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You're assuming NATO is somehow critical for the US. It is not. NATO is critical for the European powers (those not named Russia). The US doesn't require it. T

You're assuming NATO is somehow critical for the US. It is not. NATO is critical for the European powers (those not named Russia). The US doesn't require it. The US doesn't need to defend Europe any longer. And it's clear the Europeans don't want the US there, so it works out great. Europe can boost its defense spending by ~$300 billion to make up the difference, or not, whatever they choose to do is up to them. The US had the world's largest economy six decades before NATO existed. China is growing into a superpower entirely without a NATO-like participation. NATO is primarily beneficial to European stability. The US doesn't need NATO to defend itself at all.

jacquesm 9mo ago
This is not a one sided thing. The US has been allowed to do a lot of things under the NATO umbrella that it benefited from (such as: selling a vast quantity of arms). Soft power is a thing and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization came into being to deal with exactly the kind of situation that we are viewing today. To see the US bow out, and in fact threatening allies is duplicitous at best.
- OrvalWintermute 9mo ago
  The Euros also underfunded their defense obligations and received huge amounts of US investment in facilities, enabling them to upfund social programs, socialized healthcare and most egregiously 8 - 12 week vacations which are completely unheard of in the US.
  - jacquesm 9mo ago
    You are spending too much time in an echo chamber if you think that those things that are unheard of in the US could not have been done in the US. They could have been, but it would have required a different kind of path than you chose. The EU has chosen to try to cooperate rather than to be at war all the time and it looks like that may have been a wrong bet but that is mostly because first one (Russia) and now another (USA) party have reneged on the deals that were in place.
    - OrvalWintermute 9mo ago
      They could have been done is my contention. But not while carrying Euros’ defense obligations
      - jacquesm 9mo ago
        Sorry, but that's just dumb. You could have done all that and more. You're being used to defend massive wealth inequality and wealth concentration over the backs of the poorest 95% or so of the country. The two have nothing whatsoever to do with each other. The USA is not 'unable to have a more decent balance of life because they are carrying Europe's defense obligation'.
  - benterix 9mo ago
    > The Euros also underfunded their defense obligations and received huge amounts of US investment in facilities, enabling them to upfund social programs, socialized healthcare and most egregiously 8 - 12 week vacations which are completely unheard of in the US. It's hard to detect sarcasm through the screen but in case you're being serious and just repeat what Trump says, he does this because Americans are not stupid and are asking, why Europeans can enjoy free healthcare, education and 4-week holidays and we cant? The answer "because we sponsored them" makes no sense but finds fertile ground in the hearts of some people.
  - meling 9mo ago
    Who has 8 week vacations, let alone 12? No European country I’m aware of, but I didn’t check all…
    - ljf 9mo ago
      Austria has 30 days leave after 25 years service (other wise 25 days) - so that is 6 weeks, plus 13 public holidays. So some people get around 8 weeks there. Here in the UK, I get 29 days leave, I buy 5 more, plus get 8 bank holidays - so 42 days leave - or 8 weeks. Plus volunteering days and training days... but that isn't that common.
      - ulrashida 9mo ago
        Australia has 6 weeks of leave at similar service levels, plus 11 public holidays. Turns out many countries have figured out how to not work themselves to death.
    - TacticalCoder 9mo ago
      > Who has 8 week vacations, let alone 12? No European country I’m aware of, but I didn’t check all… All teachers and most politicians. Teachers do enjoy the same vacation as students: schools aren't open during vacation. Two months of vacation + 6 additional weeks of vacation during the year + a few special one-day holidays. As for politicians: my stepfather was working at a national parliament but only when there would be official questions and only when these would be in his native tongue (country had two official languages). And when the country would be without a government, he'd have as much as 500 days (500 days: you read correctly, and it didn't happen once but twice) of vacations. It's only if there was a super urgent matter where the parliament would be opened that he'd have to work: so he'd quickly hop on a plane and go back to his native country. So "who": some public servants. Not all but some public servants definitely do enjoy 8 to 12 weeks of vacation and even much more than that. At the expense of working, taxpaying, citizens. EDIT: for the 500 days... He would not know beforehand it'd be 500 days. He'd just know there was no government anymore. So he was fully paid but basically had to do jack shit until there'd be a government again. Which nobody could tell when it'd happen. But you read correctly: half a thousand days+. You all read that correctly. His vacation on the sunny french riviera paid by the taxes of the people.
  - justin66 9mo ago
    We would fund nationwide health care and more robust social programs if it weren't for all the money we are spending on defense is simply not something the US right-wing and centrists ever put out there. When they fought those things it was with the ideological argument that they were intrinsically wrong. OMG Socialism!
  - drawfloat 9mo ago
    They’re unheard of in Europe too, you’ve read too many internet comments and lost touch with reality.
    - OrvalWintermute 9mo ago
      Please refer to my comment above on how to use bridging days (Brückentage) to get to over 60 days of absense. In the case of 32 days of vacation with bridging & holidays it is very possible to get over 70 days of calendar absence
      - drawfloat 8mo ago
        And in the overwhelming majority of Europe they are unheard of.
  - carefulfungi 9mo ago
    If this were true, and if you want to give credit to Trump for EU defense spending increases, then (1) why is Trump asking for a dramatic increase in US military funding and (2) when will the US savings on defending the EU be spent on US workers?
    - kyboren 9mo ago
