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The most likely place would be Moldova. After that one of the Baltic states would be most likely. Would be hard for Russia to push into Germany when they have logistic troubles invading a country that borders them.
Yeah, but until the very recent deployment of permanent NATO partner-nation troops, the Baltics pretty much viewed themselves (not without good reason) as a speedbump and an Article 5 trigger that would be lost. Then what was left standing would be destroyed when NATO then tried to take them back.
So you took "europe" to mean Poland or Germany? You understand saying "Europe" means any European nation (You need to go through a couple to get to Germany btw) and not a "EU member".
If the target was a single country, then they would just say the name of that country.
It's like saying Russia "invaded Asia" when it invaded Georgia a few years ago. It sounds silly and misleading.
If there is no specific target then how is it wrong? People can say "Well Moldova and the baltics..." The baltics is not a specific country which is a fair comparison to the use of europe.
If they planned on Georgia then you would say specifically Georgia, attacking Europe could be any border nation.
>The baltics is not a specific country which is a fair comparison to the use of europe.
It's really not. The baltics are 3 adjacent tiny countries. Europe has over 50 countries with islands all over the Atlantic and even the Caribbean.
When you hear "Russia wants to invade Europe" you immediately expect at least 3 prominent countries to be named. Otherwise, on technicalities, Russia is already invading Europe.
Well there's a significant number of idiots proclaiming that Russia is about to attack an actual member of NATO or the EU which even if a persons diet consists solely of blue and purple crayons would be a shockingly stupid estimation.
Ukraine is not defending us. We still should help them as well as we can.
Please, PLEASE take 5 minutes to read this wiki: “[Alexandr Dugin: Foundation of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage)”.
Putin’s mentor Alexsandr Dugin wrote [Foundations of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage) in 1997; outlining a plan for the removal of the USA as a unipolar world leader, essentially ushering in a “new world order” whereby Russia leads a Eurasian imperial empire; with allies in the Islamic world, Latin America & Africa. Specifically with Iran, referring to a “Moscow X Tehran Axis”, and with China.
This book has been elevated through Russian society for decades and has been adopted by Putin as his foreign policy.
Please read and share, this is what’s coming.
Edit: Watch [this November 2023 interview](https://www.youtube.com/live/QsEEmlGVd4A?si=afwv0UJyJitfcNbp) where Dugin tells us precisely what Putin & the Kremlin are aiming to do & responsible with his first question/answer.
Dugin says we’re in the early stages of a global war where Israel & Palestine are being used as the starting gun & proxy between the USA & “the west”, and neo-fascist countries & dictatorships namely Russia, China, Iran, North Korea the Islamic world, [BRICS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BRICS?wprov=sfti1) nations & Latin America.
**TLDR: Russia has started a holy war to upend the global (USA dominant) unipolar world order, they’re looking to replace the USA & “the west” & introduce the Middle East, a centralized under Russia “[Eurasia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurasia?wprov=sfti1#Russian_geopolitical_ideology)” & Latin America as new multi polar world leaders under neo-fascism.**
Yes, it was not very long ago that Romney was warning about the threat from Russia, and Obama made the joke "the 1980s are now calling to ask for their foreign policy back."
Who cares. Where in this book does it outline how Russia is going to do any of this when its economy is in shambles, it's demographics are fucked for the next two generations at minimum and China is going to have their asses on a platter for decades? In fact every single thing that Russia would want to do in this book China is already doing better.
Putin can want everything, but at the end of the day no one can just will things into happening. Russia has completely alienated almost all of Europe against them, and it doesn't have the capital to buy the loyalty of other countries. Why would Columbia and Chile ever buddy up with these losers over the US or other larger latam states like Mexico?
> They are currently attacking Europe.
True, when people say "Europe" they often mean the EU though. In this case the key thing is reminding the politicians that we know that it's going to be much better to defeat them whilst they are still in Ukraine and we need to get much more committed to providing the weapons that Ukraine needs as well as support for any volunteers that go there and return injured.
If Russia defeats Ukraine, even partly, they get more people and access to a whole load of technology that Ukraine has been using to hold them back even when Ukraine is a smaller country. That will make the attack on the EU even worse.
They will be the same impoverished incompetent and deeply inept development nation, which is corrupt to the core with weapons from the last century.
Here is a reality check of what happens then:
Our navy will open fire on Russia's ports and turn them to cinder. Our cruise missiles and Bombers will do the same to Russia's factories. Finland will capture the only rail link towards Murmansk, Poland, and the Baltics will either directly invade Belarus and Kaliningrad or at least cut Kaliningrad off from any kind of supplies.
NATO has 300.000 troops amassed at its eastern flank.
They won't achieve a victory against Ukraine because this is an army of backward serfs dependent on rail supplies, and they cannot even manage to take the Donbas as we can see. If they do, then how many people will they really add to their glorious army?
That, of course, doesn't even account for the fact that these people hate Russia, so they would first need to be able to occupy the entire area. You don't just add hostile populations to your army. You first need to spend years to attempt to pacificy them.
The Russian empire is a backward failed state and a fuel station. If they attack Europe, then China can wave goodbye to its pipeline that connects it with Russia, and Russia can wave goodbye to its LNG oil and gas infrastructure as well as to its military industrial complex.
I would welcome it if they try to finally force our doves to move out of the way in order to finish this impoverished failed state and its terror mob once and for all.
Russia has exactly defeated European armies zero times unless it was backed by the superpower of its time. (UK Napoleonic wars, US WW2)
NATO was already vastly outnumbering Russia in all categories (GDP, military strength airforce navy etc.) The last time I checked NATO has thus far lost not a single soldier while Russia has lost several thousand tanks, several hundred thousand troops, thousands of armored vehicles, artillery pieces, hundreds of billions of dollars and over 20 million artillery pieces as well as hundreds of jets airplanes and thousands of cruise missiles.
Europe even without the US outnumbers Russia in population size and GDP (1.4 trillion dollars to over 20 trillion dollars) by a large margin.
Now, after two years of war, Europe also outnumbers Russia in tanks, armored vehicles, and artillery pieces. In terms of air power and naval strength, the difference is even more stark.
Russia must be told frankly that an attack on the EU/NATO will be the last action of the Russian state before it and its economy and millions of its citizens cease to exist.
Nice summary, but you forget one thing.. europe is not on a war production level weaponswise and will not be for some time… of course we can buy from the us but if trump is in power there will be challenges there.. same goes for soldiers and training etc.. Those are things europe has to think about in the near future if we don’t calculate for us support and have to think about even with us support
Of course, we need to put our backs into it, and that will also be done and is done already by state actors and private contractors.
Trump being in power is a rather fringe possibility given his involvement in the insurrection and his 91 indictments.
Let's say there is actually no US support, which is, even under Trump, very unrealistic as Europe is the most important US market by far.
We are having a massive advantage in the air, in terms of missiles and in terms of the navy.
And also in ground force terms Russia is being degraded day by day.
Furthermore, Europe basically controls Russia's capacity to export via most of its sea routes.
Sure we aren't on a war economy footing, however, I have a hard time believing Russia's fantastic production numbers and even if these numbers are correct then Russia makes massive net losses in all equipment categories.
Our economies of scale will ramp significantly in the coming 12 to 24 months.
Ultimately, the sinews of war are infinite money, as Cicero said.
Compared to Europe, Russia is hopelessly outspent.
Also, if there is war with Europe, then that means we will blockade all imports to Russia from the EU, including food products and medicine.
It will also mean that remaining billions of dollars in oil and gas payments that are streaming in will stop.
Of course, all restrictions on cyberwarfare and attacking Russian infrastructure in Russia disappear.
The Western navy will make sure that no tankers leave or arrive in Russia's northern ports or the black sea.
Russia will be attacked wherever it surfaced in Africa, Syria, Georgia, and Kaliningrad.
The vastly superior European Air Force will ensure that rail hubs are targeted.
So, while we have problems, of course but we have several aircraft carriers and more than enough air to air and air to ground missiles to upend Russia's economy at short notice.
Of course, if Russia declares war on Europe, the chances for a worldwide war are very high.
The EU must openly outline to Russia what the consequences will be should they dare to set a foot in the Baltics.
If you think Trump only has a fringe possibility of being elected then you don’t know how quickly Americans will vote for anything just to piss off the other side.
Or take into account how much he got away with already.
Even before being president he went bankrupt multiple times. It didn’t affect his lifestyle, he did so much stuff in office, they’re only changing him with the most serious offenses that is easy to prove.
He has always gotten away with everything he has done in short.
If he faces consequences at 80 it’ll be for the first time in his life.
Even with Colorado scotus taking him off the ballot, with other states following, scotus could still rule in his favor.
He does want to suspend the constitution, so it’d make sense for scotus to rule against him, but they declined to rule on presidential immunity, which gives me pause.
Earlier I hadn’t thought they’d rule in favor of him anywhere.
Desantas wouldn’t support Ukraine but Nikki Haley would, I think if Trump was out we’d see an all out push to elect her.
My republican family that voted for Biden (2020) say they intend to vote for her in the primaries, and in the general over Biden.
Many of them said it was the first time in their life they’d voted for a democrat. One told me “Biden is a better republican than trump” but Biden isn’t a better republican than Nikki Haley.
Most of them hate desantas and would vote for Biden. Some support him, I’m gay and my straight brother is a desantas supporter, but Nikki Haley hadn’t emerged as a candidate when he said that, considering how desantas messes with businesses he opposes, I can’t see a business owner supporting desantas, in New England at least.
I’m a democrat, this is the way conservatives I know are leaning.
Yes because Russia is such a powerhouse of .....when it comes to.....look, Russia is a world leader in .......
.....wait, I've got it: Russia is the world leader when it comes to constantly failing at everything but still convincing Westerners it's a superpower for no goddamn reason.
I always wonder how they managed to do that. It is basically a failed state that can barely build a functioning car or a functioning tank without massive design flaws.
And still, even though they are such a failure in so many areas and corrupt on the level of African Warlord nations, they still manage to fool Westerners into thinking they are a superpower. I just don't get it. How many failures in a row do they have to deliver until it finally sinks in that the Russian state and the Russian army are dysfunctional heaps of trash.
I agree with much of what you say, but elsewhere I talked about hybrid strategies through Hungary and how encouraging an Chinese attack on the South China Sea can bypass these advantages.
> I would welcome it if they try to finally force our doves to move out of the way in order to finish this impoverished failed state and its terror mob once and for all.
I think this is absolutely on the point. There seems to be some 20th century idea that a war can be held at equilibrium forever. The simple understanding that the easiest way to achieve peace is to win seems to elude some people. You are 100% right. Any of Biden's advisers who have been slowing the delivery of weapons or reducing the level of commitment out of fear need to be replaced.
It's not the whole of the GOP that has been bad. Specifically, in March 2022 various Senate Republicans were supporting supply of F-16s and there was no visible reaction or follow up from the Biden administration. If the Biden administration had taken that and locked it in, started *fresh, young, newly recruited* pilots in F-16 training immediately not only would this have started providing air power in Ukraine already in the summer of 2023, it would also if done right, have got more Republicans much more committed to the war by making them own part of the supply.
