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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
The context of the conversation has always been in the hypothetical that nukes aren't on the table and the US was uninvolved in the conflict.
And quite bluntly no, the EU cannot fight Russia in a conventional war under those circumstances. That's all that's been said since this started.
And frankly I don't think banking solely on MAD or the fragility of Russia's economy is a very good defense strategy.
Oh really when?I’ve never granted that hypothetical, you can have insisted upon it all you like, but this conversation is worthless if we throw out whatever real world evidence we don’t like so that the hypothetical works.
Banking on economic and political factors is how most nations do defence strategy, it’s how every non-nuclear power does it to be honest. It’s not just about Russian economy being unstable, it’s about it being tied to that of Europe, it’s about the Russian olegarches having interests in Europe, it’s about the Russian people not being up for dying on-mass for an invasion of Poland. Those are all real world factors that can be considered into defence strategy.
Not everyone is the US and Russia, for the rest of the world defence strategy means a lot less “how do we inflict equal casualties against a global power that comes strait for us with everything it has” and a lot more “how do we first make ourselves a non inviting target for invasion and if we can’t do that how do we make the cost of invading and occupying us to high for them to be willing to pay it”.
It’s not about being able to shoot down every plane that enters our airspace, it’s about making us something they’d choke on if they took a bite.
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ CyranMy fear isn't of Putin invading Europe like we're in f***ing Command and Conquer: Red Alert. No, he'd lose that fight assuming the entirety of Europe and Northern Asia didn't become a radioactive golf course.
No, my fear is that Putin will continue pushing just how much he can get away with and the lack of support for NATO will cause Europe to fold before the "pot" gets too big.
Say, Estonia.
Putin conquering Crimea is something he minted a ludicrous coin for even though it was economically worthless to the Federation.
Edited by CharlesPhipps on Jul 10th 2018 at 5:38:02 AM
Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.That’s a much more realistic risk, however that’s where Europe’s divergent interests are actully a benefit. Paris and Berlin might well be willing to abandon Estonia to Russia, but Warsaw isn’t, if Poland is drawn into such a conflict than Germany can’t sit it out, if Germany is draw in than that pulls in the French.
A genuinely realistic concern is the possibility of polite green men popping up in Estonia, thing is I’m pretty sure that between them the Estonian and Polish militaries will be more than capable of squashing such men, something the Ukrainian military couldn’t do.
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ CyranOn my end its also a mater of Europe is 100% unable to defend its own interests, or enforce its own power... a situation that we share. There is way too much reliance on America when America is so reliably.... unreliable.
Without things like heavy transport capability, or the ability to secure a sea route the MOST you can do is sit inside your own borders.... Which does not reflect the reality of how defense works.
You cant just sit there and wait for threats to come to you, that's how you get issues like being unable to retaliate over Nice... You don't need the US's overly pushy defense policy, but you can't just sit on your laurels either.
And for any thing like that Europe relies on NATO, and in specific US assets, without contributing as much as they should themselfs.. Because agian, the US can not be relied on any more.
The old arrangement was 100% acceptable in the days before... but now? The US has proved it cant be trusted, and so people need to bolster there own capabilities to compensate.
Edited by Imca on Jul 10th 2018 at 5:50:02 AM
Land routes can be blocked incredibly easy by some one going "No I don't want your tanks passing through my land"
Hypothetically, if Europe needed to act in middle east, sothern asia, or afirca.... All it would take is Turkey going "No" to stop it.
And with how Turkey is acting lately, that is not out of the realm of possibility.
Heavy lift is needed regardless of who you are, because no actor can say "no" to boats and aircraft.
Logistics are important, and the US provides almost all of them for NATO.
Edited by Imca on Jul 10th 2018 at 6:06:19 AM
This was just signed today. That said, it apparently goes against a 1946 act regarding how Administrative Law Judges are selected, and it has to go to court first before anything can be done with it. So it may not actually end up being implemented.
Why would we need to use tanks? We just drive enough personnel to man the border and block any Russia goods coming west, then we watch as the Russian economy collapses and the oligarchies overthrow Putin so that they can again be allowed access to all the money they’ve hidden in Cyprus and London.