      1. Obviously the Trump admin is requesting an increased military budget because of looming global conflict. We don't want to get caught with our pants down. Russia obviously bears the moral blame for starting this war, but Putin clearly was tempted by Western weakness. Had European states kept large and effective militaries and credibly threatened to employ them in Ukraine's defense, we probably wouldn't be where we are right now. So in some not insignificant measure, historical European underspending has contributed to the need right now for dramatically increased spending across the entire alliance. 2. I disagree with GP and agree with your cynicism there. US domestic policy failures are in no way caused by foreign intransigence of any kind. IIRC we spend more on health care per capita than (almost?) any other nation yet rank nowhere near the top in health outcomes. That's on us. And I think it's important to correctly identify the root cause of our broken domestic policies, because I suspect fixing that issue will fix more governance failures than just healthcare.
      - jacquesm 9mo ago
        Agreed that Putin was tempted by Western weakness, but you didn't go far enough West.
        kyboren 9mo ago
        Oh, right. I forgot that European states have no agency or responsibility and are innocent victims of big bad America. Mea culpa. I wrote "Western" rather than "European" specifically because I believe American weakness has played a role, too. But would it really make it better if Russia invaded Europe solely because of American weakness? That European states are so weak and helpless that they hardly even factor into Putin's calculus?
  - messe 9mo ago
    > socialized healthcare So why does the US spend more per capita on healthcare than the EU?
- soerxpso 9mo ago
  I find it interesting how people say "The US" to refer to groups under the US government that are often completely at odds with the interests of the actual US public. There are virtually no Americans who want our government to be acting in the interests of arms manufacturers except the arms manufacturers themselves and the politicians they pay.
  - jacquesm 9mo ago
    How many groups do you know in other countries that you refer to by name rather than the name of the country and the general idea that the government of that country must represent at least at some significant level the will of it's people?
  - blackoil 9mo ago
    It is supposed to be a "liberal democracy". "You" have killed millions to promote this idea and now trying to disown it.
  - lynx97 9mo ago
    C'mon, what a lame excuse. Well then, show us that democracy works and vote for a goverment which doesn't? If I follow your reasoning, you've just demonstrated that democracy is a failure, because the US government acts in the interests of arms manufacturers since a very long time, no matter if Dems or Reps are in power.
    - qbit42 9mo ago
      Our democracy is clearly disfunctional. I believe corporate money has played a big role to make it worse.
  - jgeada 9mo ago
    We own the consequences of our actions, our votes. Yes, we as a country, for whatever reasons, voted for someone who very clearly telegraphed he would be doing exactly what he's been doing. FAFO, and we're not even close to the full spectrum of what the FO part implies. We the people are responsible for the government we get. Don't like the consequences? Make better voting choices next time.
- kyboren 9mo ago
  NATO came into being to deal with the USSR, which was the preeminent threat to all NATO members. The US wasn't expected just to come save Europe; European states had real military power and the will to bring it to bear against the US's main adversary. In a conflict with the USSR, the US could rely on Europe to fight with them. Very valuable. Today, US policymakers see China as the main adversary. But European states have no real military power--certainly none that can be projected in the Pacific theater--and wouldn't have the will to deploy it even if they did. Europeans now expect America to fight Russia for them, not with them. So now NATO is basically all risk and cost for the US with no benefit against their main adversary. I think it's a shortsighted view of American national security imperatives: American security relies as it ever did on security in both Western Europe and Eastern Asia. Abandoning one theater to focus on the other just leaves a giant blind spot. However, this has led Europe to take its own security more seriously and stop relying on America to fight the Russians for them, something multiple POTUSes have tried more diplomatically to achieve--and failed--for decades.
  - epolanski 9mo ago
    > Europeans now expect America to fight Russia for them, not with them. As an European: nobody has this expectation, unless you're using some strange subreddit comment as a source of information.
    - SR2Z 9mo ago
      Compare the strength of the militaries of Europe with the United States and you'll see how that claim is believable. That's changing, but for many years European nations did not spend very much on their militaries. A large part of why is the protection of NATO and US bases in various countries.
      - epolanski 9mo ago
        No, that's the logic of a 15 years old playing call of duty. Europe has spent less on military because after the cold war and still today, it never had any realistic threat. Russia can't even take few miles off Ukraine. The only realistic threat is the US, which is an ally, in theory. Now a threat.
- rayiner 9mo ago
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  - glemion43 9mo ago
    [flagged]
    - jacquesm 9mo ago
      Fortunately Rayiner is not a representative sample of the USA.
      - handedness 9mo ago
        His comments align much more closely with the plurality of 2024 voters than do yours. > Effectively you've departed reality and you are now in a world of your own making where the facts are no longer relevant, just how you can stretch and twist everything to make it fit your worldview. Glass houses, and all that.
        glemion43 9mo ago
        [flagged]
        TimorousBestie 9mo ago
        Specifically on the subject of Venezuela: > Americans are split about the U.S. capturing Maduro — with many still forming opinions — according to a poll conducted by The Washington Post and SSRS using text messages over the weekend. About 4 in 10 approved of the U.S. military being sent to capture Maduro, while roughly the same share were opposed. About 2 in 10 were unsure. Republicans broadly approved of the action, while Democrats were largely opposed to it. > Nearly half of Americans, 45%, were opposed to the U.S. taking control of Venezuela and choosing a new government for the country. About 9 in 10 Americans said that the Venezuelan people should be the ones to decide the future leadership of their country. > In December, a Quinnipiac poll found that about 6 in 10 registered voters opposed U.S. military action in Venezuela. Republicans were more divided: About half were in support, while about one-third were opposed and 15% didn’t have an opinion. https://apnews.com/article/poll-venezuela-trump-foreign-policy-15c94665b41312f5613772726d710905 https://apnews.com/article/poll-venezuela-trump-foreign-poli...
- mikkupikku 9mo ago