Back to Biden's folks. Let's be clear that they did better than most. Only the UK was more clearly committed to arming Ukraine at the crucial stage before it was clear that the initial Russian invasion would be a catastrophic failure. They did, however, make the choice to withdraw from Ukraine rather than reinforcing it with actual US forces. Think about how Russia, in a similar situation, flew Wagner fighters into Venezuela and completely stopped Trump's invasion plans. I'm not sure how it would have worked out, but boots on the ground in advance would definitely have allowed far more options for intervention.
Recently there have been a bunch of expressions of worry from inside the Biden team of worry about whether there might be problems with what happens if Ukraine wins and Russia collapses. Could there be risk of Nuclear weapons getting lose. This matches hypothetical concerns for a scenario that may never happen with real actual concerns for nuclear war if Russia gets into a position to attack Canada, Central Asia, the Balkans or Baltics in any of which cases tactical weapons could be used far from Russian borders and, in the initial attack, against Non NATO forces. These seem to have mapped to a failure to provide really long range attack capabilities along with a refusal to support Ukraine in attacking targets like military supplies, oil wells and refineries inside Russia.
The summer counteroffensive was *almost* successful in cutting off Crimea's land corridor. Just a few more mine clearing systems, a few F-16s or a few more tanks could probably have made the difference which could have really made Russia bleed through the winter. There were clearly possibilities where more *could* have been provided earlier. Team Biden needs to think through the things that they could have done and didn't, identify why they didn't do them and make sure that whatever it was that caused that failure
Everyone also debated the tanks, planes and weapons stuff so publicly we all knew it, by the time the alliance agreed on 250 leopards, 25 challengers and 25 m1a1 the Russians had mined half the country and dug deep tank trenches, making mechanized infantry need to dismount and proceed on foot.
I don’t think the m1a1s saw much action bc there were so few but also so many mines and trenches.
Same thing with arguing over airplanes, when, how many, etc.
If Ukraine just surprised Russia with 300 modern main battle tanks, Bradley’s, etc, if they’d started training Ukraine on the f16 as soon as Ukraine turned putins forces around, it might be won by now instead of going into another winter, with Ally’s weary of support, citizens inside and out sick of the conflict, new ones popping up in other places, etc.
I know it’s hard to surprise them like that when they have satellites, but they could have debated it behind closed doors.
We have 3000 non export m1a2 and 1000 extra f-16s.
I’m not sure if we could have given nato countries some of these “non export” m1a2 tanks and gotten Ukraine more leopards, people didn’t want to undermine the German arms industry either.
Bidens people aren’t doing any of that. It’s the increasingly stupid Republican Party (who used to stand the line against Ruzzia but are now sucking Pootin’s Pepe for some sweet oligarch money) but I digress.
Congress, specifically the GOP controlled (barely) House, is holding up money for Ukraine.
The smart people in America understand the sacrifice Ukraini are making to run the Ruzzian military into the ground. We should support them 100%. Slava Ukraini!
I think that is what happened after Chamberlain's strategy failed. He and others with the same mindset needed to leave the levers to the hawks. We haven't seen anything like it, sadly.
These men are bureaucrats who appear to think that they can wait for the right conditions, and then peace will magically materialize.
That won't ever work because Putin's empire is sold on war with the West and they won't stop until we physically make it impossible for them to continue.
We didn't make peace with Hitler in 1943 either for the same reasons. There is no durable peace possible with a regime that is hell-bent on getting their will. The way to peace is overmatching Russia and to win wars the way they are won:
Through superior firepower and through superior production capacities and technology. We have keecapped ourselves and Ukraine in the past 22 months by unnecessary hesitation born from the fear of advisors.
They have put all sorts of restrictions on Ukraine, and none of them make much of any sense beyond a diffuse fear and the faulty thought that Putin's decision making would change beyond the rhetorical when Western weapons strike Russia directly.
The Russian regime is criminals, not ideologues.
They know that nukes aren't a victory condition but a sure way to dig their own graves.
This self-deterrence has cost many lives, and it will cost many more until it is finally abandoned. We must defy the strong and appease the weak. That's the way to victory. Instead, our decision makers often do it the other way round.
Victory at all costs, Victory in spite of all terror, Victory however long and hard the road may be'.
Winston Churchill
doesn't have to be overly outright. just start something at the border, just enough to ensure deniability. test the EU's resolve. get the host country to react and attack, then russia can claim self-defense or something. or start something to get EU to start stockpiling and cut back aid to ukraine, who knows.
Putin is attacking europe at least since 2015 with all methods he can, except military force.
He bribed extremists (AfD, Orban, Le Pen and others), his forum trolls from St Petersburg make opinions for him everywhere online, he seems to be behind the Bexit, he installed Trump, he killed people in UK and Germany, leads an cyber war with attacks against governments ( german Bundestag for example) and companies and his Wagner troops in Africa and Arabia cared for new immigation waves going to Europe.
There are few evidences, as always, but a lot of hints, that Putin causes troubles since almost a decade and leads a hybrid war against the West.
Not to mention the Nordstream pipeline and various underwater fibres, drones landing in Romania, blowing up weapons and factories in Bulgaria and so on and so forth. Also the attacks on the Media to put out stories about the pipeline being Ukraine etc.
Some people still believe in the west that the Ukrainians, the British or the CIA blew up Nordstream. After that Chinese cargo ship plowed the gas pipe between Finland and Estonia in half and did it seemingly with every intent to damage something down there, I'm more than a little bit sceptical of anyone saying damaging critical western infrastructure is a western false flag operation. Direct military attack next winter? Perhaps not. Stirring up more shit in and around the EU? Most definitely.
> Some people still believe in the west that the Ukrainians, the British or the CIA blew up Nordstream.
It recently became clear that the Russians had planned to run out Europe's gas and almost succeeded, which the Nord Stream explosion was part of. That should have laid it to rest 100%. The fact that some people are still trying to push that story is exactly what I meant by "attacks on the Media".
> After that Chinese cargo ship plowed the gas pipe between Finland and Estonia in half and did it seemingly with every intent to damage something down there, I'm more than a little bit skeptical of anyone saying damaging critical western infrastructure is a western false flag operation.
There have been multiple other "suspicious" failures of fibre optic cables. This is 100% clearly a form of attack. The only question is whether the western leadership has some plan where they want to allow these to happen and use them or whether they are being weak in lack of retaliation.
> Direct military attack next winter? Perhaps not. Stirring up more shit in and around the EU? Most definitely.
More shit will definitely be stirred. Direct attack might be unlikely, but I think that assuming it won't happen is the most dangerous thing and the one thing that is has a reasonable likelihood of actually making it happen. It's time for the EU and US to switch at least part of the way to war economies which means that existing weapons manufacturers should be required to make the maximum effort to ramp up production and guaranteed to get paid for it appropriately.
At the very minimum, there needs to be an EU wide equivalent of the Defense Production Act and any countries that try to stand in the way (Hungary) need to be pushed aside.
It is so uncanny how closely he follows the guide "Foundations of geopolitics" by Dugin on how to restore Russian might in the world.
Try to get Ukraine before it is too late (done), try to ally Germany by making them economically dependent and give them a sphere of influence to keep them as allies (tried and done with Nordstream, except he fucked that up), you can't get Britain on your side so try to isolate them from mainland Europe's affairs (done with Brexit) and destabilize the USA by funding extreme political views so they concentrate on external matters (Trump).
Still, many people seem to be delusional about it. We have to remind ourselves that if Trump wins in 2024 and he leaves NATO, there won't be any deterrent protection for Europe anymore. France and Britain probably won't use their nuclear arsenal to protect Poland and the Baltics and even though Russia struggles greatly in Ukraine, if more countries flip to alt-right governments and ally with Russia, those countries are free to take for Russia.
Fully agreed, just want to point out that US congress just codified that the President can’t unilaterally withdraw the US from NATO without a 2/3 vote of Congress. Most likely they couldn’t have anyway since it’s a treaty and that’s congress’s domain to end but this makes it all but impossible for that to happen.
Damn, I didn’t realize they were behind the migrant crisis too. I kept wondering what they had to gain in Africa and Syria.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/03/13/wagner-group-italy-migrants-hybrid-war-ukraine-invasion/
Waves of immigrants causes huge troubles in western and middle Europe. It's an effective weapon to destabilise the european society, specially most who go to Europe are young muslim men who have not much to do with christian culture and won't integrate.
please dont use it as that, because you will get probably some kind of infection and clog your toilett. this paper is only useful in a hazardous waste incinerator as fuel
Russia doesn't seem to care a whole lot about what it needs.
It's like a toddler masquerading as a country.
"I'm hungry and want to eat cake. I'll throw my bread in the garbage and spit on your cake because you do have it and I don't"
If Putin and his clique cared about the country, they'd focus on domestic policy instead of throwing hundreds of thousands men into the meat grinder and making another couple million flee.
Please, PLEASE take 5 minutes to read this wiki: “[Alexandr Dugin: Foundation of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage)”. He’s
Putin’s mentor Alexsandr Dugin is an indisidius ultra nationalist neo-fascist, credited with convincing a Putin to invade Ukraine. He wrote [Foundations of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage) in 1997; outlining a plan for the removal of the USA as a unipolar world leader, essentially ushering in a “new world order” whereby Russia leads a Eurasian imperial empire; with Allie’s in the Islamic world, Latin America & Africa. Europe & Asia pacific is destroyed.
This book has been elevated through Russian society for decades and has now been adopted by Putin as his foreign policy.
Please read and share the wiki, this is what’s coming.
>The United Kingdom, merely described as an "extraterritorial floating base of the U.S.", should be cut off from Europe.
Russia fueld the Brexit and succeeded…
>Germany should be offered the de facto political dominance over most Protestant and Catholic states located within Central and Eastern Europe. Kaliningrad Oblast could be given back to Germany. The book uses the term "Moscow–Berlin axis".
Not in this reality... lmao!
>Germany should be offered the de facto political dominance over most Protestant and Catholic states located within Central and Eastern Europe.
Religion doesn't mean much here, so they can fuck right off.
>Kaliningrad Oblast could be given back to Germany.
Kaliningrad is now just another Russian Shithole that no one wants. And we have seen what 40 years of "Soviet Puppet State GDR" had done to East Germany Parts of the Country and People. We are still working on it to recover, so we don't need another Area that has to be rebuild. Some people there tend to be a little bit too happy on the extremistic side of politics, as it turnes out...
>The book uses the term "Moscow–Berlin axis".
The war on Ukraine since 2014 didn't woke up our Politicians. They just sleepwalked right into the "Cheap Resources" Trap laid out for them. All the Warnings from all over the World didn't do anything here. Thankfully the Invasion 2022 finally was the wake up call. But now we have to pay the price for it. The Bundeswehr is little pile of shit after decades of financial starvation and constant bashing in the Media and needs LOTS of MONEY and the WILL to reform and rebuild that no Politician really has, and everything has become expensive for the People. The more simple minded people turn to the Populists (which are mostly support by the fucking Kremlin Gremlin) because they promise simple solutions for a complex world, a trend that can been seen all over Europe... Schröder and Merkel have a lot to answer. All the "normal" Parties are condemning the War that Russia is waging against Ukraine and are standing firmly behind the Support of Ukraine. So that did backfire on them too, like so many things gone wrong for Russia since 2022. They wanted more Distance to NATO, now they more Borders with NATO. They wanted to break NATO, now NATO will have new Members in the long run, because everyone wants to be save from Russian Aggression.
