Well, it looks like the U.S. involvement in NATO is finally coming to an end, or at a minimum, will be cut down. But that isn't necessarily a bad thing. Trump is right that it is time for European countries to step up and take charge of their own security, which means paying for their own security. What does the U.S. need 30,000 troops in Germany for anyway? Seems like a big expense to maintain a few airbases and not much of a deterrent. There is no Cold War anymore, as much as the media like to keep the specter of villain Russia and tyrant Putin going. How bad would Russia be if Putin weren't the leader?

And in the event that a NATO member were attacked, like Albania or Estonia, would the other members really come to their defense? I think it is unlikely. I don't think Britain or Germany would. Probably not Spain or Italy either. But France yes. They're the one European ally the U.S. can count on.

The U.S. can either lead or let some other country like Russia or China fill that vacuum. There's nothing wrong with a little pressure on our allies to step up a bit, but Trump is way off base here.

I do find it odd that the Left is suddenly in favor of the U.S. being the "world police". They used to hate U.S. meddling and derided it as "imperialist" and "colonialist", that is until Donald Dumbfuck actually threatened to stop it.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

I'm fine with this. NATO is a resource drain in this country. I'd rather our military secure our safety as a primary function.

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"Play until it hurts, then play until it hurts to not play."
http://soundcloud.com/darkside124 HOF 2013, MM Champion 2014

What would be the costs if cadet bone spurs pulled us out?

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There are only two examples of infinity: The universe and human stupidity and I'm not sure about the universe.

Europe has been a good doorstop from the Soviet/Russia thing for 70 years. Why stop now?

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CSFMB: Home of the small minded

I'm waiting for our new military alliance with Russia and North Korea.

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That's a keen observation. Quite ironic.

Trump is not getting the credit he deserves for the improvement in relations with North Korea. The details of that letter from Kim Jong Un yesterday to Trump were absolutely extraordinary. There might be some showmanship going on between the U.S. and North Korea over disarmament, but at least it's happening. The media has been nothing but unfair and faux-skeptical in its coverage.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/07/12/politics ... index.html

The Europeans are the only ones to blame for their problems. They've made nothing but a mess of immigration, especially in Germany. That was all part of an Obama open borders plan that the European leftists, like Merkel, tried to implement. European integration, even monetary union, was never a good idea in the first place, because of the loss of national identity. Add the influx of muslims, and you have a powder keg there waiting to explode. And yet, the Europeans always come off looking self-righteous, pointing fingers, when they should be pointing fingers at themselves.

Because the world has changed. NATO is a relic from a different time. That military alliance is no longer justified.

There should be an alliance with France, maybe Belgium, and that's all. Let the rest of the European countries fend for themselves, if they want to be critical of the U.S. There's a saying, "Beggars can't be choosers" and that's apropos here.

We should be happy that Russia has come out of the dark ages. They're the only ones that realistically can solve the problem in Syria.

It is funny how this statement also fits the left here.

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Elections have consequences.

I can't say that the time for Nato is forever gone. I do believe that it is time for a serious redesign or re-imagining. Changes in the types of warfare, the enemies and many other factors have changed nearly everything it was developed around. Most importantly is the financing.

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Elections have consequences.

Europeans took a pretty hard look at themselves during the worst of the Islamic siege. Attitudes are not what they were even 5 years ago. Germany sends more people back (or at least tries to) than they take in nowadays. Italy and France wont take any more boats, the NGO's have to go to Spain now. Wont be long before the Spaniards have had enough too. The land route is all but closed and has been for a while now.

NATO does need to go. It only benefits Germany who gets to enjoy life without having to spend a fortune on defense the way the USA, UK and France do. The whole idea of "coalitions of the willing" is outdated. Defense is part of national self-determination. Anyone really worried that Germany is looking to start another world war, and should remain disarmed as a consequence of WW2, is nuts. Probably another globalist who has a vision of a mongrelized USA wielding its military fist over white civilization.

Also, the right.

People don't even know what the Germans are like. But I do, having lived in Frankfurt and worked for a German bank in the 90s for three years, and studied the language for 30 years. They are pretty much liberal pacifists to the outside world, Obama's wet dream. They became that way because of guilt for the past and of self-loathing. It is the only political orientation they could have that would be acceptable after WWII.

However, among themselves, the Germans are different. To a degree, "Deutschland über alles" and "Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer" still holds.

Yea this is pretty astute. If you judge modern Germany by its actions and not its words its actually much more obvious. I wouldn't go so far as to call it a love for the führer, but really more a deep cultural attachment to Prussian values and their odd inheritance of the Napoleonic ideal.

Here's an interesting fact: Beethoven as a Deutscher originally dedicated his 3rd Symphony, Eroica, to Napoleon.

"In writing this symphony, Beethoven had been thinking of Buonaparte, but Buonaparte while he was First Consul. At that time Beethoven had the highest esteem for him, and compared him to the greatest consuls of Ancient Rome. Not only I, but many of Beethoven's closer friends, saw this symphony on his table, beautifully copied in manuscript, with the word "Buonaparte" inscribed at the very top of the title-page and "Ludwig van Beethoven" at the very bottom .."