  NATO members aren't particularly large customers for American weapons. Poland is the largest, but is dwarfed by Japan, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. Ukraine is receiving a bunch of weapons, but that math isn't so straight forward (they're getting a ton of old stock) and they don't have much choice anyway.
  - epolanski 9mo ago
    Europeans have spent 80B $ in 2024 and 68 in 2025 on US weapons. That's not peanuts.
    - _DeadFred_ 9mo ago
      Total US goods exports were $2,083 in 2025. This number is 4% of all of our exported goods for the year, so actually a pretty big number when it comes to national economics. People keep talking like the US can throw away 4% here, 2% there, likes it's nothing. The same people said last week 'Trump is meme'ing about Greenland'. Now they are saying 'the hit to our economy won't be too bad' which is as truthful of a statement as 'meme'ing about Greenland' was and based on the same 'defend Trump' and not reality.
      - mikkupikku 9mo ago
        [flagged]
  - youngtaff 9mo ago
    Apart from Patriot, Atacms and a few other modern systems, Ukraine is basically saving the US the cost of destroying old arms
- _zagj 9mo ago
  > Soft power is a thing This is the usual claptrap Euros and Eurosimps come up with when Americans gripe about subsidizing Europe's defense. "Soft power" isn't putting money back in Americans' pockets, and the primary beneficiaries of NATO clearly didn't like us very much even before Trump's return, when Biden was still president and the aid flowed freely to Kyiv: https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2024/06/11/views-of-the-u-s/ https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2024/06/11/views-of-the-u... > Sweden: 47% had a favorable opinion of the US.; Germany: 49%; France: 46%; The Netherlands: 48% This is the "soft power" that Americans should rue having lost under Trump? A continent of entitled ingrates, who constantly crow about their generous welfare states ("six months paid vacation!") they enjoy partially through neglect of defense, and condescendingly lecture us ("As a European...") about how everything we do is wrong, who apparently don't like us very much even when we do come to their defense?
  - collingreen 9mo ago
    Are the constantly crowing, entitled ingrates with their condescending lectures in the room right now?
    - _zagj 9mo ago
      Yeah, they're the ones trying to gaslight Americans into believing that NATO hasn't been a completely lopsided relationship since the end of the Cold War, and that it makes complete sense that Americans be treaty-bound to defend nations like Sweden (which lifted not one finger when Finland was invaded by the Soviet Union and its territory annexed, and also later when Norway was invaded and occupied by Nazi Germany), a country where less than half of the population had a favorable view of us as a nation, before Trump. Obviously I don't agree with his threats over Greenland, but acting like the end of NATO would be a huge loss for the US is ridiculous. Look at how obsequious European heads of government are towards Trump, even in the face of these threats; that tells you all you need to know about whom NATO truly benefits. They know if the US withdraws from Europe completely, they'll have to up their military spending considerably to plug the gaps, which will strain the welfare state.
      - 9mo ago
GoatInGrey 9mo ago
To be fair, the user can speak to NATO's value without assigning it a 'critical' value.
sunaurus 9mo ago
The US does not benefit from a stronger, more unified Europe. Thanks to NATO, "the west" has effectively become an empire in all but name, with the US having enough influence to be the de facto leaders of this empire. If US pulls back from NATO, and Europe builds up military power to compensate, then the US loses this de facto leadership seat of an empire. Today, the US appears in parallel to be doing two things: 1. Causing fragmentation in Europe, by promoting right-wing nationalist politics in the EU 2. Threatening to drastically reduce their role in NATO At the very least we can both agree that these two efforts are completely in contradiction with each other, and it's very unlikely that Europeans will want to go for more fragmentation without the military power of the US on their side, right?
- bryanrasmussen 9mo ago
  it's true that if the bet of creating fragmentation in the EU works out, then the destruction of NATO might also work out, because the US would not have created another military power with a hostile attitude to balance them. If that bet is actually being made by Putin, hmm, I'm worried, but then again the implementation of the anti-NATO project is being run by Trump, so I think the EU just might come out on top. The whole Greenland thing for example, seems like an EU solidifying step, at the same time as it is NATO destroying.
  - jacquesm 9mo ago
    The exact same thing happened with Sweden and Finland joining NATO.
- epolanski 9mo ago
  > Today, the US appears in parallel to be doing two things: You forgot another one: literally threatening two NATO members (Canada and Denmark, in form of Greenland) of annexation.
  - autoexec 9mo ago
    An attack on one NATO member is an attack on all. The US is threatening Canada, Denmark, and all of their allies.
benterix 9mo ago
> NATO is critical for the European powers (those not named Russia). To be pedantic, Canada is a major non-European NATO member. And then there are allies, some of them designated by Trump: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_non-NATO_ally https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_non-NATO_ally Or, they were, as there is no certainty under his rule.
ben_w 9mo ago
Last time the US won a war without the assistance of any allies (and not against yourself), it was 1848 and you were fighing Mexico. The US economy is only the largest if you don't adjust for purchasing power, at which point the US and EU are in joint second place way behind China, and separated from each other by a rounding error despite Brexit. If the US wants to go alone, sure we'd miss you, but it's welcome to go in peace… so long as it doesn't steal Greenland on the way out.
- jacquesm 9mo ago
  This is effectively a defection, which in game theory may make sense but we're talking about a lot of lives and the established world order here. You mess with that at your peril, the idea that you can just pretend we're playing a game of Risk here is idiotic. But once you get past a certain point momentum takes over. We may already be there, maybe not quite, but this is about as dangerous as it has been in a very long time.
  - ben_w 9mo ago
    I agree, but due to the revealed preference of the current rhetoric and how this becomes a defacto method of departure, rather than the choice to depart itself.
    - jacquesm 9mo ago
      It's a decision either way, whether announced or not doesn't really make a difference. There was some measure to ensure that Trump could not take the US out of NATO, he seems have been trying to find some alternative that has the same effect and he may well have found it.
