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That seems an apt assessment.
~ $ apt assessment
E: Invalid operation assessment
Take a lap
This time one right side of the history. Letβs hope.
Hey, we were on the right side last time too... politically
I have many friends here in eu talking about Europe getting militant as a bad thing. I'm not for escalating conflict in any way, but would like to hear some alternatives.
There really is no alternative. History (especially in Europe) has proven a near infinite amount of times that peace through strength is the only language imperialistic dictatorships understand.
Appease them and they will see that as an encouragement to come for you.
We either get militant, or we get steamrolled by those that already are.
I don't think bolstering up defence spending is bad.
It is much better to be prepared than sorry, also negotiating from a strong standpoint is helpful towards some other nations.
The EU defense spending is already massive, easily outclassing everyone but the US.
The problem is on what the money is spend on, as much is wasted to national white elephants or transferred to unreliable US defense companies.
And in general way too much is spend on global force projection tech. There is for example no need for the EU to have a navy fleet that can operate independently for many months in the Pacific.
China is up there too, with U.S. $236.1 billion in 2024.
There is for example no need for the EU to have a navy fleet that can operate independently for many months in the Pacific.
So Tahiti or New Caledonia do not need a navy to be protected. I am sure the French will be exited by having part of their country not being protected by the EU.
I'm curious. Please ask them for alternatives to fighting back when Russia invades and report back.
Economic sanctions is one alternative. See North Korea. It doesn't work very well against Russia because they do have a lot of resources and their population is used to scarcity. This tactic would be more efficient against, say USA, because quite frankly, the western lifestyle is not self-sufficient.
Another alternative is to use Putin's own "special military operations" where instead of fighting a war front to front, they attack specific targets or throw people out of windows.
This is difficult for Europe to do, because we like to align with each other before doing anything serious. That way, actual democracies are not fit to do this kind of stuff in comparison to a dictatorship, but it's possible if anyone feels it's necessary. However it rarely has a positive outcome. It's like flipping the table and hoping something better comes up.
Overall, all agressive behavior leads to a losing position. Nobody has ever won a war or even a street fight. Both sides lose. The victory goes to those who wins the peace. So that's what Europe is constantly trying to do by diplomacy.
Even if I dislike spending ressources on military, it might make sense to armour up, just to keep a seat at the table of peace negotiation.
As an Alsatian, I just hop they keep the AFD in check for the foreseeable future !
More like the AFD's new arm
Germany is pretty confused. They continued doing lucrative business with putin even long after he invaded Ukraine for the first time, but now they are arming against him. If they could only have stopped themselves from funding the russian military for decades then maybe they wouldnβt need to be funding theirs now.
Hopefully those soldiers wonβt be deployed to build nord stream 3 in a couple of years.
Well, the gas pipeline was built in the early 2000s to get russia on board as a business partner to prevent escalation. As the saying goes: if the goods are not rolling, the tanks are rolling between countries.
You could say Germany isn't unique though. The US is also split between those who want to be friendly with Russia (Republicans) and those who don't (Democrats).
With Germany I guess Merkel believed that business ties with Russia would persuade Russia to not threaten Europe, but now that theory has been disproven, so Germans seem to be more supportive of the idea of cutting ties with Russia and boosting Germany's defence spending.