Russia withdraws from arms treaty

[syscom3]

Originally Posted by davparlr

Go to your globe and place a string indicating a great circle route and make a line between Northeast Iran and the following cities, Stockholm, Berlin, London, and Washington, and see what part of the world falls under that line. It would be nice to have anti-missile defenses including radar along that line.

A missle defense site in Europe serves primarily to protect Europe, not the US.

Let the Europeans defend themselves.

[Hunter368]

Originally Posted by syscom3

Let the Europeans defend themselves.

What serves one's allies also serves yourself often.

I would rethink that way of thinking if I was you. What would the world look like today if USA had "served itself only" during the period of 1938-1945?

[syscom3]

Originally Posted by Hunter368

What serves one's allies also serves yourself often.

I would rethink that way of thinking if I was you. What would the world look like today if USA had "served itself only" during the period of 1938-1945?

I wouldnt exactly call some of the countries of Europe as "allies" in the traditional sense.

The cold war has been over for quite some time now, and the purpose of NATO has been completed.

Let the EU defend itself.

[Hunter368]

Originally Posted by syscom3

I wouldnt exactly call some of the countries of Europe as "allies" in the traditional sense.

The cold war has been over for quite some time now, and the purpose of NATO has been completed.

Let the EU defend itself.

I agree with you to a degree, but we have weakened Russia and won the cold war. Do not now become a isolationist country, where a enemy see weakness or opportunity she will capitalize on it and create problems. Let us remain strong with our allies and gain more allies in the process. Give our enemies no room to grow or spread their propaganda and gain their own friends or even worse take some of allies away from us.

I am not saying USA pays and does everything for EU....I am saying help them.....keep them as allies.....if they are not current allies then lets get them as allies.

[syscom3]

Originally Posted by Hunter368

I agree with you to a degree, but we have weakened Russia and won the cold war. Do not now become a isolationist country, where a enemy see weakness or opportunity she will capitalize on it and create problems. Let us remain strong with our allies and gain more allies in the process. Give our enemies no room to grow or spread their propaganda and gain their own friends or even worse take some of allies away from us.

I am not saying USA pays and does everything for EU....I am saying help them.....keep them as allies.....if they are not current allies then lets get them as allies.

Its obvious that Europe see's the world through a different view than the US. Thats fine, I just see no reason for the US to spend any more money on NATO. If Europe wants to have a voice in the world without having a military, no problem. Just dont come to the US asking for help.

[Hunter368]

Originally Posted by syscom3

Its obvious that Europe see's the world through a different view than the US. Thats fine, I just see no reason for the US to spend any more money on NATO. If Europe wants to have a voice in the world without having a military, no problem. Just dont come to the US asking for help.

I am not sure saying EU having no military is an accurate statement.....they are just less active.

I agree much of the free world does sit back and let USA spend and die for their benefit (Canada being one of them), but could / would USA want the EU to try to even compete with Russia? USA would lose some of it's global status if she did not play the "big brother role" as much as she currently does. But then again USA would not be resented as much as she is by the rest of the world (by her non allies) if she stepped back a little.

Pick your poison.....

Big brother = resentment and spending big bucks and losing soldiers

or

Isolation = less resentment and less spending and less status globally and perhaps letting an enemy grow in strength and status.


Pretty much USA is damned either way......

But thats what happens when you are the top dog no matter what you are talking about.

[davparlr]

Originally Posted by syscom3

Let the Europeans defend themselves.

We do have friends there, and stability and security of Europe is important to our well being. We can't have Iran or other radicals blackmailing Europe.

[davparlr]

Originally Posted by DerAdlerIstGelandet

Funny thing is I am American....

A great American. And ...... a great German! Thanks for your service.

[Cyrano]

FlyBoyJ

---

(I know this idiot is banned, but I'm going to answer anyways)

Originally Posted by Virtual_pilot

And then what? Russia will never attack, because it does not have sufficient army forces. It will however use nukes in any direct war with NATO, so what will you achieve with greater budgets?