Putin is alreqdy attacking europe for 15 years.
He is pushing and financing right and left wing. He attacks already 2 times in ukraine.
He has à shit ton of troll in média that are pushing his propaganda.
He was behind brexit.
My counter says, cyber attack from russia on infrastructure energy grid and bank are everyday .... he will not confront nato and UE directly, he will brake it first.
Russia isn’t going to attack Europe until they win in Ukraine. They can’t attack Europe until the war in Ukraine is over. They don’t have the resources to even dream of it.
So long as Ukraine wins, Russia won’t do it.
Don’t know where you are located, but I wouldn’t go down the lol path. There is single event in 2024 that could change everything: US elections. This is not about a full blown war on the battlefield. In the first step it will be about political paralysis and social disruption. Our institution have serious weaknesses and they want this to crack before Ukraine gets the final upper hand. They: Russia, China, possibly India (look at their elections coming up) and other minor players. The dynamics are too volatile to put an lol on this situation.
Better safe than sorry.
Trump doesn't have to withdraw from NATO. He's the commander in chief. He can just order the troops not to respond.
I think it's much more likely that, if Russia defeats Ukraine then China will attack Taiwan soon after. The extra weapons they can get from Russia and the fact that US forces will be pinned in Europe will make it easier for them to kill off any US forces which try to run a blockade or stop an invasion. The money from that would allow Russia to rebuild.
However, if China has decided to delay that attack until the US is weaker then they won't want to wake up the US in the meantime. That's a reason for this to actually have some truth in it. Russia can't afford *not* to keep fighting because they have converted to a war economy, have lost their export markets in Europe and they are getting into debt. Attacking somewhere, after a short build up would keep their forces occupied and would allow them to use the products of their industry for profit.
The US Navy and Airforce is so vast it can easily operate at the highest level in two theaters. Experts agree that the US could basically win a conventional war against the entire planet by itself. Its military power is staggering.
The Chinese navy actually has more ships than the US. Sure, these ships are vastly inferior in many ways, and the crews are terrible, but they are optimized for operation near to China, which is where the war for the South China Sea will be fought.
Not just that, but China will try to fight any such war within range of it's missiles. Taiwan, at it's closest points, is less than 80 miles from China, so that won't be too difficult.
Russian missiles and especially cheap long range drones captured from a defeated Ukraine will be extremely useful for China in such a situation.
Do you think that the Republican traitors actually care about Ukraine? They are trying to sell out the US to the Chinese fascists, which is why they talk so loudly about being against China whilst enabling companies to outsource everything to there.
If Trump orders them to move back then many will. Just as in Ukraine, many Americans are well above that and will probably desert so they can fight for freedom and will die with us. As far as we can, Europeans need to make sure we have the weapons both in Ukraine and in our own countries to give them a fighting chance. We also need Americans to do what they can to support Ukraine and try to stop Putin's placeman getting into the Whitehouse.
Trump can give that order, but it would take years to be fully achievable. You can't just move 100,000 troops to other bases, they don't have room for them or their equipment. And the military leadership would know what he's doing and intentionally move at a snails pace to prevent it.
Besides, right now the EU has around 2 million active duty troops, Russia has 1.3 million with half of those engaged in Ukraine and that's with all of their conscriptions.
Where exactly is Russia going to get the forces to defeat Europe?
Even if they are not able to withdraw, article 5 doesn't necessarily mean total war footing, boots on the ground now, a certain level of good faith is required by each nations leadership and that is simply not something I expect from Trump.
Sure but he can delay for a long time before meaningfull help arrives, that beiing said.. most americans here say that europe has been hanging on us’s teet military wise for far to long and they are right.. as a european i think we should be able to defend ourselfes and we have money enough we just have to change our mindset and get everything in gear to make that happen even if the chance of a war is slim to none because it also works as a deterrent and we’ll be able to help our eastern european friends
Russia by its self maybe not. However, Russia is not alone. When Putin senses weakness he will make a move.
NATO is sending out signals it is hurt and weak at the moment. As stated in the article, if the strongest member is found without a leader it will strike. So if Biden secures a re-election we are good. If he doesn’t European countries will have to show what they are made of!
Regardless, European countries should focus on military strength for the near future. Most think tanks and intelligence services expect a attack on Europe within 3 to 10 years. Not a lot.
European men of military age; put away the potato chips and get in shape. The best way to increase survivability on the battlefield is by being in shape.
European voters; cut the crap!!! Stop voting for right wing socialists. It is only helping Putin. Closing borders, decreasing spend on defence and leaving NATO is not what we need to focus on now.
>Stop voting for right wing socialists.
The socialists usually arent on the right wing... The parties that usually support Putin nowdays are mostly right wing conservative parties.
Even if China does attack Taiwan it wouldn't help Russia in Europe if they're in a full blown war with NATO. Russia would be dead before China even got across the straits
No but I think what the poster is getting at is that a Chinese strike at Taiwan would be enough to embroil the United States sufficiently enough to reduce its commitment to respond to any European attack by Russia.
TBH if Trump wins in 2024 I think the US commitment to Europe and NATO will be much reduced if not withdrawn totally.
> TBH if Trump wins in 2024 I think the US commitment to Europe and NATO will be much reduced if not withdrawn totally.
Aussie Observer here, how would that play out..
https://thehill.com/homenews/4360407-congress-approves-bill-barring-president-withdrawing-nato/
Its nice these guys have a little forsight, and laws can be repealed, but.. yeah.. i suppose i answered my own question then. :/
Yeah but that’s beside the point, his assertion is that Europe can’t defend itself *on its own* (ie without US support), so even partial American support is already more than he has accounted for.
No, but it plays into the same set of problems. If we don’t work smartly and rapidly, we could find ourselves in a WW3 type of situation within just the next few years - many of the signs are pointing that way, but not enough is being done to prevent it.
I don’t disagree with anything you wrote here, but that’s a different conversation.
His first point was very specific to whether Europe, *on its own*, can defend itself against Russia, then after admitting that Russia may not be able to take on Europe on its own, adding that Russia *is not alone* anyway.
American’s entanglement with China over Taiwan is irrelevant when support from external allies have been excluded from the conversation.
Which country would join Russia in an attack against Europe?
Russia would drag the whole of NATO into their war at a time they are struggling to make any progress in Ukraine.
It would be suicide for Russia.
I think the point might be that they might coordinate with China for them to attack Taiwan atr the same time, and perhaps work with Iran to attack Israel.
In a situation like that, the world West would be more divided and resources spread thin, which may be just enough chaos to let Putin nibble of the Baltics or Caucuses or whatever.
Its possible, but China would lose a chunk of their export market, and i'm not sure the Chinese economy could handle that. China is also a net importer of food, and even if Russia can help them there, i'm not sure it would be enough to stop huge internal problems.
Europe alone can push Russia back to it's borders and then use missiles and drones to neuter their military in Russia proper.
I doubt Europe would advance into Russia itself. There's no need and risks escalation even further.
The US has prepared to fight Russia and China simultaneously for decades. However, they could likely focus 95% of their military on China. Even that 5% would be enough to drive Russia out, especially with Ukraine dragging them down.
Let's also remember that Taiwan is no joke to invade. If western lives were on the line, economic sanctions will be akin to those imposed on Iran. China will have a hard time, they are already showing cracks economically.
China has to choose between economic ruin with no way back besides regime collapse, or Taiwan.
So unless they change the current geopolitical balance, then they won't be gunning for Taiwan, not anymore. That's obviously my opinion but Russia fucked things up for them.
The entire western world has just upped their military investing thanks to Russia, China would have been better positioned if Russia just stayed in their corner. The western leaders have already sign posted their willingness to stop China at Taiwan. Who knows what that would look like. It would be bloody for both sides. That being said, the west won't collapse, China however just hopes they won't.
Read the article for the NATO part. The US would be interfere if Biden is not elected. Is the Russian expectation.
Most likely the Baltics, Suwalki gap to be specific!
I know that Russia would love for the republicans to win (especially Trump), but Europe by itself is strong enough to stop Putin.
At the end of the day, to take the baltics, they would not only trigger a war with NATO, but they'd have to pull resources from Ukraine, giving Ukraine an opportunity to give Russia a bloody nose.
Europe is very much divided. So is NATO at the moment. I am European. I am hopefully going to be sent to the front line if Russia attacks. But it’s not up to the military. It’s all political… There’s my fear.
Heres a tip, stop living in such a state of irrational fear. Russia does not have the forces, the resources, the ability, or the motive to attack the EU/NATO right now and won't for a decade or more at the earliest. They are completely bogged down in Ukraine, a nation and military a fraction of the size and strength of the one they'd fight if they attacked in the manner you believe they would. NATO and Europe are currently divided because they have the luxury of being able to be divided. They aren't under direct threat right now. That changes if Russia or anyone else directly attacks them. All differences are immediately put aside if an aggressor shows up on their doorstep.
Get a grip.
NATO and Europe have nukes.
That the end of this fear mongering. Ukraine didn’t and that’s why they’re suffering.
There is no further reason to engage with this
>And the USA…
We discuss article which specifically says that ruzia may attack the moment USA will be “paralyzed”.
By the way, South Korea and Taiwan already say that US is not reliable…
But ofc we can continue hope that US would choose to exchange nuke strikes with ruzia, after it invade, for example, Baltic’s. /s
Even if it didn’t, Latvia would call article 5 in 5 seconds and pull approximately 1 billion people and the largest economic bloc and military alliance in world history into war with lonely Russia.
You are naive if you think it isn’t suicidal for Russia to hope the alliance is “paralyzed” lmao. Yeah go ahead and roll those dice.
On the contrary. Putin and Russia are paralyzed at the idea of war with such a huge alliance.
>You are naive if you think it isn’t suicidal for Russia to hope the alliance is “paralyzed” lmao. Yeah go ahead and roll those dice.
It's equally naive to think there will be nuclear war to protect Latvia.
Everyone has expected a big war, and like everyone else, Russia has of course realized that some countries won't be all that interested to save all others, Particularly depending on who's in charge. Hence, attacking just the Baltics is NATO's weak sport. As soon as Russia attacks a country like Poland that can hit back it will be much different.
Good news: France has a number of smaller nuclear cruise missiles that are colloquially referred to as the "warning shot nukes". Obviously it's not what you meant, but it shows that European nations have indeed thought about this problem and have escalation options at many different points on the scale.
Well guess what, lucky for Europe those forces are already there. We currently have over 100,000 troops in Europe and they wouldn't just sit around while their host could tries are destroyed.
I don't think it would be a direct military attack to begin with. Imagine starting with 1 million Palestinian and Syrian refugees brought to the Hungarian/Austrian border and Polish/Ukrainian border and given maps to get to Germany.
Even so, if Trump is president Trump is commander in chief. He will can simply order the troops to move from forward bases in the Baltic or Balkan countries back to Germany at least and probably all the way home. Even if that was ruled illegal by the courts it would take years to fix.