throwaway290 9mo ago
> You're assuming NATO is somehow critical for the US. It is not. NATO is critical for the European powers only 1 country invoked article 5 until today and it's not in Europe)
epolanski 9mo ago
Just a reminder that NATO troops have always been rallied by Washington and on top of that the US is the only country to have ever invoked article 5. The European allies have put their money and more importantly blood into these conflicts. Yes, we can all look at a geographical map and state that the USA is blessed geographically by being split by two oceans from anything major in the world and thus conclude that the US does not need Europeans to defend its borders. In essence you're completely ignoring how US allies in form of NATO allowed US to thrive as the global military power by providing a deep web of support, logistics, bases, ports, intelligence and allowing the US to have a huge influence it has consistently leveraged for decades to its own benefit or needs. And that includes financial reasons (like buying US weaponry). If US wants to pull out of NATO it is what it is, but this whole nonsense of NATO benefitting only the European allies when it's always Washington asking for other's blood and bases and logistics is just it: nonsense.
- _zagj 9mo ago
  > US is the only country to have ever invoked article 5. > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Atlantic_Treaty https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Atlantic_Treaty > Following the September 11 attacks, the Secretary General of NATO, George Robertson telephoned Colin Powell and said that declaring an Article 5 contingency would be a useful political statement for NATO to make. The United States indicated it had no interest in making such a request itself; however, it would not object to the council taking such action on its own.[55][56]
wiseowise 9mo ago
> The US had the world's largest economy six decades before NATO existed. Only because Europe was intent on destroying each other.
orwin 9mo ago
I wish europe was out of NATO. It does nothing to defend europe, bring us in wars we didn't ask for, and manufacture crisis European still suffer from (Syria refugee). It force its "allies" to buy defective weapons that are basically spyware, and still spy on them just in case. It force other allies to spill their blood in the middle East. The only "good" thing it did was breaking Sarajevo's siege in the mid 90s, but event then it isn't actually clear if the Serb wouldn't have backed off anyway at the end of the month because they couldn't progress due to the UN presence. Still saved a few hundred civilian lives, in exchange for a thousand of proto-nazi, so i can't say it was bad. No one will attack any EU country anyway, as long as france doens't change its nuclear doctrine, which, i will state here once again, include a "warning shot".
- mcswell 9mo ago
  I am an American, so my view of the situation over there is not...well informed. But I have wondered whether the EU couldn't set itself up as the New NATO. All European (unless Canada decides to join you), and omitting some of the old NATO provisions that are causing problems, like the ability of one member country to veto everyone else (I'm looking at you, Hungary). Would it work? Or is the EU infrastructure to weak to do that?
  - orwin 9mo ago
    The issue is that this kind of authoritarian military organization needs a clear leader, and without that, cannot function properly. That leader used to be the US. Even under Trump 1 (and even though i disagree with the decision), forcing NATO member to think about the 3% rule was ultimately something someone have to do (my preference would have been to lower the threshold), and that someone was the US. I also think it would need a pre-2008 France, who refused to be under the integrated command, to build a sort of trust and respect between members. Ultimately though, the Irak invasion shattered the trust and status quo, and i agree 100% with people saying NATO must die. Alliance that are more than a reactive defensive pact and force member into attacking unrelated countries should disappear. Just get nukes, and pray you won't have to use them.
- deepsun 9mo ago
xorcist 9mo ago
NATO is a rootkit, a foothold for lateral movement in a literal sense, for the US in Europe. Is is not "critical" for anyone, in some theoretical sense, but it has proven very effective over the better part of a century to keep European military in check and guaranteed not to form any other alliances than with the US. The EU itself was viewed critically from Washington until it could be proven that it had no intention of becoming a military alliance. So while it could be true that the US does not need NATO in a strict sense, the idea that it has not been net beneficial to the US is absurd. No Danish soldiers would have died in middle eastern wars if it wasn't for NATO.
jleyank 9mo ago
6 decades before NATO was formed, Britain was the largest economy and financial empire. The US was up-and-coming but had not yet had its war with Spain to demonstrate their arrival. Nato was formed "To keep the US in, the Germans down and the Russians out" (per Ismay). The first clause is now inoperative. The second clause is being reversed by the various Euro states and the third, unfortunately, remains. There was also a benefit to the US maintaining NATO - it could nudge/encourage/guide other countries into doing things it wanted done (such as Afganistan). This soft power is being discarded with NATO.
glemion43 9mo ago
USA had this because it manufactured everything and got rich doing so. NATO is / was USAs way of controlling Europe to have something against Asia. It's time for us / Europe to let the USA being whatever and kicking them out We (Germany) are quite well equipped making guns and tanks. And btw it was our strategy to try to win over countries by NOT being the big bully but sure Russia and USA made it clear that this no longer works. I hope USA leaves NATO and we kick them out sooner than later
youngtaff 9mo ago
Borrowing money from the rest of the world is critical to the US…
tliltocatl 9mo ago
- USA will be free to enjoy Chinese submarines coming via GIUK gap (if POTUS keep doing what they are, these submarines will probably base directly in UK and Norway). - If EU gets some more vertebrate leaders (something that tends to happen in times like this even in the most spineless countries), the first thing they will do is probably go get some allies in the Pacific to make up for this - and Pacific is much more sensitive to US. Of course, all of this is phenomenally stupid and everyone will be far worse off.
Braxton1980 9mo ago
NATO was formed as a defense against Russia. Which is a major threat to the US so I don't see why it's useless. We operate bases in Germany, Spain, and others. If we need Greenland so bad because Russia is that dangerous then isn't NATO important?

