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Even further, the US position is getting tougher. Now there are new ideas getting pushed (through influencers like Musk): that Ukraine "should be sanctioned",
by rvnx 2y ago
Even further, the US position is getting tougher.
Now there are new ideas getting pushed (through influencers like Musk): that Ukraine "should be sanctioned", that Ukraine "should give their minerals to the US", that Ukraine "should give up their lands", that Zelensky "should resign" and finally that "US should leave NATO".
With such allies, you don't really need enemies.
- seanmcdirmid 2y agoIt’s really bizarre that we are looking at a near future where our best ally is Russia and West Europe/Canada and everyone else who was our friend is now our enemy. You literally couldn’t write this up as fiction and be taken seriously a decade ago.
- yuliyp 2y agoIt really makes you feel like you're in the middle part of the 1980s.
- davidw 2y agoI lived through the 1980ies, and I still have trouble processing the idea that the anti-Soviet, rah-rah patriot types that loved movies like Red Dawn are now in bed with the Russians. It's just bizarre.
- jcgrillo 2y agoIt used to be that fascists and communists were our most hated enemies. How the tables have turned! EDIT: more seriously, though, throughout the 20th century America hewed much closer to fascism than communism. It's always been there, if not always out in the open.
- pmontra 2y agoThey are more or less the same thing. Fascism in its original form (with that name) in Italy one century ago had an anti communism flavor because communists were its internal enemies to the road of power. Remove that and you are left with nationalism, control of society (what you can say in pubblic, how to behave) and control of economy even in something as thin as do as you please but do not challenge the big boss with the influence you gain with your money (see what happened in China a few years ago.) Communism had an internationalist phase but that was over by the middle of the cold war. It started as an ideal, then become a way to rationalize the USSR's grip on the East, then it died out as countries started to realize they would be better off with the other bloc. Edit: of course communism had more ideals than internationalism. For example it did not include the authoritarianism part. However they disappeared after it was implemented as a way to rule a country and were replaced by the means that allowed the ruling group to stay in power.
- wat10000 2y agoIt is, but it also makes sense. The enemy wasn’t really Russia, it was communism and, more broadly, leftism. Modern Russia resembles the USSR in some respects: oppressive government, not particularly wealthy, over-militarized. But it’s definitely not communist. If freedom and democracy is your thing then that part doesn’t matter. But if your thing is anti-leftism, conservative morality, militarism, powerful rulers, and white people, modern Russia looks pretty good.
- rayiner 2y agoYou must have been traveling in some neocon circles a decade ago. But normalizing relations with Russia and disengaging with the rest of the world military was the goal for us liberals back then: https://youtu.be/T1409sXBleg?si=svqMzx1aAIKgMd13 https://youtu.be/T1409sXBleg?si=svqMzx1aAIKgMd13; https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0372588/ https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0372588/
- wat10000 2y agoSure, back when Russia looked vaguely like a democracy for about ten minutes.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- rayiner 2y agoWe are allied with lots of non-democracies, including ones that invade their neighbors (like Saudi). That part is irrelevant.
- hdjjhhvvhga 2y agoWell, there was a point when everybody, including European politicians, wanted to normalize relations with Russia. But the guy had a different view and chose to invade Georgia in 2008 and Ukraine in 2014. At that point some people still chose to believe that he can be civilized. It backfired badly in 2022. So now Trump trying the same thing and pretending to be Putin's buddy and trying his best to make Ukraine miserable is just sad.
- versale 2y agoYou'd better report your wrongthink. We, Oceania, have always been at war with Eastasia, Eurasia was always our ally.
- bad_user 2y agoUS's Republicans have been so afraid of '1984' that they took it as an instructions manual.
- rayiner 2y ago[flagged]
- whatshisface 2y agoThe present administration isn't really planning to cut military spending, they just want to redirect it. $4B of military aid was recently approved for another country. Here's the budgetary outlook: You'll notice that defense spending is projected to have a slight increase in real terms, or a slight (0.1%) decrease in terms of fraction of GDP. https://www.cbo.gov/publication/61172 https://www.cbo.gov/publication/61172
- Jtsummers 2y agoYep. DOD spending is likely to shift, but not be reduced. The major firms are probably going to see some contracts cut or tougher competition from the likes of Anduril in certain domains. DOD spending in IT-related efforts may also shift, Palantir will be a major contender here.
- pharrington 2y agoAre you the mythical "ethical consumer under capitalism" I've heard so many legends about? addendum: sibling comment's point is more relevant
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- ck2 2y agoThe shift to bailout Russia is no surprise to anyone taking notes, there is a long LONG history https://reddit.com/comments/j6z8eh https://reddit.com/comments/j6z8eh
- hyperman1 2y agoIt was idiotically unbelievable fiction until literally the day before Trump took office, even with project 2025 readable on the internet. In fact, we discussed how the whole idea of an USA ex-president calling up a personal militia, trying a coup that could reboot a civil war, giving up half way, and not ending up in jail or even politically castrated was garbage fiction until 5 jan 2021.
- dragonwriter 2y ago“Our best ally is Russia” is a nightmare scenario; ask anyone else in the CSTO how responsive Russia is to allies’ needs.
- bojan 2y agoAnd a bit further back, ask anyone who the Red Army helped liberate in WW2 what has happened later, and how long it took the Red Army to actually withdraw.
- BrandoElFollito 2y agoFor a generic village in Poland during WWII having the Red Army show up was an order of magnitude worse outcome then the Germans. What was expected were rapes and thefts so people preferred to flee. It was really the nightmare scenario.
- riehwvfbk 2y agoFound the Nazi.
- ahartmetz 2y agoThe Manchurian Candidate was along these lines, though it has an (early) happy ending, before the candidate becomes president, at least in the movie. I haven't read the book.
- fakedang 2y agoThe game Tom Clancy's End War is basically about a quadripolar world (you play as Russia, USA or Europe), where Russia hacks the EU WMD network and uses it to attack an American space-based weapon, using that as a false flag operation to make America go to war with Europe. Russia "joins" USA in an alliance and attacks the EU from the east while the US attacks from the Netherlands and Denmark.
- freehorse 2y agoThere were people saying that, but you are right that they were not been taken seriously. Maybe they should have had.
- tmn 2y agoI think this is a popular but unrealistic take based on real observation.Real observations being. Increase friendliness towards Russia. Decrease friendliness towards Europe/canada. Don’t confuse inflection points with the actual position.
- rapjr9 2y agoLeaving NATO is not a one way street. If the US leaves NATO, then the NATO countries can also stop supporting the US. How many components of US weapon systems are made in the EU?
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- _DeadFred_ 2y agoThe US cannot support it's military projection without allies. If every US base has to be ran as 'fortress USA' the budget will break. Even just losing a few strategically located bases will greatly increase the cost of power projection. All Europe has to do is stop all local support for US bases and force all resupply to be done via the US military and the bases existing infra, not via ANY civilian infrastructure (no civilian airports, no civilian trucking, no civilian shipping). That's just one pain point in the USAs soft underbelly that we didn't have to worry about before because we had allies.
- fallingknife 2y agoI think that's kind of the point. The Trump admin takes a very isolationist view of things, so I don't think they even want all those international bases.
- _DeadFred_ 2y agoIt's not the point for the MAGA types. They want the power AND deference of the good old days, not actual feeble pullback and irrelevance. They think Europe paying it's share means Europe will pay for OUR military presence. Add on their kids no longer having access to military jobs/path to education and those communities will start to freak out. Trump wants to project power in the middle east. That's current done out of European bases.
- warrenmiller 2y agotell that to Greenland.