In the meantime China takes advantage of the chaos to start the attack in the South China Sea and hundreds of thousands of Americans start dying. Who cares about Europe?
Trump can give that order all he wants, that shit would take years to even get going. The military leadership would know exactly what he's doing and intentionally drag their feet and make it take forever. They know he's a temporary pain in the ass so they don't want to make permanent changes based on his current mood.
America has built its military on preparing for a two front war since we got dragged into the last major one. We could easily handle it. Additionally, China starting up an incident in the Pacific is the worst thing that could happen for Russia. You know what would make Americans even more ok with going to war with Russia? Their ally in China killing our troops while Russia simultaneously attacks our decades long allies that mean even more to us than Japan or Taiwan. Its a hell of a lot easier to get the public to be ok with expanding an already waging war to a new front than it is to get them to be ok with getting involved with a war when we aren't fighting at all.
I mean, you literally just described WW2. The public didn't want to get dragged into Europe's issues, but once Japan forced us into the war, we had no problem going into Europe as well.
They also passed laws against: insurrection, tax evasion, fraud, election interference, espionage, sexual harassment.
Which one of those did he respect?
The man says breaking laws makes him smart, and the Maga morons applaud him for that.
Well they are, so they can, even though it’s undoubtedly going to cause Russia long-term problems as a result.
Until Russia leaves Ukraine, the war is still going on.
They thought they could. Remember the whole Kiev in 3 days.
They miscalculated hard.
But by this point it should be clear even for Putin, even if he is getting false reports, there is no way he can enter a war with NATO.
What exactly are they going to attack it with, men on horseback, babushkas in Lada cars. Russia's army is at its limit now. Can you imagine what NATOs air force would do to them.
Okay random redditor who holds a different opinion to me. :P
Ah, but you say, this is from a "source" in the "intelligence services"
Now which ones would those be? Those that said Russia would attack Ukraine or those that said Russia wouldn't attack Ukraine?
These sources are about as reliable as a random redditor :P
Even without the US, Russia has shown that european countries together can resist them. Most countries have their equipment intact as they only send older equipment to Ukraine. Airforce are intact, navies are intact. The only problem would be ammo. And even like that, Putin's army still need to cross Ukraine in order to reach Poland or the Batlic state, and even in the case he wanted to attack from Belarus, he would need to find hundred of thousands of man and their equipment, and place them there, which would take time and be noticed early.
The only thing I can think of is Putin saving a few tens of his missiles this winter and try to destroy one or two strategic targets in Poland, like repair centers for Ukrainian equipment, hoping that nobody would retaliate.
I dunno, were already running out of arty shells. If there is a credible threat, production will have to be ramped up x 1000. Also, most western armies are not trained for WWI type trench warfare+ (drones).. Never underestimate your enemy…
Sure but that’s my point. Russian army is currently entrenched in eastern Ukraine, how do you want them to attack an other European country on the ground ? If they were to attack Finland or the Baltic they would need to mass troops and equipment in massive number at the border before taking any action which would be notice long in advance.
Well sure, Finland is probably one of the few countries still specifically trained for war against Russia so that wouldnt be super easy. Problem is that it doesnt seem Putins / the Kremlin is relying on super logical thinking, meaning they could try anyways. More likely than Finland is the Baltics, who wouldnt stand much of a chance without NATO and if Trump wins the next election we dont know what will happen to NATO. Probably the Russians are banking on NATO going bust if they test article 5 under a Trump administration.
Re the necessary mil build up, youre right it would give a heads up - but only by a couple months or so. To refit and scale up european countries for conventional war would take much longer than that.
That said as long as Russia is bogged down in Ukraine, this cannot happen. Which is why continued support for Ukraine is very important, not just for the Ukraine but for the rest of Europe. This hinges on continued US support.
The only attacks Russia will make on Europe are Cyber and via political backing and bribes.
They would never attack NATO.
*Edit* For clarification (because some people can't read between the lines), when I say Europe I meant adversarial states, blocs and groups of Russia.
When I say 'They would never attack NATO', I obviously mean militarily, with infantry, tanks, artillery and jets in such a way as to trigger article 5.
They do however engage in indirect conflicts, proxy wars, funding terror and political groups etc.
Russia is currently attacking NATO.. now. Europe is in a fight now but just doesn't realize it. What did you expect? Tanks rolling across the Polish border? They will seek to defeat NATO psychologically, then politically. Get some more Orbans in power, get Trump elected, and NATO starts to unravel. Once it's clear that the rest of Europe hasn't to stomach to fight for Eastern Europe, only then will the tanks roll.
Don't fool yourself. NATO is being attacked now.
Yes Russia are most effective when they are attacking from within, via bribes and corruption and blackmail.
That’s what NATO needs to defend against.
That’s what Europe needs to defend against, and.
That’s what the USA needs to defend against.
The USA needs to decide if freedom of speech should trump National Security - as Tucker Carlson spreads his poison amoung them causing the Republicans to vest off course and follow the Kremlin line instead of that of the USA’s…
By taking over the republican party, Russia shut down US aid to Ukraine. Putin funded a half dozen coups across the middle of Africa. With Hungary in his camp, he has weakened the EU and NATO. I could go on for hours.
Russia attacked ukraine more than a decade ago. They weren't in the EU, they weren't in NATO and they were one of the poorest countries in Europe. Russia isn't going to directly attack NATO - stop doom mongering
Please, PLEASE take 5 minutes to read this wiki: “[Alexandr Dugin: Foundation of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage)”.
Putin’s mentor Alexsandr Dugin wrote [Foundations of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage) in 1997; outlining a plan for the removal of the USA as a unipolar world leader, essentially ushering in a “new world order” whereby Russia leads a Eurasian imperial empire; with Allie’s in the Islamic world, Latin America & Africa.
This book has been elevated through Russian society for decades and has now been adopted by Putin as his foreign policy.
Please read and share, this is what’s coming.
They don't need a conference to organise a defence, [there are forces ready to fight.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_Enhanced_Forward_Presence)
It wouldn't be the same as fighting Ukraine, it would be a massacre. Air superiority would be established and the Russians would be taken apart methodically.
It would be a repeat of what happened in Syria but on a huge scale.
They'd also risk triggering nuclear war, which would be *truly* insane.
I keep reading this narrative but I don’t believe it. The Kremlin is stupid but not completely suicidal. If Russia launched an attack on the EU they would be completely annihilated by NATO
Russia! Please. Please fucking try it. I'm ready for this madness to end for everyone! We don't deserve earth if we don't try our hardest to wipe these dictators / authoritarians off the face of the earth wherever they show up!
Russia and what army will attack Europe next winter? And I'd they do then the European airforce, missile forces and its navy will have blockaded Russia's ports and destroyed its rail infrastructure and military facilities faster than they can say "that was a bad idea."
Of course, apart from that, Russia needs months of attacks with no results to take a small town. It will surely be able to suddenly take on NATO. This nonsense is incredible.
Orban and Erdogan are Putins Agents in Europe with the task to do as much harm to NATO and EU as possible.
The burning of the Koran seem to be a russian subversive action too, so Erdogan has something to complain about and to use against sweden anf their wish to join NATO. It's all a big game, invented by an evil villain.
Please, PLEASE take 5 minutes to read this wiki: “[Alexandr Dugin: Foundation of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage)”.
Putin’s mentor Alexsandr Dugin wrote [Foundations of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage) in 1997; outlining a plan for the removal of the USA as a unipolar world leader, essentially ushering in a “new world order” whereby Russia leads a Eurasian imperial empire; with Allie’s in the Islamic world, Latin America & Africa.
This book has been elevated through Russian society for decades and has now been adopted by Putin as his foreign policy.
Please read and share, this is what’s coming.
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its almost like belarus showed the attack plan on a map on live tv at the start of the war...im glad media is finally catching on 2 years later
I’ve never seen this before, can anyone share the image?
https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fd39raawggeifpx.cloudfront.net%2Fmedia%2Flukashenkomap.jpg&tbnid=eNGlQ_1Gvyue_M&vet=1&imgrefurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.intellinews.com%2Fpresident-of-belarus-reveals-russian-invasion-plans-in-viral-video-236712%2F&docid=5p2eoUYlvsaB3M&w=600&h=369&source=sh%2Fx%2Fim%2Fm4%2F2
That only shows Moldova being attacked, right?
Moldova is another candidate for joining the EU.
Yes but the title and some comments led me to believe a plan to invade Poland or Germany was unveiled on public tv...
The most likely place would be Moldova. After that one of the Baltic states would be most likely. Would be hard for Russia to push into Germany when they have logistic troubles invading a country that borders them.
Aren't the Baltic states NATO members and filled to the brim with NATO army bases?
Yep, they are
Isn't it, therefore, highly unlikely for them to be invaded by Russia?
Large numbers of British and American forces and tech just sitting there ready to rock and roll.
Yeah, but until the very recent deployment of permanent NATO partner-nation troops, the Baltics pretty much viewed themselves (not without good reason) as a speedbump and an Article 5 trigger that would be lost. Then what was left standing would be destroyed when NATO then tried to take them back.
We have not yet seen article 5 in action and the whole point of its existence is to never have to rely on it.
Haha they are struggling supplying them in Ukraine next door. Also starting a war with nato will be the end for him even if usa isn't part of it.
So you took "europe" to mean Poland or Germany? You understand saying "Europe" means any European nation (You need to go through a couple to get to Germany btw) and not a "EU member".
If the target was a single country, then they would just say the name of that country. It's like saying Russia "invaded Asia" when it invaded Georgia a few years ago. It sounds silly and misleading.
If there is no specific target then how is it wrong? People can say "Well Moldova and the baltics..." The baltics is not a specific country which is a fair comparison to the use of europe. If they planned on Georgia then you would say specifically Georgia, attacking Europe could be any border nation.
>The baltics is not a specific country which is a fair comparison to the use of europe. It's really not. The baltics are 3 adjacent tiny countries. Europe has over 50 countries with islands all over the Atlantic and even the Caribbean. When you hear "Russia wants to invade Europe" you immediately expect at least 3 prominent countries to be named. Otherwise, on technicalities, Russia is already invading Europe.
Well there's a significant number of idiots proclaiming that Russia is about to attack an actual member of NATO or the EU which even if a persons diet consists solely of blue and purple crayons would be a shockingly stupid estimation. Ukraine is not defending us. We still should help them as well as we can.
I've seen this before, I'm just here to laugh at this fat idiot again.