Fun fact, Europe does not face a security risk of a large scale invasion from the Middle East, Southern Asia or Africa.
I’m not denying that lit capability would be nice, hell it would even benefit our security positon when it comes to fighting global instability, but it’s not a requirement in any way for an actual defence of Europe.
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran![]()
Can I get a translation of what that means into practical terms/non-legal? I don't understand the ramifications but that seems big.
Large scale invasions are not the only threat to nations, Terror Attacks, Insurgencies, or even just protecting Regional Assets and combating global instability all mater.
Armys provide "defense" but "defense" is a wide reaching concept that extends beyond just "The nation won't exist tomorrow", there non-existance can still lead to hundreds and even thousands of deaths without the nation vanishing.
Yeah, I've got to agree with Silas—the goal posts are moving fast in this conversation, and it all seems to be in favour of fearmongering about Russian military capability.
Putin stays in power because Russians think he's the reason their economy works. If the Russian economy crashes, Putin loses power. Putin does not want to lose power. Russia cannot fight Western Europe without an economic crash.
So you can memorize the details of new Russian SAMs, or wring your hands about "obsolete German tanks" all you want; the reality is, Putin cannot invade Western Europe without setting motion a chain of events that will remove him from power. Which makes this entire conversation pointless.
Russia is not the USSR. It does not have the resources, manpower, or allies, to wage a war across the whole of the European continent. Should Western Europe step up its military capabilities? Absolutely. But not to defend itself from incoming blimps. It should step it up so that Trump loses his ability to blackmail them, and Putin loses his ability to bluster his way through international diplomacy.
Edited by AmbarSonofDeshar on Jul 10th 2018 at 6:41:05 AM
They’re the only existential threats to a nation, also an insurgency isn’t a security threat if you’re not the occupying force.
Yes pretty much everything falls under the security umbrella now (it didn’t used to), I remember writing an essay about the application of traditional military forces to security is a broadened security environments which includes concepts like health security, ecenomic security and security against terrorism.
Non of that matters to the point that started all this, Trump’s claim (and people here’s defence of said claim) that Europe without the US military presence stationed in Europe is a sitting duck to the existential threat of Russian invasion.
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran
& ![]()
Russia has always been an example here, the point is that Europe needs to spend more money on defence and quit relying on the US to do every thing for them, which is very much the truth. Europe without the American presence is unable to act in its own military interestes beyond the most basic "We can keep our borders kind of safe" and even then only once something is inside them.
The moving goal posts is "Europe would be fine under these circumstances, so it is fine always" with every one else countering those, with the fact that under many other circumstances it isn't.
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Not really TBH. :/
Edited by Imca on Jul 10th 2018 at 6:48:20 AM
Yeah because the US does “everything” even though we just explained how the US is entierly unnecessary when it comes to securing Europe against existential threats.
You’d have had it if you’d resisted the urge to claim that the US does everything for Europe, but you couldn’t.
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ CyranThis was a few pages back, but regardinf the right's prominence on social media and YT:
It's important to remember that a lot of them had a headstart and have been around for a long while. The thing is some of them like Amazing Atheist and Thunderf00t apparently used to be slightly more reasonable,not that they weren't sexist/racist but it got a lot worse and more vitriolic over time and their userbase swallowed it up bc they felt like they could trust their opinions based on their prior takedowns of creationist arguments and all that jazz.
The other important thing to remember is that a lot of their views were already pretty mainstream anyway, if you're not well-educated a lot of the YT right's milder talking points sound like "common sense" and aren't really going to be seen as right-wing positions. It's a lot easier for many to believe racial and gender problems are mostly solved and the people "making a fuss" are chasing windmills, as opposed to accepting the fact we live in a deeply prejudiced and unfair society where you have to constantly question yourself and fight against your preconceptions.
But of course that doesn't necessarily explain why the left had a lacking media presence on all these sites for so long. Not sure thst I have an answer for that outside of complacency.
It's more that Russia can't attack than that Europe can defend against a Russian attack. If Russia did attack, then its success matter of whether the off-his-meds Russian dictator who tried it would be able to make any kind of gains before his own people offed him.
Not really a strategy I'd like to rely on as a European leader anywhere east of Spain.
