politics/us-ukraine-we...
• rhexs 5y ago
  Of course no country (aside from the US or China) can handle this alone, but that’s the point of the EU, a collection of countries. They’d much rather have America sink into debt than touch the sacred cow of EU social spending.
  • cbg0 5y ago
    > They’d much rather have America sink into debt than touch the sacred cow of EU social spending. Didn't Germany, Denmark, Romania, Austria (and possibly others I'm forgetting) already announce increases in military spending?
    • omginternets 5y ago
      The trend is very much in the opposite direction. This is a tiny blip on the radar compared to the overall trend of defunding and downsizing European militaries.
      • svara 5y ago
        You're right looking back, but this might just be the turning point. The German chancellor just announced an increase of military spending to exceed 2% of annual GDP, as requested by NATO allies for a very long time; to supply weapons to Ukraine; and to support the EU buying weapons for Ukraine. As a German, each one of those points is really far out of what used to be the political mainstream for many, many decades, and has broad support. It feels like things really are shifting.
        • omginternets 5y ago
          Yes, and comparable announcements have happened before. They have never lasted very long. Things might be changing, but they also might not. You're just making a proclamation of faith, here.
    • causi 5y ago
      Yes, they increased from "hiring enough people to give Putin directions on the way to Berlin" to "way smaller than you'd expect with a lunatic next door". Germany announced an increase to 2% of GDP. For the three decades prior to the fall of the Soviet Union it averaged 3.5%.
• omginternets 5y ago
  >We already have armies at the country level I say the following as a former officer in the French army, which I'm sure you'll agree is one of the more active armies in the EU. We nominally have country-level armies. Their funding is consistently reduced and their numbers regularly downsized, and this trend exists across Europe. One might nitpick by pointing to specific budget increases, but the trend is undeniable if you look at it on any reasonable time-scale. I can think of no European country that has an autonomous standing army, capable of deploying itself to the theater of operations, resupplying and sustaining combat efforts without the support of US logistics. To point at the mere existence of national armies is to play word games. The EU members have outsourced their defense to the United States, and are now paying the price. EDIT: to be clear, I am quite skeptical of an EU strategic command.
  • pasabagi 5y ago
    The reason is simple: you need extensive logistics support for expeditionary warfare. European states are not really structurally placed to engage in this kind of thing: ever since the Suez crisis, it's been obvious that we basically live in an US world order, and doing expeditionary stuff without the American's say-so is a bad idea. So, since you're going to need American permission anyway, you may as well plan on relying on their capabilities.
    • omginternets 5y ago
      Ignoring the fact that the Suez crisis was largely a turning point for the English, your argument is circular. The entire point is that we need to re-invest in these capabilities to some degree.
      • pasabagi 5y ago
        > your argument is circular. How so? The Suez invasion didn't fail because the British (or the French) didn't have the logistics to supply their forces. It failed because the US wasn't OK with it happening. The point is, France could build whatever expeditionary force it could fit within its national budget, and it would still be completely useless for national strategic interests, because you could only really use it if the Americans agree you could use it. Thus, it would just end up doing stuff that fits in with American strategic imperatives.
• pphysch 5y ago
  NATO goes way beyond "working together with allies".
• usrusr 5y ago
  Some countries are so small it might just as well be "we already have armies, at county level". Apparently, these days EU actually needs something like Force de Frappe second strike capabilities. What a sad time.
• michaelt 5y ago
  The chances of a war between Europe and Russia without American involvement do indeed seem very remote. But some would say at present, the EU is the junior power in the EU-USA military relationship, despite its greater GDP; and that it's embarrassing we can't do our fair share. And America is a democracy - so at any time they could elect someone who puts America first and doesn't value an alliance with a bunch of weak, argumentative allies. Or someone with an appetite for spreading freedom abroad, who resents their allies not being at their side.
  • criley2 5y ago
    For the record, the combined E.U. GDP in 2021 was $17.1 trillion USD, while the U.S. GDP in 2021 was $20.94 trillion USD. Even so, U.S. military spending is $768 billion or ~3.7% of GDP, while E.U. spending was around $220 billion in 2020, or about ~1.5%.
    • michaelt 5y ago
      You're right, I was thinking of pre-Brexit EU GDP figures.
  • nebula8804 5y ago
    >And America is a democracy - so at any time they could elect someone who puts America first and doesn't value an alliance with a bunch of weak, argumentative allies. This will not happen at least until the baby boomer generation dies off. In the last election we saw clear as day how suppressed any candidate outside the mainstream really is. (Not talking about Trump but Sanders). I believe there is a large population of pissed off Americans that want to end this arrangement but they are not going to be able to exert their power until the generation that greatly benefited from the US being world police finally kicks the bucket.