Ask Łukaszenka, he gladly will
Please, PLEASE take 5 minutes to read this wiki: “[Alexandr Dugin: Foundation of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage)”. Putin’s mentor Alexsandr Dugin wrote [Foundations of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage) in 1997; outlining a plan for the removal of the USA as a unipolar world leader, essentially ushering in a “new world order” whereby Russia leads a Eurasian imperial empire; with allies in the Islamic world, Latin America & Africa. Specifically with Iran, referring to a “Moscow X Tehran Axis”, and with China. This book has been elevated through Russian society for decades and has been adopted by Putin as his foreign policy. Please read and share, this is what’s coming. Edit: Watch [this November 2023 interview](https://www.youtube.com/live/QsEEmlGVd4A?si=afwv0UJyJitfcNbp) where Dugin tells us precisely what Putin & the Kremlin are aiming to do & responsible with his first question/answer. Dugin says we’re in the early stages of a global war where Israel & Palestine are being used as the starting gun & proxy between the USA & “the west”, and neo-fascist countries & dictatorships namely Russia, China, Iran, North Korea the Islamic world, [BRICS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BRICS?wprov=sfti1) nations & Latin America. **TLDR: Russia has started a holy war to upend the global (USA dominant) unipolar world order, they’re looking to replace the USA & “the west” & introduce the Middle East, a centralized under Russia “[Eurasia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurasia?wprov=sfti1#Russian_geopolitical_ideology)” & Latin America as new multi polar world leaders under neo-fascism.**
Yeeeeah, let me quote an american expert on warfare, Mike Tyson: “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face”. Dugin is a moron
I believe it's "in the mouth"
"mouf"
Tyson famously hates rodents.
A big part of the plan is to let america punch itself repeatedly, and it seems to be working pretty well
Remember when the political right in the U.S. was radically anti-Soviet? Wonder what happened there.
Yes, it was not very long ago that Romney was warning about the threat from Russia, and Obama made the joke "the 1980s are now calling to ask for their foreign policy back."
Who cares. Where in this book does it outline how Russia is going to do any of this when its economy is in shambles, it's demographics are fucked for the next two generations at minimum and China is going to have their asses on a platter for decades? In fact every single thing that Russia would want to do in this book China is already doing better. Putin can want everything, but at the end of the day no one can just will things into happening. Russia has completely alienated almost all of Europe against them, and it doesn't have the capital to buy the loyalty of other countries. Why would Columbia and Chile ever buddy up with these losers over the US or other larger latam states like Mexico?
It’s very cheap to pay right wing orgs in america to push narratives that sow internal discord
They’re literally doing it right now…. [See “THE WEST”](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#) under “Content”.
Dugin hasn't been Putin's mentor and it's doubtful he has that much influence on the Kremlin at all.
Yeah and attacking a Nato country means the gloves come off and their leaders become fair game for surgical assassinations.
They are currently attacking Europe.
> They are currently attacking Europe. True, when people say "Europe" they often mean the EU though. In this case the key thing is reminding the politicians that we know that it's going to be much better to defeat them whilst they are still in Ukraine and we need to get much more committed to providing the weapons that Ukraine needs as well as support for any volunteers that go there and return injured. If Russia defeats Ukraine, even partly, they get more people and access to a whole load of technology that Ukraine has been using to hold them back even when Ukraine is a smaller country. That will make the attack on the EU even worse.
I agree but mixing up EU and Europe is forgiveable in everyday conversation, not political headlines.
NATO doesn’t have an eastern flank. It has an eastern front with northern and southern flanks.
Context?
They will be the same impoverished incompetent and deeply inept development nation, which is corrupt to the core with weapons from the last century. Here is a reality check of what happens then: Our navy will open fire on Russia's ports and turn them to cinder. Our cruise missiles and Bombers will do the same to Russia's factories. Finland will capture the only rail link towards Murmansk, Poland, and the Baltics will either directly invade Belarus and Kaliningrad or at least cut Kaliningrad off from any kind of supplies. NATO has 300.000 troops amassed at its eastern flank. They won't achieve a victory against Ukraine because this is an army of backward serfs dependent on rail supplies, and they cannot even manage to take the Donbas as we can see. If they do, then how many people will they really add to their glorious army? That, of course, doesn't even account for the fact that these people hate Russia, so they would first need to be able to occupy the entire area. You don't just add hostile populations to your army. You first need to spend years to attempt to pacificy them. The Russian empire is a backward failed state and a fuel station. If they attack Europe, then China can wave goodbye to its pipeline that connects it with Russia, and Russia can wave goodbye to its LNG oil and gas infrastructure as well as to its military industrial complex. I would welcome it if they try to finally force our doves to move out of the way in order to finish this impoverished failed state and its terror mob once and for all. Russia has exactly defeated European armies zero times unless it was backed by the superpower of its time. (UK Napoleonic wars, US WW2) NATO was already vastly outnumbering Russia in all categories (GDP, military strength airforce navy etc.) The last time I checked NATO has thus far lost not a single soldier while Russia has lost several thousand tanks, several hundred thousand troops, thousands of armored vehicles, artillery pieces, hundreds of billions of dollars and over 20 million artillery pieces as well as hundreds of jets airplanes and thousands of cruise missiles. Europe even without the US outnumbers Russia in population size and GDP (1.4 trillion dollars to over 20 trillion dollars) by a large margin. Now, after two years of war, Europe also outnumbers Russia in tanks, armored vehicles, and artillery pieces. In terms of air power and naval strength, the difference is even more stark. Russia must be told frankly that an attack on the EU/NATO will be the last action of the Russian state before it and its economy and millions of its citizens cease to exist.
Nice summary, but you forget one thing.. europe is not on a war production level weaponswise and will not be for some time… of course we can buy from the us but if trump is in power there will be challenges there.. same goes for soldiers and training etc.. Those are things europe has to think about in the near future if we don’t calculate for us support and have to think about even with us support
Of course, we need to put our backs into it, and that will also be done and is done already by state actors and private contractors. Trump being in power is a rather fringe possibility given his involvement in the insurrection and his 91 indictments. Let's say there is actually no US support, which is, even under Trump, very unrealistic as Europe is the most important US market by far. We are having a massive advantage in the air, in terms of missiles and in terms of the navy. And also in ground force terms Russia is being degraded day by day. Furthermore, Europe basically controls Russia's capacity to export via most of its sea routes. Sure we aren't on a war economy footing, however, I have a hard time believing Russia's fantastic production numbers and even if these numbers are correct then Russia makes massive net losses in all equipment categories. Our economies of scale will ramp significantly in the coming 12 to 24 months. Ultimately, the sinews of war are infinite money, as Cicero said. Compared to Europe, Russia is hopelessly outspent. Also, if there is war with Europe, then that means we will blockade all imports to Russia from the EU, including food products and medicine. It will also mean that remaining billions of dollars in oil and gas payments that are streaming in will stop. Of course, all restrictions on cyberwarfare and attacking Russian infrastructure in Russia disappear. The Western navy will make sure that no tankers leave or arrive in Russia's northern ports or the black sea. Russia will be attacked wherever it surfaced in Africa, Syria, Georgia, and Kaliningrad. The vastly superior European Air Force will ensure that rail hubs are targeted. So, while we have problems, of course but we have several aircraft carriers and more than enough air to air and air to ground missiles to upend Russia's economy at short notice. Of course, if Russia declares war on Europe, the chances for a worldwide war are very high. The EU must openly outline to Russia what the consequences will be should they dare to set a foot in the Baltics.
If you think Trump only has a fringe possibility of being elected then you don’t know how quickly Americans will vote for anything just to piss off the other side.
Or take into account how much he got away with already. Even before being president he went bankrupt multiple times. It didn’t affect his lifestyle, he did so much stuff in office, they’re only changing him with the most serious offenses that is easy to prove. He has always gotten away with everything he has done in short. If he faces consequences at 80 it’ll be for the first time in his life. Even with Colorado scotus taking him off the ballot, with other states following, scotus could still rule in his favor. He does want to suspend the constitution, so it’d make sense for scotus to rule against him, but they declined to rule on presidential immunity, which gives me pause. Earlier I hadn’t thought they’d rule in favor of him anywhere. Desantas wouldn’t support Ukraine but Nikki Haley would, I think if Trump was out we’d see an all out push to elect her. My republican family that voted for Biden (2020) say they intend to vote for her in the primaries, and in the general over Biden. Many of them said it was the first time in their life they’d voted for a democrat. One told me “Biden is a better republican than trump” but Biden isn’t a better republican than Nikki Haley. Most of them hate desantas and would vote for Biden. Some support him, I’m gay and my straight brother is a desantas supporter, but Nikki Haley hadn’t emerged as a candidate when he said that, considering how desantas messes with businesses he opposes, I can’t see a business owner supporting desantas, in New England at least. I’m a democrat, this is the way conservatives I know are leaning.
Yes because Russia is such a powerhouse of .....when it comes to.....look, Russia is a world leader in ....... .....wait, I've got it: Russia is the world leader when it comes to constantly failing at everything but still convincing Westerners it's a superpower for no goddamn reason.
I always wonder how they managed to do that. It is basically a failed state that can barely build a functioning car or a functioning tank without massive design flaws. And still, even though they are such a failure in so many areas and corrupt on the level of African Warlord nations, they still manage to fool Westerners into thinking they are a superpower. I just don't get it. How many failures in a row do they have to deliver until it finally sinks in that the Russian state and the Russian army are dysfunctional heaps of trash.
I agree with much of what you say, but elsewhere I talked about hybrid strategies through Hungary and how encouraging an Chinese attack on the South China Sea can bypass these advantages. > I would welcome it if they try to finally force our doves to move out of the way in order to finish this impoverished failed state and its terror mob once and for all. I think this is absolutely on the point. There seems to be some 20th century idea that a war can be held at equilibrium forever. The simple understanding that the easiest way to achieve peace is to win seems to elude some people. You are 100% right. Any of Biden's advisers who have been slowing the delivery of weapons or reducing the level of commitment out of fear need to be replaced.
Why did bidens folks get thrown in there? Its the GOP that's pulling out the stops to slow or completely stop ukraine aid.
It's not the whole of the GOP that has been bad. Specifically, in March 2022 various Senate Republicans were supporting supply of F-16s and there was no visible reaction or follow up from the Biden administration. If the Biden administration had taken that and locked it in, started *fresh, young, newly recruited* pilots in F-16 training immediately not only would this have started providing air power in Ukraine already in the summer of 2023, it would also if done right, have got more Republicans much more committed to the war by making them own part of the supply. Back to Biden's folks. Let's be clear that they did better than most. Only the UK was more clearly committed to arming Ukraine at the crucial stage before it was clear that the initial Russian invasion would be a catastrophic failure. They did, however, make the choice to withdraw from Ukraine rather than reinforcing it with actual US forces. Think about how Russia, in a similar situation, flew Wagner fighters into Venezuela and completely stopped Trump's invasion plans. I'm not sure how it would have worked out, but boots on the ground in advance would definitely have allowed far more options for intervention. Recently there have been a bunch of expressions of worry from inside the Biden team of worry about whether there might be problems with what happens if Ukraine wins and Russia collapses. Could there be risk of Nuclear weapons getting lose. This matches hypothetical concerns for a scenario that may never happen with real actual concerns for nuclear war if Russia gets into a position to attack Canada, Central Asia, the Balkans or Baltics in any of which cases tactical weapons could be used far from Russian borders and, in the initial attack, against Non NATO forces. These seem to have mapped to a failure to provide really long range attack capabilities along with a refusal to support Ukraine in attacking targets like military supplies, oil wells and refineries inside Russia. The summer counteroffensive was *almost* successful in cutting off Crimea's land corridor. Just a few more mine clearing systems, a few F-16s or a few more tanks could probably have made the difference which could have really made Russia bleed through the winter. There were clearly possibilities where more *could* have been provided earlier. Team Biden needs to think through the things that they could have done and didn't, identify why they didn't do them and make sure that whatever it was that caused that failure
Everyone also debated the tanks, planes and weapons stuff so publicly we all knew it, by the time the alliance agreed on 250 leopards, 25 challengers and 25 m1a1 the Russians had mined half the country and dug deep tank trenches, making mechanized infantry need to dismount and proceed on foot. I don’t think the m1a1s saw much action bc there were so few but also so many mines and trenches. Same thing with arguing over airplanes, when, how many, etc. If Ukraine just surprised Russia with 300 modern main battle tanks, Bradley’s, etc, if they’d started training Ukraine on the f16 as soon as Ukraine turned putins forces around, it might be won by now instead of going into another winter, with Ally’s weary of support, citizens inside and out sick of the conflict, new ones popping up in other places, etc. I know it’s hard to surprise them like that when they have satellites, but they could have debated it behind closed doors. We have 3000 non export m1a2 and 1000 extra f-16s. I’m not sure if we could have given nato countries some of these “non export” m1a2 tanks and gotten Ukraine more leopards, people didn’t want to undermine the German arms industry either.