jacquesm 9mo ago

This is not a one sided thing. The US has been allowed to do a lot of things under the NATO umbrella that it benefited from (such as: selling a vast quantity of arms). Soft power is a thing and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization came into being to deal with exactly the kind of situation that we are viewing today. To see the US bow out, and in fact threatening allies is duplicitous at best.

OrvalWintermute 9mo ago
The Euros also underfunded their defense obligations and received huge amounts of US investment in facilities, enabling them to upfund social programs, socialized healthcare and most egregiously 8 - 12 week vacations which are completely unheard of in the US.
- jacquesm 9mo ago
  You are spending too much time in an echo chamber if you think that those things that are unheard of in the US could not have been done in the US. They could have been, but it would have required a different kind of path than you chose. The EU has chosen to try to cooperate rather than to be at war all the time and it looks like that may have been a wrong bet but that is mostly because first one (Russia) and now another (USA) party have reneged on the deals that were in place.
  - OrvalWintermute 9mo ago
    They could have been done is my contention. But not while carrying Euros’ defense obligations
    - jacquesm 9mo ago
      Sorry, but that's just dumb. You could have done all that and more. You're being used to defend massive wealth inequality and wealth concentration over the backs of the poorest 95% or so of the country. The two have nothing whatsoever to do with each other. The USA is not 'unable to have a more decent balance of life because they are carrying Europe's defense obligation'.
- benterix 9mo ago
  > The Euros also underfunded their defense obligations and received huge amounts of US investment in facilities, enabling them to upfund social programs, socialized healthcare and most egregiously 8 - 12 week vacations which are completely unheard of in the US. It's hard to detect sarcasm through the screen but in case you're being serious and just repeat what Trump says, he does this because Americans are not stupid and are asking, why Europeans can enjoy free healthcare, education and 4-week holidays and we cant? The answer "because we sponsored them" makes no sense but finds fertile ground in the hearts of some people.
- meling 9mo ago
  Who has 8 week vacations, let alone 12? No European country I’m aware of, but I didn’t check all…
  - ljf 9mo ago
    Austria has 30 days leave after 25 years service (other wise 25 days) - so that is 6 weeks, plus 13 public holidays. So some people get around 8 weeks there. Here in the UK, I get 29 days leave, I buy 5 more, plus get 8 bank holidays - so 42 days leave - or 8 weeks. Plus volunteering days and training days... but that isn't that common.
    - ulrashida 9mo ago
      Australia has 6 weeks of leave at similar service levels, plus 11 public holidays. Turns out many countries have figured out how to not work themselves to death.
  - TacticalCoder 9mo ago
    > Who has 8 week vacations, let alone 12? No European country I’m aware of, but I didn’t check all… All teachers and most politicians. Teachers do enjoy the same vacation as students: schools aren't open during vacation. Two months of vacation + 6 additional weeks of vacation during the year + a few special one-day holidays. As for politicians: my stepfather was working at a national parliament but only when there would be official questions and only when these would be in his native tongue (country had two official languages). And when the country would be without a government, he'd have as much as 500 days (500 days: you read correctly, and it didn't happen once but twice) of vacations. It's only if there was a super urgent matter where the parliament would be opened that he'd have to work: so he'd quickly hop on a plane and go back to his native country. So "who": some public servants. Not all but some public servants definitely do enjoy 8 to 12 weeks of vacation and even much more than that. At the expense of working, taxpaying, citizens. EDIT: for the 500 days... He would not know beforehand it'd be 500 days. He'd just know there was no government anymore. So he was fully paid but basically had to do jack shit until there'd be a government again. Which nobody could tell when it'd happen. But you read correctly: half a thousand days+. You all read that correctly. His vacation on the sunny french riviera paid by the taxes of the people.
- justin66 9mo ago
  We would fund nationwide health care and more robust social programs if it weren't for all the money we are spending on defense is simply not something the US right-wing and centrists ever put out there. When they fought those things it was with the ideological argument that they were intrinsically wrong. OMG Socialism!
- drawfloat 9mo ago
  They’re unheard of in Europe too, you’ve read too many internet comments and lost touch with reality.
  - OrvalWintermute 9mo ago
    Please refer to my comment above on how to use bridging days (Brückentage) to get to over 60 days of absense. In the case of 32 days of vacation with bridging & holidays it is very possible to get over 70 days of calendar absence
    - drawfloat 8mo ago
      And in the overwhelming majority of Europe they are unheard of.
- carefulfungi 9mo ago
  If this were true, and if you want to give credit to Trump for EU defense spending increases, then (1) why is Trump asking for a dramatic increase in US military funding and (2) when will the US savings on defending the EU be spent on US workers?
  - kyboren 9mo ago
    1. Obviously the Trump admin is requesting an increased military budget because of looming global conflict. We don't want to get caught with our pants down. Russia obviously bears the moral blame for starting this war, but Putin clearly was tempted by Western weakness. Had European states kept large and effective militaries and credibly threatened to employ them in Ukraine's defense, we probably wouldn't be where we are right now. So in some not insignificant measure, historical European underspending has contributed to the need right now for dramatically increased spending across the entire alliance. 2. I disagree with GP and agree with your cynicism there. US domestic policy failures are in no way caused by foreign intransigence of any kind. IIRC we spend more on health care per capita than (almost?) any other nation yet rank nowhere near the top in health outcomes. That's on us. And I think it's important to correctly identify the root cause of our broken domestic policies, because I suspect fixing that issue will fix more governance failures than just healthcare.
    - jacquesm 9mo ago
      Agreed that Putin was tempted by Western weakness, but you didn't go far enough West.
      - kyboren 9mo ago
        Oh, right. I forgot that European states have no agency or responsibility and are innocent victims of big bad America. Mea culpa. I wrote "Western" rather than "European" specifically because I believe American weakness has played a role, too. But would it really make it better if Russia invaded Europe solely because of American weakness? That European states are so weak and helpless that they hardly even factor into Putin's calculus?
- messe 9mo ago
  > socialized healthcare So why does the US spend more per capita on healthcare than the EU?
soerxpso 9mo ago
I find it interesting how people say "The US" to refer to groups under the US government that are often completely at odds with the interests of the actual US public. There are virtually no Americans who want our government to be acting in the interests of arms manufacturers except the arms manufacturers themselves and the politicians they pay.
- jacquesm 9mo ago
  How many groups do you know in other countries that you refer to by name rather than the name of the country and the general idea that the government of that country must represent at least at some significant level the will of it's people?
- blackoil 9mo ago