To maintain independency. Estonia got recently bullied by Russia, though it is a NATO country. Russia did this for three reasons:

1) Estonia has a large Russian minority that immigrated there during the 50 years of illegal Soviet occupation. Russia wants to present itself as a hero of the slavs, just like Nazi Germany wanted to present itself as a big brother of all foreign Germans. We all know what resulted.

2) Russia wants to keep EU on its toes. This is the reason for recent threats in foreign and energy politics. Seems to be working. At the moment there is a persecution of minorities going on in the central Russia, and the EU does nothing. I know all this in detail, since these minorities are related to Finns and I have a friend there. Our president is a shameful example of this attitude, she knows exactly what is going on there, and yet she does nothing. All EU leaders are like this at the moment.

3) Russia wants to surround itself with enemies. Old trick, generate fear to keep your people in leash. Modern Russia sees fascists everywhere, except within its borders.

Former Soviet buffer countries have to reach independency from Russia, using both military and trade, to reach a status where Russia can't threat them with military or energy sanctions. Everybody knows that Russia isn't attacking anywhere in the next 10 years, but it's military is gaining more strenght, and the whole country is going into a very dangerous direction.
Just today I read from the newspaper about this camp that has been put up for Nashi youth. It's a political camp, where they train the youth to think politically right, reminds me of Hitler Jugend.

I'd rather like to see a strong democratic Russia, instead of a weak non-democratic Russia. I have nothing against common Russian people, I wish all the best for them. But as long as Russia walks this dangerous path, surrounding countries have to maintain sufficient military strenght that will simply by existing prevent insults on their sovereignty.

[FLYBOYJ]

Great post Cyrano!

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Originally Posted by davparlr

We do have friends there, and stability and security of Europe is important to our well being. We can't have Iran or other radicals blackmailing Europe.

Could not agree more with what you are saying.

By the way have you guys been hearing about the Russians sending Tu-160s toward England over the last few weeks since they had that spat with England.

Once apparantly the Tu-160s actually entered British Airspace.

Every time that they launched and headed toward England the Tu-160s were intercepted by Norwegian F-16s and British Tornados.

Cold War restarting maybe....

[mkloby]

Originally Posted by syscom3

I wouldnt exactly call some of the countries of Europe as "allies" in the traditional sense.

The cold war has been over for quite some time now, and the purpose of NATO has been completed.

Let the EU defend itself.

I would definitely like to see European nations take a more active interest in their own defense.

Do you know how many European nations are incapable of even training aviators??? Tons of them pour through American flight schools.

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

There is a reason why so many go through American Flight School. It is not because they are incapable mkloby. That is a pretty harsh and untrue statement you made.

For instance here in Germany the country is so small that you can not do any kind of training without flying over large populated areas. Therefore the Luftwaffe even has a base in the United States.

[mkloby]

Originally Posted by DerAdlerIstGelandet

There is a reason why so many go through American Flight School. It is not because they are incapable mkloby. That is a pretty harsh and untrue statement you made.

For instance here in Germany the country is so small that you can not do any kind of training without flying over large populated areas. Therefore the Luftwaffe even has a base in the United States.

I think you misunderstood my meaning of "incapable." I used that term speaking in an operational sense, which is true - several European countries are not able to train their aviators domestically, regardless of the reason. What I did not mean was it was because of any sort of deficiency in human ability. None whatsoever. They are trained to the same high standard as US pilots. With regard to the Italian Navy - their output of aviators is too small for their government to deem it worth the costs in facilitating their own domestic training program. So - they pay the US to train their naval aviators. I would imagine that the same is possibly true for Spain and Denmark.

I don't understand the comment about populated areas. We train and fly over populated areas routinely. Their fleet squadrons must also train too (obviously as squadrons never stop training), and much of that training must also take place within Germany, no?

[DerAdlerIstGelandet]

Originally Posted by mkloby

I don't understand the comment about populated areas. We train and fly over populated areas routinely. Their fleet squadrons must also train too (obviously as squadrons never stop training), and much of that training must also take place within Germany, no?

You have to remain at high altitude. There are plenty of German training squadrons in Germany but they only recieve training at alltitude because of the dense population of Germany.