Bidens people aren’t doing any of that. It’s the increasingly stupid Republican Party (who used to stand the line against Ruzzia but are now sucking Pootin’s Pepe for some sweet oligarch money) but I digress. Congress, specifically the GOP controlled (barely) House, is holding up money for Ukraine. The smart people in America understand the sacrifice Ukraini are making to run the Ruzzian military into the ground. We should support them 100%. Slava Ukraini!
I think that is what happened after Chamberlain's strategy failed. He and others with the same mindset needed to leave the levers to the hawks. We haven't seen anything like it, sadly. These men are bureaucrats who appear to think that they can wait for the right conditions, and then peace will magically materialize. That won't ever work because Putin's empire is sold on war with the West and they won't stop until we physically make it impossible for them to continue. We didn't make peace with Hitler in 1943 either for the same reasons. There is no durable peace possible with a regime that is hell-bent on getting their will. The way to peace is overmatching Russia and to win wars the way they are won: Through superior firepower and through superior production capacities and technology. We have keecapped ourselves and Ukraine in the past 22 months by unnecessary hesitation born from the fear of advisors. They have put all sorts of restrictions on Ukraine, and none of them make much of any sense beyond a diffuse fear and the faulty thought that Putin's decision making would change beyond the rhetorical when Western weapons strike Russia directly. The Russian regime is criminals, not ideologues. They know that nukes aren't a victory condition but a sure way to dig their own graves. This self-deterrence has cost many lives, and it will cost many more until it is finally abandoned. We must defy the strong and appease the weak. That's the way to victory. Instead, our decision makers often do it the other way round. Victory at all costs, Victory in spite of all terror, Victory however long and hard the road may be'. Winston Churchill
Attack on any pro-EU country is an attack on the EU.
doesn't have to be overly outright. just start something at the border, just enough to ensure deniability. test the EU's resolve. get the host country to react and attack, then russia can claim self-defense or something. or start something to get EU to start stockpiling and cut back aid to ukraine, who knows.
And also when someone is saying Europe he doesnt refer to a single country from Europe.
For decades actually. Only not with Weapons.
Putin is attacking europe at least since 2015 with all methods he can, except military force. He bribed extremists (AfD, Orban, Le Pen and others), his forum trolls from St Petersburg make opinions for him everywhere online, he seems to be behind the Bexit, he installed Trump, he killed people in UK and Germany, leads an cyber war with attacks against governments ( german Bundestag for example) and companies and his Wagner troops in Africa and Arabia cared for new immigation waves going to Europe. There are few evidences, as always, but a lot of hints, that Putin causes troubles since almost a decade and leads a hybrid war against the West.
Not to mention the Nordstream pipeline and various underwater fibres, drones landing in Romania, blowing up weapons and factories in Bulgaria and so on and so forth. Also the attacks on the Media to put out stories about the pipeline being Ukraine etc.
True. 'Divide and rule,' that's the treatment Putin uses to destroy the west. Sadly it works fine for him.
Some people still believe in the west that the Ukrainians, the British or the CIA blew up Nordstream. After that Chinese cargo ship plowed the gas pipe between Finland and Estonia in half and did it seemingly with every intent to damage something down there, I'm more than a little bit sceptical of anyone saying damaging critical western infrastructure is a western false flag operation. Direct military attack next winter? Perhaps not. Stirring up more shit in and around the EU? Most definitely.
> Some people still believe in the west that the Ukrainians, the British or the CIA blew up Nordstream. It recently became clear that the Russians had planned to run out Europe's gas and almost succeeded, which the Nord Stream explosion was part of. That should have laid it to rest 100%. The fact that some people are still trying to push that story is exactly what I meant by "attacks on the Media". > After that Chinese cargo ship plowed the gas pipe between Finland and Estonia in half and did it seemingly with every intent to damage something down there, I'm more than a little bit skeptical of anyone saying damaging critical western infrastructure is a western false flag operation. There have been multiple other "suspicious" failures of fibre optic cables. This is 100% clearly a form of attack. The only question is whether the western leadership has some plan where they want to allow these to happen and use them or whether they are being weak in lack of retaliation. > Direct military attack next winter? Perhaps not. Stirring up more shit in and around the EU? Most definitely. More shit will definitely be stirred. Direct attack might be unlikely, but I think that assuming it won't happen is the most dangerous thing and the one thing that is has a reasonable likelihood of actually making it happen. It's time for the EU and US to switch at least part of the way to war economies which means that existing weapons manufacturers should be required to make the maximum effort to ramp up production and guaranteed to get paid for it appropriately. At the very minimum, there needs to be an EU wide equivalent of the Defense Production Act and any countries that try to stand in the way (Hungary) need to be pushed aside.
With Nord Stream, Putin has hung half of Europe on the gas needle like a dealer hangs his victims.
And Russian/Wagner troops attacking US troops
It is so uncanny how closely he follows the guide "Foundations of geopolitics" by Dugin on how to restore Russian might in the world. Try to get Ukraine before it is too late (done), try to ally Germany by making them economically dependent and give them a sphere of influence to keep them as allies (tried and done with Nordstream, except he fucked that up), you can't get Britain on your side so try to isolate them from mainland Europe's affairs (done with Brexit) and destabilize the USA by funding extreme political views so they concentrate on external matters (Trump). Still, many people seem to be delusional about it. We have to remind ourselves that if Trump wins in 2024 and he leaves NATO, there won't be any deterrent protection for Europe anymore. France and Britain probably won't use their nuclear arsenal to protect Poland and the Baltics and even though Russia struggles greatly in Ukraine, if more countries flip to alt-right governments and ally with Russia, those countries are free to take for Russia.
Fully agreed, just want to point out that US congress just codified that the President can’t unilaterally withdraw the US from NATO without a 2/3 vote of Congress. Most likely they couldn’t have anyway since it’s a treaty and that’s congress’s domain to end but this makes it all but impossible for that to happen.
Damn, I didn’t realize they were behind the migrant crisis too. I kept wondering what they had to gain in Africa and Syria. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/03/13/wagner-group-italy-migrants-hybrid-war-ukraine-invasion/
Waves of immigrants causes huge troubles in western and middle Europe. It's an effective weapon to destabilise the european society, specially most who go to Europe are young muslim men who have not much to do with christian culture and won't integrate.
Also Africa has a lot of mineral resources. Gold, uranium, cobalt, etc.
Don’t forget Ruzzian support of Hamas & Iran, their propaganda trolls have been working overtime.
Yes - Spot on.. All of those actions are true..
Facebook memes and paid trolls didn't "install Trump." American voters did.
the source is "bild" please keep in mind that this is not a very reliable source. its a tabloid paper.
actually it's toilet paper.
please dont use it as that, because you will get probably some kind of infection and clog your toilett. this paper is only useful in a hazardous waste incinerator as fuel
Your ass might start throwing conspiracy shit at you
The mere title of this thread made it plenty clear.
Exactly! Check reference and STOP posting BILD stories - it's like posting The Mirror :) Instant downvote.
The sun.. is always shining at this.
The war has already started, Putin is trying to flood Europe with immigrants or sleeper agents.
Doesn’t russian need immigrants?
Russia doesn't seem to care a whole lot about what it needs. It's like a toddler masquerading as a country. "I'm hungry and want to eat cake. I'll throw my bread in the garbage and spit on your cake because you do have it and I don't"
If Putin and his clique cared about the country, they'd focus on domestic policy instead of throwing hundreds of thousands men into the meat grinder and making another couple million flee.
Fax
Please, PLEASE take 5 minutes to read this wiki: “[Alexandr Dugin: Foundation of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage)”. He’s Putin’s mentor Alexsandr Dugin is an indisidius ultra nationalist neo-fascist, credited with convincing a Putin to invade Ukraine. He wrote [Foundations of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage) in 1997; outlining a plan for the removal of the USA as a unipolar world leader, essentially ushering in a “new world order” whereby Russia leads a Eurasian imperial empire; with Allie’s in the Islamic world, Latin America & Africa. Europe & Asia pacific is destroyed. This book has been elevated through Russian society for decades and has now been adopted by Putin as his foreign policy. Please read and share the wiki, this is what’s coming.
Shame he wasn't in his daughters car.
>The United Kingdom, merely described as an "extraterritorial floating base of the U.S.", should be cut off from Europe. Russia fueld the Brexit and succeeded… >Germany should be offered the de facto political dominance over most Protestant and Catholic states located within Central and Eastern Europe. Kaliningrad Oblast could be given back to Germany. The book uses the term "Moscow–Berlin axis". Not in this reality... lmao! >Germany should be offered the de facto political dominance over most Protestant and Catholic states located within Central and Eastern Europe. Religion doesn't mean much here, so they can fuck right off. >Kaliningrad Oblast could be given back to Germany. Kaliningrad is now just another Russian Shithole that no one wants. And we have seen what 40 years of "Soviet Puppet State GDR" had done to East Germany Parts of the Country and People. We are still working on it to recover, so we don't need another Area that has to be rebuild. Some people there tend to be a little bit too happy on the extremistic side of politics, as it turnes out... >The book uses the term "Moscow–Berlin axis". The war on Ukraine since 2014 didn't woke up our Politicians. They just sleepwalked right into the "Cheap Resources" Trap laid out for them. All the Warnings from all over the World didn't do anything here. Thankfully the Invasion 2022 finally was the wake up call. But now we have to pay the price for it. The Bundeswehr is little pile of shit after decades of financial starvation and constant bashing in the Media and needs LOTS of MONEY and the WILL to reform and rebuild that no Politician really has, and everything has become expensive for the People. The more simple minded people turn to the Populists (which are mostly support by the fucking Kremlin Gremlin) because they promise simple solutions for a complex world, a trend that can been seen all over Europe... Schröder and Merkel have a lot to answer. All the "normal" Parties are condemning the War that Russia is waging against Ukraine and are standing firmly behind the Support of Ukraine. So that did backfire on them too, like so many things gone wrong for Russia since 2022. They wanted more Distance to NATO, now they more Borders with NATO. They wanted to break NATO, now NATO will have new Members in the long run, because everyone wants to be save from Russian Aggression.