  It is supposed to be a "liberal democracy". "You" have killed millions to promote this idea and now trying to disown it.
- lynx97 9mo ago
  C'mon, what a lame excuse. Well then, show us that democracy works and vote for a goverment which doesn't? If I follow your reasoning, you've just demonstrated that democracy is a failure, because the US government acts in the interests of arms manufacturers since a very long time, no matter if Dems or Reps are in power.
  - qbit42 9mo ago
    Our democracy is clearly disfunctional. I believe corporate money has played a big role to make it worse.
- jgeada 9mo ago
  We own the consequences of our actions, our votes. Yes, we as a country, for whatever reasons, voted for someone who very clearly telegraphed he would be doing exactly what he's been doing. FAFO, and we're not even close to the full spectrum of what the FO part implies. We the people are responsible for the government we get. Don't like the consequences? Make better voting choices next time.
kyboren 9mo ago
NATO came into being to deal with the USSR, which was the preeminent threat to all NATO members. The US wasn't expected just to come save Europe; European states had real military power and the will to bring it to bear against the US's main adversary. In a conflict with the USSR, the US could rely on Europe to fight with them. Very valuable. Today, US policymakers see China as the main adversary. But European states have no real military power--certainly none that can be projected in the Pacific theater--and wouldn't have the will to deploy it even if they did. Europeans now expect America to fight Russia for them, not with them. So now NATO is basically all risk and cost for the US with no benefit against their main adversary. I think it's a shortsighted view of American national security imperatives: American security relies as it ever did on security in both Western Europe and Eastern Asia. Abandoning one theater to focus on the other just leaves a giant blind spot. However, this has led Europe to take its own security more seriously and stop relying on America to fight the Russians for them, something multiple POTUSes have tried more diplomatically to achieve--and failed--for decades.
- epolanski 9mo ago
  > Europeans now expect America to fight Russia for them, not with them. As an European: nobody has this expectation, unless you're using some strange subreddit comment as a source of information.
  - SR2Z 9mo ago
    Compare the strength of the militaries of Europe with the United States and you'll see how that claim is believable. That's changing, but for many years European nations did not spend very much on their militaries. A large part of why is the protection of NATO and US bases in various countries.
    - epolanski 9mo ago
      No, that's the logic of a 15 years old playing call of duty. Europe has spent less on military because after the cold war and still today, it never had any realistic threat. Russia can't even take few miles off Ukraine. The only realistic threat is the US, which is an ally, in theory. Now a threat.
rayiner 9mo ago
[flagged]
- glemion43 9mo ago
  [flagged]
  - jacquesm 9mo ago
    Fortunately Rayiner is not a representative sample of the USA.
    - handedness 9mo ago
      His comments align much more closely with the plurality of 2024 voters than do yours. > Effectively you've departed reality and you are now in a world of your own making where the facts are no longer relevant, just how you can stretch and twist everything to make it fit your worldview. Glass houses, and all that.
      - glemion43 9mo ago
        [flagged]
      - TimorousBestie 9mo ago
        Specifically on the subject of Venezuela: > Americans are split about the U.S. capturing Maduro — with many still forming opinions — according to a poll conducted by The Washington Post and SSRS using text messages over the weekend. About 4 in 10 approved of the U.S. military being sent to capture Maduro, while roughly the same share were opposed. About 2 in 10 were unsure. Republicans broadly approved of the action, while Democrats were largely opposed to it. > Nearly half of Americans, 45%, were opposed to the U.S. taking control of Venezuela and choosing a new government for the country. About 9 in 10 Americans said that the Venezuelan people should be the ones to decide the future leadership of their country. > In December, a Quinnipiac poll found that about 6 in 10 registered voters opposed U.S. military action in Venezuela. Republicans were more divided: About half were in support, while about one-third were opposed and 15% didn’t have an opinion. https://apnews.com/article/poll-venezuela-trump-foreign-policy-15c94665b41312f5613772726d710905 https://apnews.com/article/poll-venezuela-trump-foreign-poli...
mikkupikku 9mo ago
NATO members aren't particularly large customers for American weapons. Poland is the largest, but is dwarfed by Japan, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. Ukraine is receiving a bunch of weapons, but that math isn't so straight forward (they're getting a ton of old stock) and they don't have much choice anyway.
- epolanski 9mo ago
  Europeans have spent 80B $ in 2024 and 68 in 2025 on US weapons. That's not peanuts.
  - _DeadFred_ 9mo ago
    Total US goods exports were $2,083 in 2025. This number is 4% of all of our exported goods for the year, so actually a pretty big number when it comes to national economics. People keep talking like the US can throw away 4% here, 2% there, likes it's nothing. The same people said last week 'Trump is meme'ing about Greenland'. Now they are saying 'the hit to our economy won't be too bad' which is as truthful of a statement as 'meme'ing about Greenland' was and based on the same 'defend Trump' and not reality.
    - mikkupikku 9mo ago
      [flagged]
- youngtaff 9mo ago
  Apart from Patriot, Atacms and a few other modern systems, Ukraine is basically saving the US the cost of destroying old arms
_zagj 9mo ago
> Soft power is a thing This is the usual claptrap Euros and Eurosimps come up with when Americans gripe about subsidizing Europe's defense. "Soft power" isn't putting money back in Americans' pockets, and the primary beneficiaries of NATO clearly didn't like us very much even before Trump's return, when Biden was still president and the aid flowed freely to Kyiv: https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2024/06/11/views-of-the-u-s/ https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2024/06/11/views-of-the-u... > Sweden: 47% had a favorable opinion of the US.; Germany: 49%; France: 46%; The Netherlands: 48% This is the "soft power" that Americans should rue having lost under Trump? A continent of entitled ingrates, who constantly crow about their generous welfare states ("six months paid vacation!") they enjoy partially through neglect of defense, and condescendingly lecture us ("As a European...") about how everything we do is wrong, who apparently don't like us very much even when we do come to their defense?
- collingreen 9mo ago
  Are the constantly crowing, entitled ingrates with their condescending lectures in the room right now?
  - _zagj 9mo ago
    Yeah, they're the ones trying to gaslight Americans into believing that NATO hasn't been a completely lopsided relationship since the end of the Cold War, and that it makes complete sense that Americans be treaty-bound to defend nations like Sweden (which lifted not one finger when Finland was invaded by the Soviet Union and its territory annexed, and also later when Norway was invaded and occupied by Nazi Germany), a country where less than half of the population had a favorable view of us as a nation, before Trump. Obviously I don't agree with his threats over Greenland, but acting like the end of NATO would be a huge loss for the US is ridiculous. Look at how obsequious European heads of government are towards Trump, even in the face of these threats; that tells you all you need to know about whom NATO truly benefits. They know if the US withdraws from Europe completely, they'll have to up their military spending considerably to plug the gaps, which will strain the welfare state.
    - 9mo ago

