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[Helgoland]

Let's just wait for the rest of the world to admit it: We are awesome. Simple as that. I bet there's a reason that Europe and not another region was the only one to ever achieve world dominance.

[misko27]

Imperialist.
 
More seriously, It was most likely do to favorable livestock and climes. Europe has the vast majority of large mammals suitable for farm work. 12. EU never really achieved World dominance though. They were to damn fractitious. That's really the thing here, not that there tough. Tough like a serb maybe. You guys could have controlled the world, but were to busy divinding it up with infighting. The end of European Dominance of other coutnries was the world wars, which made holding on to colonies expensive.

[GreatJustice]

Let's just wait for the rest of the world to admit it: We are awesome. Simple as that. I bet there's a reason that Europe and not another region was the only one to ever achieve world dominance.

Now hold on there, Russia's nominally European too. They certainly have had their times in the sun.

Besides that, Russia would have the distinct advantage in the short term, not in the least because the EU is (A) An economic, not political union, so proper military organization would be a gigantic mess and (B) Basically has a military doctrine, collectively speaking, that comes down to NATO (Read:The US and co) coming in at some point to assist. Furthermore, Russia has an iron grip on European energy via Gazprom. Yes, Russia receives European goods too, but Russia can survive without European consumer goods a lot longer than Europe can survive without Russian gas.

Though if you don't include the non-EU countries, it would be a very cold war since the only borders Russia has with the EU are at the Baltic. If you do include them, Byelorussia would line up with Russia pretty fast, the Ukraine would be a big mess due to ethnic tensions, and most of the rest of the Europeans would rush for the EU. Even with them, though, Russia's sheer military might would probably be sufficient to eat right through the EU.

At which point the frail and overextended Russian economy would collapse, since Russia presently is barely capable of maintaining a peacetime economy, let alone one forced to supply a gigantic force occupying the entirety of Europe without any European imports. So I guess no one would win, though the maps might show a really big green Russia for a while.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

The funny part is that Russia doesn't even want Belarus. They're like a nation of annoying fanboys.

[Osmosis Jones]

I wonder if the US would use the war to annex Siberia New Greater Alaska... a fair bit of mineral wealth out there, from what I understand.

[misko27]

I agree. I will point out that some of the other balkan countries will break for Russia or be embroiled in war. Example: Serbia! The question of Russian allying versus European Intergration is a difficult one in many places.
 
But what is the context though? If it's something personal, the US might now want to Intervene. If, in the otherhand, the Chinese feel the can tip the scales, they may be tempted to ally with Russia.
 
The questions would be exactly to what extent the russians will eventually advance, and how long and how effectively they will be able to hold on. I doubt not too long, but war does help economies.I think that, assuming the russians begin their advance, and that the US has up to this point not intervened, they will be able to push at least to France. as soon as the russians begin their advance, of course, the US will be all over that. But that takes time, and the US doesn't have the military prescense in the region it once had. if the Russians push so far back as to essentially claim the continent, There will be a more intersting question regarding whether they can sustain themselves. If they don't push even as far as france, the question is moot.
 
If the russians can't capture land before the trenches are in the ground and the front lines are drawn quite clearly, they're screwed. There advantage of military might is all they have, once the advance has slowed, they'll need to go SUPER-WARTIME ECONOMY MODE to even have a shot of keeping any of that territory. if they somehow manage to hold on for a year and have begun gaining the fruits of the European Economy, WW3 will start. The US will press China into making a descision, and as I said, if it looks like the russians have a good chance, they may well jump ship.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

I wonder if the US would use the war to annex Siberia New Greater Alaska... a fair bit of mineral wealth out there, from what I understand.

It's funny that you would mention that. During some of the USSR's late economic turmoil it was suggested by some that the US approach them with offers of money for land in Siberia. Never went anywhere, obviously, and I think they would have learned their lessen about letting America buy your land after what happened with Alaska.

"No, they said, there's nothing of worth in Alaska, just ice and polar bears! Let the Americans have it, there's no way they'll find massive amounts of oil and gold there later."

