So Starmer's decided we need to spend a chunk more on the military. Denmark, of all countries, is splurging on the military. Germany is chomping at the bit.
The threat is considered to be Russia, and specifically Russia when the US isn't there to back us. And it does seem possible Russia wouldn't stop at Ukraine.
This is a thread to record what's happening, but also to ponder the wisdom of it all. And to think on such questions as: has there ever been a time when Europe re-armed and it didn't spiral into a European war and beyond? And if someone assassinated Putin would it save us all a lot of expense and trouble, or is Russia truly set on expansionism?
Hateful though the concept is, what other choice does Europe have?
Regardless of who takes over from Trump, the current admin has proven beyond any doubt that the US is now, at best, an 'unreliable partner' and the old assurance of the Americans wading in to help should NATO's Article 5 be invoked has been irreversibly undermined. What 'Western' and specifically, European powers have witnessed in the past month is a former ally and cornerstone of the military alliance that has largely helped to keep Europe free of major wars for the past 80 years turn around and threaten a NATO European state and made annexation overtures towards another non-European NATO state.
The breathtaking arrogance and myopic contempt that the Trump admin has displayed towards the US's closest allies is showing no sign of slowing down and it's highly likely that the next target for their disruptiveness is breaking the NATO alliance. So, in the event of that happening, what's to replace it? Eastern European states are rightly worried that an assertive Russia may want to start taking land -whether by 'salami-slicing' areas with a majority ethnic russian population, or by wholesale invasion. Russia may have the economy of Italy but it still has a significant proportion of the former USSR's nuclear forces and a shitload of mothballed vehicles and aircraft that they can dust-off and use. When people were mocking Russia a while ago for fielding tanks from the 1950's, Ukrainian soldiers were rightly saying 'any tank is a danger when you don't have the means to take it on'. Europe's reliance on American defensive guarantees for the best part of a century has left the continent in a militarily vulnerable position -the various nations do not have massive stockpiles of weapons and materiel that they can bring to bear at short notice. Likewise, the 'credible deterrence' of the French and British nuclear weapons stystems is miniscule compared to Russia's (a few hundred vs several thousand and no long-range capability as that got handed-off to the US). A significant number of the continent's defence contracts are being fulfilled by
American defence contractors and not domestic ones which, again, leaves the continent somewhat exposed.
I hate the fact that we are now looking at a period where European powers once again start tooling up. I had hoped the post cold war dividend would extend to finally getting rid of nuclear weapons altogether but that never fucking happened, did it? It's a fucking shite state of affairs but this is the world we have inherited and now that the foundation of European security has been found to be built on sand, what else are the Europeans to do?
Also, assassinating Putin is a fucking stupid idea for very obvious reasons.