GoatInGrey 9mo ago

To be fair, the user can speak to NATO's value without assigning it a 'critical' value.

sunaurus 9mo ago

The US does not benefit from a stronger, more unified Europe. Thanks to NATO, "the west" has effectively become an empire in all but name, with the US having enough influence to be the de facto leaders of this empire. If US pulls back from NATO, and Europe builds up military power to compensate, then the US loses this de facto leadership seat of an empire. Today, the US appears in parallel to be doing two things: 1. Causing fragmentation in Europe, by promoting right-wing nationalist politics in the EU 2. Threatening to drastically reduce their role in NATO At the very least we can both agree that these two efforts are completely in contradiction with each other, and it's very unlikely that Europeans will want to go for more fragmentation without the military power of the US on their side, right?

bryanrasmussen 9mo ago
it's true that if the bet of creating fragmentation in the EU works out, then the destruction of NATO might also work out, because the US would not have created another military power with a hostile attitude to balance them. If that bet is actually being made by Putin, hmm, I'm worried, but then again the implementation of the anti-NATO project is being run by Trump, so I think the EU just might come out on top. The whole Greenland thing for example, seems like an EU solidifying step, at the same time as it is NATO destroying.
- jacquesm 9mo ago
  The exact same thing happened with Sweden and Finland joining NATO.
epolanski 9mo ago
> Today, the US appears in parallel to be doing two things: You forgot another one: literally threatening two NATO members (Canada and Denmark, in form of Greenland) of annexation.
- autoexec 9mo ago
  An attack on one NATO member is an attack on all. The US is threatening Canada, Denmark, and all of their allies.

benterix 9mo ago

> NATO is critical for the European powers (those not named Russia). To be pedantic, Canada is a major non-European NATO member. And then there are allies, some of them designated by Trump: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_non-NATO_ally https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_non-NATO_ally Or, they were, as there is no certainty under his rule.

ben_w 9mo ago

Last time the US won a war without the assistance of any allies (and not against yourself), it was 1848 and you were fighing Mexico. The US economy is only the largest if you don't adjust for purchasing power, at which point the US and EU are in joint second place way behind China, and separated from each other by a rounding error despite Brexit. If the US wants to go alone, sure we'd miss you, but it's welcome to go in peace… so long as it doesn't steal Greenland on the way out.

jacquesm 9mo ago
This is effectively a defection, which in game theory may make sense but we're talking about a lot of lives and the established world order here. You mess with that at your peril, the idea that you can just pretend we're playing a game of Risk here is idiotic. But once you get past a certain point momentum takes over. We may already be there, maybe not quite, but this is about as dangerous as it has been in a very long time.
- ben_w 9mo ago
  I agree, but due to the revealed preference of the current rhetoric and how this becomes a defacto method of departure, rather than the choice to depart itself.
  - jacquesm 9mo ago
    It's a decision either way, whether announced or not doesn't really make a difference. There was some measure to ensure that Trump could not take the US out of NATO, he seems have been trying to find some alternative that has the same effect and he may well have found it.