[misko27]

I sum up: 3 stages, each critical to the chances of this being a war the russians could actually eventually win. The sucess for each will determine the upper limit for sucess on the next one, and increase the odds.
1) Land grab. This should take as little time as possible preferably. The best chance is taking all of mainland Europe, save for neutrals.
2) Capitalize off that shit! This will depend on how sucessful the last was. If therewas little land taken, this will be very short indeed. Preferably lasting as long as possible.
3) The Counterattack. Eventually the opposing world powers are going to have their land armies ready to shoot some russians. This could take a long time, if Europe is totally occupied, or very little, if they made little sucess. How effectively they fight will depend on how sucessful the previous action went.
 
If all these go well, and very well, the Russians will be in a position to fight on equal terms. And so began WW3

[Mego]

Let's just wait for the rest of the world to admit it: We are awesome. Simple as that. I bet there's a reason that Europe and not another region was the only one to ever achieve world dominance.

Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond addresses those reasons, and is a very good read.

[Owlbread]

Russia is no longer 1970s Russia. They're a corrupt shadow of their former selves who have too much to lose in any kind of large scale conflict. Those days, in general actually, are gone. People don't really invade other countries to annex them or annex large amounts of territory, just to force leadership changes if they can afford it. It's quite pointless to debate this kind of thing because it's as likely as Europe actually uniting into a federation - yeah, right. You sell that to the Czechs, British, Hungarians and Latvians.

[Helgoland]

Imperialist.
 

A little bit

More seriously, It was most likely do to favorable livestock and climes. Europe has the vast majority of large mammals suitable for farm work. 12. EU never really achieved World dominance though. They were to damn fractitious. That's really the thing here, not that there tough. Tough like a serb maybe. You guys could have controlled the world, but were to busy divinding it up with infighting. The end of European Dominance of other coutnries was the world wars, which made holding on to colonies expensive.

World dominance was achieved, it just wasn't a very coherent dominance. ~90% of Earth were ruled by Europeans (explicitly including Russia; can't get to 90%  without Siberia), and the rest were small/underdeveloped (at the time) countries - Ethiopia and the early US come to mind.
Not that I'm an advocate of colonialism; it's just that in this crisis it's good to take a look at what Europe is capable of.

[misko27]

Let's just wait for the rest of the world to admit it: We are awesome. Simple as that. I bet there's a reason that Europe and not another region was the only one to ever achieve world dominance.

Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond addresses those reasons, and is a very good read.

Hey! I remember that! My Global history teacher reccomended it.

[Reelya]

In GGS, Jared Diamond explains how race plays little part in the spread of "high tech". Food production does. The traditional old-world empires follow the "wheat belt" of Eurasia and North Africa, they themselves were never able to "colonize" outside the wheat belt until fairly recently in history, for example the Dutch sailed past the tropics and landed in the southern temperate zone of South Africa, where there was only hunter-gatherer resistance (the Khoisan tribes), because the central African tropical farm crops couldn't grow in the colder areas, but it was ideal for wheat.

The "backwards" areas are the areas unable to support the dominant crops - or places isolated from trade with the more advanced areas. Trade plays a bigger part than local innovation - consider all the things that made Britain a world power, and very few of them were purely invented in England.

Another thing is that Europe is extremely resistant to deforestation - it rains so much that you just can't clear-cut it. Dryer regions like the Fertile Cresent, and the Chaco Canyon did not bounce back once people started to chop down trees, even though they had what appears to be abundant forest at one point, it was much more fragile. The same aggressive use of forestry in North Africa, Middle East wasn't sustainable, but in Europe, you can chop trees for millennia and barely dent the thing.

[Sheb]

And let's not forget livestocks, and the wonderful amount of germs it brings. Which mean you evovle resistance. Which mean you don't even need to kill the native, coughing in their directions one or twice is enough.

[misko27]

Beating expectations, Jobs report Highly positive. 146,000 jobs added, unemployment down to 7.7 precent
 
And people were predicting a rise to 8%! Not even Hurricane sandy ruined it. It's the lowest level since 2008.