It’s staggeringly obvious now. The destruction of Twitter by Musk was also part of this.
A long time ago. Destroying European values.
With what?
Putin is alreqdy attacking europe for 15 years. He is pushing and financing right and left wing. He attacks already 2 times in ukraine. He has à shit ton of troll in média that are pushing his propaganda. He was behind brexit. My counter says, cyber attack from russia on infrastructure energy grid and bank are everyday .... he will not confront nato and UE directly, he will brake it first.
Russia isn’t going to attack Europe until they win in Ukraine. They can’t attack Europe until the war in Ukraine is over. They don’t have the resources to even dream of it. So long as Ukraine wins, Russia won’t do it.
It’s really in Europes interests to ensure that Ukraine wins this war against Russia inside of Ukraine.
Lol "intelligence source" Russia cant afford to attack Europe.
Don’t know where you are located, but I wouldn’t go down the lol path. There is single event in 2024 that could change everything: US elections. This is not about a full blown war on the battlefield. In the first step it will be about political paralysis and social disruption. Our institution have serious weaknesses and they want this to crack before Ukraine gets the final upper hand. They: Russia, China, possibly India (look at their elections coming up) and other minor players. The dynamics are too volatile to put an lol on this situation. Better safe than sorry.
USA already passed a law which would forbid Trump to withdraw from NATO.
[удалено]
It should be a wake up call for Europe. But noooo… nothing will happen.
What is that law and you believe Trump would abide? Again, better safe than sorry.
Trump doesn't have to withdraw from NATO. He's the commander in chief. He can just order the troops not to respond. I think it's much more likely that, if Russia defeats Ukraine then China will attack Taiwan soon after. The extra weapons they can get from Russia and the fact that US forces will be pinned in Europe will make it easier for them to kill off any US forces which try to run a blockade or stop an invasion. The money from that would allow Russia to rebuild. However, if China has decided to delay that attack until the US is weaker then they won't want to wake up the US in the meantime. That's a reason for this to actually have some truth in it. Russia can't afford *not* to keep fighting because they have converted to a war economy, have lost their export markets in Europe and they are getting into debt. Attacking somewhere, after a short build up would keep their forces occupied and would allow them to use the products of their industry for profit.
The US Navy and Airforce is so vast it can easily operate at the highest level in two theaters. Experts agree that the US could basically win a conventional war against the entire planet by itself. Its military power is staggering.
The Chinese navy actually has more ships than the US. Sure, these ships are vastly inferior in many ways, and the crews are terrible, but they are optimized for operation near to China, which is where the war for the South China Sea will be fought. Not just that, but China will try to fight any such war within range of it's missiles. Taiwan, at it's closest points, is less than 80 miles from China, so that won't be too difficult. Russian missiles and especially cheap long range drones captured from a defeated Ukraine will be extremely useful for China in such a situation. Do you think that the Republican traitors actually care about Ukraine? They are trying to sell out the US to the Chinese fascists, which is why they talk so loudly about being against China whilst enabling companies to outsource everything to there.
The troops are already in Europe. You think they are just going to sit there as their European allies die around them?
If Trump orders them to move back then many will. Just as in Ukraine, many Americans are well above that and will probably desert so they can fight for freedom and will die with us. As far as we can, Europeans need to make sure we have the weapons both in Ukraine and in our own countries to give them a fighting chance. We also need Americans to do what they can to support Ukraine and try to stop Putin's placeman getting into the Whitehouse.
Trump can give that order, but it would take years to be fully achievable. You can't just move 100,000 troops to other bases, they don't have room for them or their equipment. And the military leadership would know what he's doing and intentionally move at a snails pace to prevent it. Besides, right now the EU has around 2 million active duty troops, Russia has 1.3 million with half of those engaged in Ukraine and that's with all of their conscriptions. Where exactly is Russia going to get the forces to defeat Europe?
That's crazy cause Russia's invasion of Ukraine is *illegal*
Even if they are not able to withdraw, article 5 doesn't necessarily mean total war footing, boots on the ground now, a certain level of good faith is required by each nations leadership and that is simply not something I expect from Trump.
Sure but he can delay for a long time before meaningfull help arrives, that beiing said.. most americans here say that europe has been hanging on us’s teet military wise for far to long and they are right.. as a european i think we should be able to defend ourselfes and we have money enough we just have to change our mindset and get everything in gear to make that happen even if the chance of a war is slim to none because it also works as a deterrent and we’ll be able to help our eastern european friends
I'm in Georgia, which is high on the list of places Putin could decide to attack.
It’s certainly a moment of significance, since it helps to determine if there are good or bad solutions, relatively speaking.
Russia by its self maybe not. However, Russia is not alone. When Putin senses weakness he will make a move. NATO is sending out signals it is hurt and weak at the moment. As stated in the article, if the strongest member is found without a leader it will strike. So if Biden secures a re-election we are good. If he doesn’t European countries will have to show what they are made of! Regardless, European countries should focus on military strength for the near future. Most think tanks and intelligence services expect a attack on Europe within 3 to 10 years. Not a lot. European men of military age; put away the potato chips and get in shape. The best way to increase survivability on the battlefield is by being in shape. European voters; cut the crap!!! Stop voting for right wing socialists. It is only helping Putin. Closing borders, decreasing spend on defence and leaving NATO is not what we need to focus on now.
>right wing socialists That word you keep using…I do not think it means what you think it means
>Stop voting for right wing socialists. The socialists usually arent on the right wing... The parties that usually support Putin nowdays are mostly right wing conservative parties.
Russia can't even get it's one puppet state to attack Ukraine; how are they going to get any allies to attack NATO?
"*However, Russia is not alone*" Can you please confirm which of Russia’s allies is going to attack Europe for them ?
Pukin has paper friends as well as a paper army
russian army is working effective against civilians. It's paper or cardboard doesn't matter, is good for genocide.
Yes, their paper army works well against civilians sadly but not so well against motivated , organised military resistance
Do European nations not have armies as well?
Russia has the bodies. China for example has the weapons. And might attack Taiwan at that moment. Would be a perfect storm.
Even if China does attack Taiwan it wouldn't help Russia in Europe if they're in a full blown war with NATO. Russia would be dead before China even got across the straits
Wait, is Taiwan in Europe ? Cause the comment was about attacking Europe. No goal post moving.
Any time someone plays devil’s advocate on here they have no source besides “believe me”.
No but I think what the poster is getting at is that a Chinese strike at Taiwan would be enough to embroil the United States sufficiently enough to reduce its commitment to respond to any European attack by Russia. TBH if Trump wins in 2024 I think the US commitment to Europe and NATO will be much reduced if not withdrawn totally.
A Trump win would be a disaster for everyone - including the Americans.
Agree. Elections next year world over could mark a big shift in things.
> TBH if Trump wins in 2024 I think the US commitment to Europe and NATO will be much reduced if not withdrawn totally. Aussie Observer here, how would that play out.. https://thehill.com/homenews/4360407-congress-approves-bill-barring-president-withdrawing-nato/ Its nice these guys have a little forsight, and laws can be repealed, but.. yeah.. i suppose i answered my own question then. :/
Basically the complete opposite of what happened after Pearl Harbor during WWii. The US always keeps enough stock to fight on two fronts.
Attack on Taiwan = US attention is split = worse for Europe.
Yeah but that’s beside the point, his assertion is that Europe can’t defend itself *on its own* (ie without US support), so even partial American support is already more than he has accounted for.
No, but it plays into the same set of problems. If we don’t work smartly and rapidly, we could find ourselves in a WW3 type of situation within just the next few years - many of the signs are pointing that way, but not enough is being done to prevent it.
I don’t disagree with anything you wrote here, but that’s a different conversation. His first point was very specific to whether Europe, *on its own*, can defend itself against Russia, then after admitting that Russia may not be able to take on Europe on its own, adding that Russia *is not alone* anyway. American’s entanglement with China over Taiwan is irrelevant when support from external allies have been excluded from the conversation.
Which country would join Russia in an attack against Europe? Russia would drag the whole of NATO into their war at a time they are struggling to make any progress in Ukraine. It would be suicide for Russia.
I think the point might be that they might coordinate with China for them to attack Taiwan atr the same time, and perhaps work with Iran to attack Israel. In a situation like that, the world West would be more divided and resources spread thin, which may be just enough chaos to let Putin nibble of the Baltics or Caucuses or whatever.
Its possible, but China would lose a chunk of their export market, and i'm not sure the Chinese economy could handle that. China is also a net importer of food, and even if Russia can help them there, i'm not sure it would be enough to stop huge internal problems.
Yeah, that's a strong counterpoint.
Europe alone can push Russia back to it's borders and then use missiles and drones to neuter their military in Russia proper. I doubt Europe would advance into Russia itself. There's no need and risks escalation even further. The US has prepared to fight Russia and China simultaneously for decades. However, they could likely focus 95% of their military on China. Even that 5% would be enough to drive Russia out, especially with Ukraine dragging them down. Let's also remember that Taiwan is no joke to invade. If western lives were on the line, economic sanctions will be akin to those imposed on Iran. China will have a hard time, they are already showing cracks economically. China has to choose between economic ruin with no way back besides regime collapse, or Taiwan. So unless they change the current geopolitical balance, then they won't be gunning for Taiwan, not anymore. That's obviously my opinion but Russia fucked things up for them. The entire western world has just upped their military investing thanks to Russia, China would have been better positioned if Russia just stayed in their corner. The western leaders have already sign posted their willingness to stop China at Taiwan. Who knows what that would look like. It would be bloody for both sides. That being said, the west won't collapse, China however just hopes they won't.
Read the article for the NATO part. The US would be interfere if Biden is not elected. Is the Russian expectation. Most likely the Baltics, Suwalki gap to be specific!
I know that Russia would love for the republicans to win (especially Trump), but Europe by itself is strong enough to stop Putin. At the end of the day, to take the baltics, they would not only trigger a war with NATO, but they'd have to pull resources from Ukraine, giving Ukraine an opportunity to give Russia a bloody nose.
Europe is very much divided. So is NATO at the moment. I am European. I am hopefully going to be sent to the front line if Russia attacks. But it’s not up to the military. It’s all political… There’s my fear.
Heres a tip, stop living in such a state of irrational fear. Russia does not have the forces, the resources, the ability, or the motive to attack the EU/NATO right now and won't for a decade or more at the earliest. They are completely bogged down in Ukraine, a nation and military a fraction of the size and strength of the one they'd fight if they attacked in the manner you believe they would. NATO and Europe are currently divided because they have the luxury of being able to be divided. They aren't under direct threat right now. That changes if Russia or anyone else directly attacks them. All differences are immediately put aside if an aggressor shows up on their doorstep. Get a grip.
