Silverthrone: If you're in Europe, Trump is basically wink wink nod nodding at Putin that he can "invade" whoever he likes and the US will just ignore it. This, to me, is not a good thing. (Not that Obama has been willing to actually try to stop him so far, but I have no doubt Hillary would have)
It isn't a good thing, no. It will necessitate rebuilding our own defensive capabilities, which will be expensive, unpopular but unavoidable. But, I think that the U.S. wouldn't be prepared to pay for Europe's defence forevermore, as it were. It's a severe re-adjustment, but it's better it happens early.
(Of course, Trump does talk a lot. Despite what he has expressed, there are likely still things they'd rather the Russians didn't do.)
Don't forget the cost of the parapets, the hoardings, the ammunition stores, and manning the trebuchets and ballistae. Although you could probably get some back from the tourism, and Medieval Times might work with us; it'd be pretty lucrative for them, after all, and borders are great places for gift shops.
Hmm. It also depends on how much efficient magma pumps costs these days. They might give some trickleback through geoheat, though.
There has been a lot of talk about Trump's lukewarm relation to NATO recently. Honestly, it might be for the best. It's well about time we saw to our own defences, and it just isn't fair expecting the U.S. to do all the work and foot the most of the bill. Him pulling back on NATO isn't a danger to global security, that is the effect of expecting Uncle Sam to do most of the work. Well, it sort of is a threat to global security the way we like it, but it is self-inflicted, if anything. Both the Pentagon and the White House has been complaining about that for years, it seems so strange that no one in the European high commands thought to listen to it.
Because for most nations, against the prime threat of Russia spending more on defence wouldn't really pull dividends, most modern wars haven't required a large military for European nations, and times are hard so it's hard to get more funding for anything.
Take Belgium. It spends something like .92% of gdp on it's military - that's 3.25 billion dollars off the top of my head.
Russia spends 65+ billion dollars on it's military.
Even if a lot of these smaller nations, they'd never be even slightly capable of matching the russian war machine in money, men or materials.
In these hard financial times, politicians don't want to expand the military for something unlikely to be really used - most conflicts have been more peacekeeping roles, part of a coalition - so even if the various European high commands heard, there's not much they can do to expand. People want hospitals and working trains more than they want more soldiers, because being sick or late to work is a much more pressing issue than maybe russia.
At least, that's my thoughts on it.
Well, true. You're right, it'd be incredibly difficult, and probably a lot more politically painful than just accepting the odd little tribute gesture to the Russians, if need be. But it's mainly the tone of it that WTFs me, that sense of Trump suddenly betraying NATO and Europe, when the signs have been there for years.
Sometimes I wonder if some politicians are actively anti-environmental. Heh, imagine one day, there's a severe hurricane, and a politician gathers support to dump oil and toxic waste in the sea as retribution. Not likely, but regrettably not unlikely enough.
Some absolutely are, straight up explicitly, bought and paid. One of trump's advisors or somethin' used to be a tobacco lobbyist (denying that tobacco caused harm) that transitioned into doing the same sort of work for the energy industry (denying any and every thing climate change), just as an example. There very much are politicians, in the US and elsewhere, that are actively working to destroy the environment of the areas they potentially oversee, are aware of the problems they are causing, and just straight up don't give a damn.
I like to think they had a nasty encounter with poison ivy in their childhoods, and swore a dark oath of revenge on the planet's ecology. I mean, at a certain point, they could still make a pretty damn good bit of money while also realigning in a more substainable direction, but they don't. Like it's a matter of principle.
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Topic: Things that made you go "WTF?" today o_O (Read 14845085 times)