Also, this, but it goes further. A side effect of these considerations is that there's very little that Europe is politically able to do even to deal with nerve gas attacks in a city that, for the moment, is still a European capital.
Edited by Ramidel on Jul 10th 2018 at 6:00:46 AM
You’d have had it if you’d resisted the urge to claim that the US does everything for Europe, but you couldn’t.
Logistics IS every thing when it comes to national defense, an army is useless without Bullets, Food, and Spare Parts.
But if you would prefer a list.
- Logistics
- Naval
- Air Forces
- Traning
- Working equipment
All of those are things the US contributes almost entirely too in NATO.
Edited by Imca on Jul 10th 2018 at 7:00:56 AM
Except you’re thinking of gains in the wargaming since, actully wars don’t produce easy gains like that, the Soviets couldn’t make gains out of Afghanistan, the US couldn’t make gains out of Vietnam or Iraq, Russia’s inability to make gains out of most of Ukraine is why they stooped at Crimea and the eastern regions, making gains from a war against a vastly inferior foe is bloody difficult, against an only slightly inferior foe? It’ll be madness.
Also Europe has plenty it can be to retaliate against Russian chemical weapons attacks, the UK is unwilling due to internal political issues (the UK government has heavy ties to the groups that launder Russian oligarchs blood money) and the rest of the EU is unwilling to act without the UK considering we are the ones who suffered the attack.
There’s a reason this shit happens in the UK, if a Russian defector was killed with a WMD in Paris or Berlin you’d see a retaliation.
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Oh yay you found the Napoleon quote about logistics, try Clausewitz next, I much prefer his take.
The US covers that shit for non-European operations, which are of a non-existential needs to Europe, we don’t rely on the US if we need to move troops internally.
It’s really not. The ability of another nation in your power range to do massive damage to you for generations if it goes full suicidal is a fact of international relations (hell its a fact of life when dealing with people), you trust that they won’t go full suicidal crazy, you act to prevent them going suicidal crazy and you ensure you don’t accidentally provoke them into being suicidal crazy.
Edited by Silasw on Jul 10th 2018 at 2:11:08 PM
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran
Or it could be that I don't know the Nepolean quote at all, but study history quite a bit and have seen recorded MANY times what happens when an army cant supply itself.
Or have noticed that logistics units outnumber combat units in the military 4 to 1, and often even more then that which is why it takes 120 men per artillery gun to keep one operational.
Or that even ships never set sail without things in the group specifically designed to cary more fuel and ammo even at the cost of being almost entirely unarmed themselfs because having enough fuel ammo and parts is so damned important.
No it was specifically a Nepolean quote, and not a fact of conflict.
Edited by Imca on Jul 10th 2018 at 7:13:19 AM

Well that’s a hell of a lot less doomy when you actully lay it out isn’t it?
One example is a purely expeditionary asset, two example are about future obsolescence and the final example is a problem that’s being addressed.
If you’d said that the Royal Navy is currently experiencing a strategic hole due to issues with the Daring class destroyers I’d have agreed with you, likewise if you said that with the phasing out fo a number of Royal Navy assets the British Navy is looking to have a vastly reduced capacity in the future I’d have agreed with you.
But instead you went with the doomsaying about how the entire Royal Navy was functionaly gone.
Oh and you’ve ignored an entire submarine class, the UK operates both the Vanguard nuclear missile subs (which as you said would be hidden away as per MAD) and attack submarines in the form of outgoing Trafalgar class and incoming Astute class submarines. The UK’s attack submarine force is high tech, being a nuclear powered attack sub force just like the Russia and US ones (everyone else uses diesel-electric).
Those goalposts are moving so fast I think they might indicate match rigging at the World Cup.
We’ve gone from “the EU needs the US to protect to Europe”, to “the EU needs the US to protect Europe if it’s going to chose to tie one hand behind it back and not use its strongest weapons” to “the EU needs the US to protect Europe if it’s going to chose to tie one hand behind its back and not use its strongest weapons while the Russian economy magicly undergoes a full retrofit that makes in independent from Europe”.
I look forward to my other notes on strategic non-military defence being added to your expanding goalposts net.
Edited by Silasw on Jul 10th 2018 at 12:27:13 PM
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ Cyran