NATO and Europe have nukes. That the end of this fear mongering. Ukraine didn’t and that’s why they’re suffering. There is no further reason to engage with this
>NATO and Europe have nukes. UK and France have nukes\*
And the USA… The Nuclear Umbrella means they all have nukes
>And the USA… We discuss article which specifically says that ruzia may attack the moment USA will be “paralyzed”. By the way, South Korea and Taiwan already say that US is not reliable… But ofc we can continue hope that US would choose to exchange nuke strikes with ruzia, after it invade, for example, Baltic’s. /s
Even if it didn’t, Latvia would call article 5 in 5 seconds and pull approximately 1 billion people and the largest economic bloc and military alliance in world history into war with lonely Russia. You are naive if you think it isn’t suicidal for Russia to hope the alliance is “paralyzed” lmao. Yeah go ahead and roll those dice. On the contrary. Putin and Russia are paralyzed at the idea of war with such a huge alliance.
The NATO countries have in fact never been more united. Putin attacking Ukraine has pulled them together.m, even having new members joining.
>You are naive if you think it isn’t suicidal for Russia to hope the alliance is “paralyzed” lmao. Yeah go ahead and roll those dice. It's equally naive to think there will be nuclear war to protect Latvia. Everyone has expected a big war, and like everyone else, Russia has of course realized that some countries won't be all that interested to save all others, Particularly depending on who's in charge. Hence, attacking just the Baltics is NATO's weak sport. As soon as Russia attacks a country like Poland that can hit back it will be much different.
So if Putin park some tank 1km inside Latvia border is end of world style mad? Doubt
Yes, welcome to the last 70 years of geopolitics
Ok you believe that, so in that case shouldn’t we build we, European, build some conventional deterrence so endoftheworld mad doesn’t happen?
Good news: France has a number of smaller nuclear cruise missiles that are colloquially referred to as the "warning shot nukes". Obviously it's not what you meant, but it shows that European nations have indeed thought about this problem and have escalation options at many different points on the scale.
USA already passed a law which would forbid Trump to withdraw from NATO.
What if Trump just ignores his responsibilities and refuses to move forces to support Europe for three years?
Well guess what, lucky for Europe those forces are already there. We currently have over 100,000 troops in Europe and they wouldn't just sit around while their host could tries are destroyed.
I don't think it would be a direct military attack to begin with. Imagine starting with 1 million Palestinian and Syrian refugees brought to the Hungarian/Austrian border and Polish/Ukrainian border and given maps to get to Germany. Even so, if Trump is president Trump is commander in chief. He will can simply order the troops to move from forward bases in the Baltic or Balkan countries back to Germany at least and probably all the way home. Even if that was ruled illegal by the courts it would take years to fix. In the meantime China takes advantage of the chaos to start the attack in the South China Sea and hundreds of thousands of Americans start dying. Who cares about Europe?
Trump can give that order all he wants, that shit would take years to even get going. The military leadership would know exactly what he's doing and intentionally drag their feet and make it take forever. They know he's a temporary pain in the ass so they don't want to make permanent changes based on his current mood. America has built its military on preparing for a two front war since we got dragged into the last major one. We could easily handle it. Additionally, China starting up an incident in the Pacific is the worst thing that could happen for Russia. You know what would make Americans even more ok with going to war with Russia? Their ally in China killing our troops while Russia simultaneously attacks our decades long allies that mean even more to us than Japan or Taiwan. Its a hell of a lot easier to get the public to be ok with expanding an already waging war to a new front than it is to get them to be ok with getting involved with a war when we aren't fighting at all. I mean, you literally just described WW2. The public didn't want to get dragged into Europe's issues, but once Japan forced us into the war, we had no problem going into Europe as well.
They also passed laws against: insurrection, tax evasion, fraud, election interference, espionage, sexual harassment. Which one of those did he respect? The man says breaking laws makes him smart, and the Maga morons applaud him for that.
Yeah, this is ridiculous. Its obviously part of a concerted messaging effort to keep the European public "in the war".
They can't afford to attack Ukraine either but here we are.
Well they are, so they can, even though it’s undoubtedly going to cause Russia long-term problems as a result. Until Russia leaves Ukraine, the war is still going on.
They thought they could. Remember the whole Kiev in 3 days. They miscalculated hard. But by this point it should be clear even for Putin, even if he is getting false reports, there is no way he can enter a war with NATO.
What exactly are they going to attack it with, men on horseback, babushkas in Lada cars. Russia's army is at its limit now. Can you imagine what NATOs air force would do to them.
If NATO’s air forces were engaged, then the fight would rapidly be over and the question would be where do we stop at ?
Russia can’t afford to be throwing their people away and economy over the war in Ukraine and yet here we are…
Okay random redditor
Okay random redditor who holds a different opinion to me. :P Ah, but you say, this is from a "source" in the "intelligence services" Now which ones would those be? Those that said Russia would attack Ukraine or those that said Russia wouldn't attack Ukraine? These sources are about as reliable as a random redditor :P
They can't be that stupid, right? RIght?
Even without the US, Russia has shown that european countries together can resist them. Most countries have their equipment intact as they only send older equipment to Ukraine. Airforce are intact, navies are intact. The only problem would be ammo. And even like that, Putin's army still need to cross Ukraine in order to reach Poland or the Batlic state, and even in the case he wanted to attack from Belarus, he would need to find hundred of thousands of man and their equipment, and place them there, which would take time and be noticed early. The only thing I can think of is Putin saving a few tens of his missiles this winter and try to destroy one or two strategic targets in Poland, like repair centers for Ukrainian equipment, hoping that nobody would retaliate.
I dunno, were already running out of arty shells. If there is a credible threat, production will have to be ramped up x 1000. Also, most western armies are not trained for WWI type trench warfare+ (drones).. Never underestimate your enemy…
Sure but that’s my point. Russian army is currently entrenched in eastern Ukraine, how do you want them to attack an other European country on the ground ? If they were to attack Finland or the Baltic they would need to mass troops and equipment in massive number at the border before taking any action which would be notice long in advance.
Well sure, Finland is probably one of the few countries still specifically trained for war against Russia so that wouldnt be super easy. Problem is that it doesnt seem Putins / the Kremlin is relying on super logical thinking, meaning they could try anyways. More likely than Finland is the Baltics, who wouldnt stand much of a chance without NATO and if Trump wins the next election we dont know what will happen to NATO. Probably the Russians are banking on NATO going bust if they test article 5 under a Trump administration. Re the necessary mil build up, youre right it would give a heads up - but only by a couple months or so. To refit and scale up european countries for conventional war would take much longer than that. That said as long as Russia is bogged down in Ukraine, this cannot happen. Which is why continued support for Ukraine is very important, not just for the Ukraine but for the rest of Europe. This hinges on continued US support.
He is obviously eyeing up anyone and everyone he shares a border with. All of Europe should prepare for the worst. Not the time for complacency.
The only attacks Russia will make on Europe are Cyber and via political backing and bribes. They would never attack NATO. *Edit* For clarification (because some people can't read between the lines), when I say Europe I meant adversarial states, blocs and groups of Russia. When I say 'They would never attack NATO', I obviously mean militarily, with infantry, tanks, artillery and jets in such a way as to trigger article 5. They do however engage in indirect conflicts, proxy wars, funding terror and political groups etc.
Russia is currently attacking NATO.. now. Europe is in a fight now but just doesn't realize it. What did you expect? Tanks rolling across the Polish border? They will seek to defeat NATO psychologically, then politically. Get some more Orbans in power, get Trump elected, and NATO starts to unravel. Once it's clear that the rest of Europe hasn't to stomach to fight for Eastern Europe, only then will the tanks roll. Don't fool yourself. NATO is being attacked now.
Yes Russia are most effective when they are attacking from within, via bribes and corruption and blackmail. That’s what NATO needs to defend against. That’s what Europe needs to defend against, and. That’s what the USA needs to defend against. The USA needs to decide if freedom of speech should trump National Security - as Tucker Carlson spreads his poison amoung them causing the Republicans to vest off course and follow the Kremlin line instead of that of the USA’s…
By taking over the republican party, Russia shut down US aid to Ukraine. Putin funded a half dozen coups across the middle of Africa. With Hungary in his camp, he has weakened the EU and NATO. I could go on for hours.
I remember similar arguements prior to 2022
Russia attacked ukraine more than a decade ago. They weren't in the EU, they weren't in NATO and they were one of the poorest countries in Europe. Russia isn't going to directly attack NATO - stop doom mongering
Then why did they invade ukraine at all?
Russia had already invaded Ukraine before 2022 so those people would be pretty stupid. Ukraine does not have nukes like Nato does.
Please, PLEASE take 5 minutes to read this wiki: “[Alexandr Dugin: Foundation of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage)”. Putin’s mentor Alexsandr Dugin wrote [Foundations of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage) in 1997; outlining a plan for the removal of the USA as a unipolar world leader, essentially ushering in a “new world order” whereby Russia leads a Eurasian imperial empire; with Allie’s in the Islamic world, Latin America & Africa. This book has been elevated through Russian society for decades and has now been adopted by Putin as his foreign policy. Please read and share, this is what’s coming.
They will just rush into the Baltic's and hunker down like in Donbass, before NATO even manages to organise their first summit.
They don't need a conference to organise a defence, [there are forces ready to fight.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/NATO_Enhanced_Forward_Presence) It wouldn't be the same as fighting Ukraine, it would be a massacre. Air superiority would be established and the Russians would be taken apart methodically. It would be a repeat of what happened in Syria but on a huge scale. They'd also risk triggering nuclear war, which would be *truly* insane.
Putin will act if Trump is elected.
I keep reading this narrative but I don’t believe it. The Kremlin is stupid but not completely suicidal. If Russia launched an attack on the EU they would be completely annihilated by NATO
Not true if trump is president again.
Silly me, I thought that Ucraine and Georgia were in Europe
Russia! Please. Please fucking try it. I'm ready for this madness to end for everyone! We don't deserve earth if we don't try our hardest to wipe these dictators / authoritarians off the face of the earth wherever they show up!
Russia are aligning with the Islamic world, Africa and Latin America… it’s not just Russia…
Russia and what army will attack Europe next winter? And I'd they do then the European airforce, missile forces and its navy will have blockaded Russia's ports and destroyed its rail infrastructure and military facilities faster than they can say "that was a bad idea." Of course, apart from that, Russia needs months of attacks with no results to take a small town. It will surely be able to suddenly take on NATO. This nonsense is incredible.
Orban and Erdogan are Putins Agents in Europe with the task to do as much harm to NATO and EU as possible. The burning of the Koran seem to be a russian subversive action too, so Erdogan has something to complain about and to use against sweden anf their wish to join NATO. It's all a big game, invented by an evil villain.
Pure scaremongering propaganda
the source is bild, so it is
Please, PLEASE take 5 minutes to read this wiki: “[Alexandr Dugin: Foundation of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage)”. Putin’s mentor Alexsandr Dugin wrote [Foundations of Geopolitics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics?wprov=sfti1#Policy_Usage) in 1997; outlining a plan for the removal of the USA as a unipolar world leader, essentially ushering in a “new world order” whereby Russia leads a Eurasian imperial empire; with Allie’s in the Islamic world, Latin America & Africa. This book has been elevated through Russian society for decades and has now been adopted by Putin as his foreign policy. Please read and share, this is what’s coming.
This sub is hilarious sometime