But then Beethoven didn't like that Napoleon declared himself Emperor and changed the dedication or so the story goes. It went against his humble core as a human being. The greatest of all composers, save perhaps Bach, was the humblest of men. The malady of deafness could not have been more humbling to him that he, of all people, had to suffer it; and yet, he still triumphed over it by producing his "Ode to Joy", 9th Symphony.

Beethoven was from Bonn, but lived in Vienna for most of his life, where he met Mozart.

Why should we continue to be in NATO when we have thousands of miles of ocean to protect us from any real foe?

NATO was founded to protect Western Europe and deter the Soviets. Given the fact that Europe seems content to not spend on their own defense and refuses to sanction Russia, perhaps it is time to let them stand alone. Germany, France, UK, etc. should be responsible for their own defense. While we are at it, we should also be pulling troops out of South Korea and Japan as well. We could cut our military budget by 75% and still have more than enough to adequately defend ourselves as we have such large natural barriers to make fighting a war against us a logistical nightmare for any enemy before we even fire a shot.

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

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Not an unexpected retort from the message board stalker. You are a damn fool and asshole. If you want to play games go right ahead. You aren't half as smart as I am.

ltg never goes low like that.

I think that is pretty spot on. NATO should rightly be a true alliance for self protection. But that does not mean that the US needs to place troops within each of the member countries. There was a guy on Tucker's show recently, a retired colonel, who said it very well. If Russia, for example, decided to invade Germany the 30,000 or so American troops there would be squashed like grapes in a couple of days. THe NATO countries need to commit their own manpower and weaponry to provide the first level of defense against attack with its allies committing immediately to the common defense.

This is obviously how it needs to work. Germany is a very rich country and needs its own capable military and to assume that the US is going to over-spend in order to protect the rest of the free world is an unfair assumption.

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An Ode to the Texas man who shot an Antifa terrorist:

Oh, he might have went on livin'
But he made one fatal slip
When he tried to match the Ranger
With the big iron on his hip

With a post like that, I think Frank might just be Long Time Gay, either that or LTG's shit is so predictable any of us can mimic him and be dead on.

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“When I walked in this morning, and saw the flag was at half mast, I thought 'alright another bureaucrat ate it.'" - Ron Swanson

Where does this even come from?

The furthest Germany went in this regard was their U-boats sinking American tankers and merchant ships along the East Coast after Germany declared war on the U.S. in December, 1941. The film, "Das Boat" gives a good feel for what this was like from the German point of view. But it is a far cry from being invaded or any invasion threat. Germany didn't invade England, which was a lot closer, despite having plans to in Operation Sea-Lion. This proves they were not capable of invading the U.S.

"Operation Sea Lion, also written as Operation Sealion (German: Unternehmen Seelöwe), was Nazi Germany's code name for the plan for an invasion of the United Kingdom during the Battle of Britain in the Second World War. Following the Fall of France, Adolf Hitler, the German Führer and Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces, hoped the British government would seek a peace agreement and he reluctantly considered invasion only as a last resort if all other options failed. As a precondition, he specified the achievement of both air and naval superiority over the English Channel and the proposed landing sites, but the German forces did not achieve either at any point during the war, and both the German High Command and Hitler himself had serious doubts about the prospects for success. A large number of barges were gathered together on the Channel coast, but, with air losses increasing, Hitler postponed Sea Lion indefinitely on 17 September 1940 and it was never put into action."

Is it a hobby of yours to accuse people of being "mults"? It really is pretty juvenile.

_________________
An Ode to the Texas man who shot an Antifa terrorist:

Oh, he might have went on livin'
But he made one fatal slip
When he tried to match the Ranger
With the big iron on his hip

That is absolutely true. There was no way that either Germany or Japan could have the logistical wherewithal to invade the US at that time. The best that they could hope for is a takeover of Europe and the Soviet Union and an armistice with the US and China. And invasion of the US would have to come from the Russians coming down through Alaska and Canada along with the Japanese through South America and Mexico.

_________________
An Ode to the Texas man who shot an Antifa terrorist:

Oh, he might have went on livin'
But he made one fatal slip
When he tried to match the Ranger
With the big iron on his hip

It's far-fetched to think that Russia would invade Germany or other European countries anyway, when it is the main supplier of gas to them. It is as silly as thinking that the U.S. would invade Canada.

Russia is known as the "Bear" for a reason. If you leave him alone, he is not going to harm you. But if you awaken and piss him off, then you have huge problems. Continuing the U.S. engagement in NATO is something that qualifies.

Ukraine and Georgia probably would disagree with that assessment.

Cue the Putin mult to tell us Ukraine and Georgia rightfully part of new Soviet Union.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Tulsi, and Don

They're former Soviet republics.

We're not exactly innocent ourselves, still being in Germany, South Korea, Japan, etc.

It was the RAF who prevented the Germans from launching an assault on Great Britain. Their great heroism in shooting down so many German planes pretty much forced FDR to declare its entry in the war and change the entire landscape of the war itself. WWII was the war theater that changed the entire concept on how wars would be fought. A lessoning on the importance of battleships being great military weapons and instead the import of the aircraft carrier and attacks from the air in general. Now space is becoming another evolution of this change in weaponry and tactics.

_________________
An Ode to the Texas man who shot an Antifa terrorist:

Oh, he might have went on livin'
But he made one fatal slip
When he tried to match the Ranger
With the big iron on his hip