throwaway290 9mo ago

> You're assuming NATO is somehow critical for the US. It is not. NATO is critical for the European powers only 1 country invoked article 5 until today and it's not in Europe)

epolanski 9mo ago

Just a reminder that NATO troops have always been rallied by Washington and on top of that the US is the only country to have ever invoked article 5. The European allies have put their money and more importantly blood into these conflicts. Yes, we can all look at a geographical map and state that the USA is blessed geographically by being split by two oceans from anything major in the world and thus conclude that the US does not need Europeans to defend its borders. In essence you're completely ignoring how US allies in form of NATO allowed US to thrive as the global military power by providing a deep web of support, logistics, bases, ports, intelligence and allowing the US to have a huge influence it has consistently leveraged for decades to its own benefit or needs. And that includes financial reasons (like buying US weaponry). If US wants to pull out of NATO it is what it is, but this whole nonsense of NATO benefitting only the European allies when it's always Washington asking for other's blood and bases and logistics is just it: nonsense.

_zagj 9mo ago
> US is the only country to have ever invoked article 5. > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Atlantic_Treaty https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Atlantic_Treaty > Following the September 11 attacks, the Secretary General of NATO, George Robertson telephoned Colin Powell and said that declaring an Article 5 contingency would be a useful political statement for NATO to make. The United States indicated it had no interest in making such a request itself; however, it would not object to the council taking such action on its own.[55][56]

wiseowise 9mo ago

> The US had the world's largest economy six decades before NATO existed. Only because Europe was intent on destroying each other.

orwin 9mo ago

I wish europe was out of NATO. It does nothing to defend europe, bring us in wars we didn't ask for, and manufacture crisis European still suffer from (Syria refugee). It force its "allies" to buy defective weapons that are basically spyware, and still spy on them just in case. It force other allies to spill their blood in the middle East. The only "good" thing it did was breaking Sarajevo's siege in the mid 90s, but event then it isn't actually clear if the Serb wouldn't have backed off anyway at the end of the month because they couldn't progress due to the UN presence. Still saved a few hundred civilian lives, in exchange for a thousand of proto-nazi, so i can't say it was bad. No one will attack any EU country anyway, as long as france doens't change its nuclear doctrine, which, i will state here once again, include a "warning shot".

mcswell 9mo ago
I am an American, so my view of the situation over there is not...well informed. But I have wondered whether the EU couldn't set itself up as the New NATO. All European (unless Canada decides to join you), and omitting some of the old NATO provisions that are causing problems, like the ability of one member country to veto everyone else (I'm looking at you, Hungary). Would it work? Or is the EU infrastructure to weak to do that?
- orwin 9mo ago
  The issue is that this kind of authoritarian military organization needs a clear leader, and without that, cannot function properly. That leader used to be the US. Even under Trump 1 (and even though i disagree with the decision), forcing NATO member to think about the 3% rule was ultimately something someone have to do (my preference would have been to lower the threshold), and that someone was the US. I also think it would need a pre-2008 France, who refused to be under the integrated command, to build a sort of trust and respect between members. Ultimately though, the Irak invasion shattered the trust and status quo, and i agree 100% with people saying NATO must die. Alliance that are more than a reactive defensive pact and force member into attacking unrelated countries should disappear. Just get nukes, and pray you won't have to use them.
deepsun 9mo ago

xorcist 9mo ago

NATO is a rootkit, a foothold for lateral movement in a literal sense, for the US in Europe. Is is not "critical" for anyone, in some theoretical sense, but it has proven very effective over the better part of a century to keep European military in check and guaranteed not to form any other alliances than with the US. The EU itself was viewed critically from Washington until it could be proven that it had no intention of becoming a military alliance. So while it could be true that the US does not need NATO in a strict sense, the idea that it has not been net beneficial to the US is absurd. No Danish soldiers would have died in middle eastern wars if it wasn't for NATO.

jleyank 9mo ago

6 decades before NATO was formed, Britain was the largest economy and financial empire. The US was up-and-coming but had not yet had its war with Spain to demonstrate their arrival. Nato was formed "To keep the US in, the Germans down and the Russians out" (per Ismay). The first clause is now inoperative. The second clause is being reversed by the various Euro states and the third, unfortunately, remains. There was also a benefit to the US maintaining NATO - it could nudge/encourage/guide other countries into doing things it wanted done (such as Afganistan). This soft power is being discarded with NATO.

glemion43 9mo ago

USA had this because it manufactured everything and got rich doing so. NATO is / was USAs way of controlling Europe to have something against Asia. It's time for us / Europe to let the USA being whatever and kicking them out We (Germany) are quite well equipped making guns and tanks. And btw it was our strategy to try to win over countries by NOT being the big bully but sure Russia and USA made it clear that this no longer works. I hope USA leaves NATO and we kick them out sooner than later

youngtaff 9mo ago

Borrowing money from the rest of the world is critical to the US…

tliltocatl 9mo ago

- USA will be free to enjoy Chinese submarines coming via GIUK gap (if POTUS keep doing what they are, these submarines will probably base directly in UK and Norway). - If EU gets some more vertebrate leaders (something that tends to happen in times like this even in the most spineless countries), the first thing they will do is probably go get some allies in the Pacific to make up for this - and Pacific is much more sensitive to US. Of course, all of this is phenomenally stupid and everyone will be far worse off.

Braxton1980 9mo ago

NATO was formed as a defense against Russia. Which is a major threat to the US so I don't see why it's useless. We operate bases in Germany, Spain, and others. If we need Greenland so bad because Russia is that dangerous then isn't NATO important?