Trump calls Zelenskyy a ‘dictator’ as US rift with Ukraine deepens
US president warns Ukrainian leader he ‘better move fast or he is not going to have a country left’
bad news, truly, this is what i believe from all evidence i've seen, most european nations have no standing armies, and no conventional weapons stockpiles, only uk and france have nukes. europe will begin to cauterize ukraine soon in order to concentrate on their own borders, but their defense spending has been so low, for so long, they couldn't offer a token defense to the russians (not even mentioning the americans) in 10 years, and that's if they started diverting enourmous parts of their gdp currrently going to social services like health care, yesterday
most european nations have no standing armies, and no conventional weapons stockpiles
Wherever you're getting your information from, you should probably look elsewhere.
Honey, America doesn’t have battle tanks because they are outdated. Carrying ppl into war via vehicles is some 1940s war behavior. Modern war is focused on subs, planes, and targeted missiles. Less waste, less civilian death, more precise. Unlike Europe, America has enough war experience to learn what works best. America is sending their outdated handmidown tanks, not a B83.
Honey, you're a one hour old account with nothing but horribly bad takes on everything.
Good luck
Is there an internet law that says I’m not allowed to comment the day I sign up? Stop this mentality lol
Yes. It's rule #33, "Lurk more -- it's never enough".
😭
You got video of that?
I think you are overestimating Russia. Sure Ukraine has US support, but it’s still a fraction of what fighting all of NATO (minus the US) would look like.
I’m more worried about economic and propaganda warfare. For instance, y’all need to regulate the shit out of engagement-driven, commercial social media before it’s too late.
I hope most Europeans don’t think like this because it would take long at all for America to decimate Europe. There are several simulations across decades to plan for these scenarios. Who would stop America? Not India, China or Russia (assuming Russia follows history and doesn’t unite with Europe). Canada could try but they are one of the weakest countries in the planet nearly totally dependent on America with 3/4 of Canadian exports being bought by Americans. America has played nice for decades and I guess everyone forgot why America keeps getting involved in wars; because we tend to win wars.
ok. best of luck with that. i don't think i'm overstimating russia, or understimated european capability, and more importantly european resolve.
Yes you are.
I ninja edited, but the point I am trying to make is that if you focus on physical military defense, the US and Russia are going to destroy you in the economic, cyber, and most critically, public opinion space. Demagogues will brainwash everyone without a single shot fired, as they are already doing.
Public opinion? Whose? Europe’s, who look down on rampant American capitalism and Trump? Africa’s, who have just been screwed by Trump and Musk? The Middle-East, who have been screwed by America for decades? Asia, who are waiting to hear what China says?
How about Europe's own right wing movements, and their massive public followings. Brexit? AFD? Hungary? Many more are gaining traction right under your nose.
Take it from an American; that's just the start.
Brexit wasn’t left/right wing. Eurosceptics on both sides. I’d also point out France where right-wing populism ultimately lost out despite an increase in protest votes.
There’s also a greater tradition of public service broadcasting, meaning politicians are more rigorously interrogated than in the highly commercial, partisan American system.
The EU and EC are somewhat stabilising influences too. An EU member government simply wouldn’t be allowed to do some of the stuff Trump is doing.
The lack of economic and political agility in Europe is a big reason much of Europe is 2nd world, and why Europe won’t return to its previous state of popularity for at least another 100 years.
Europe’s, who look down on rampant American capitalism and Trump?
Unfortunately, there are still plenty of fascist Europeans. Anecdotally, my mom recently told me her friend likes Trump, and that same person votes for our own far-right party whose leader has essentially been trying to emulate Trump.
One of my biggest fears that I think not enough people have though about, is that - due to how much more connect the world is with the internet - WW3 would devolve into a bunch of civil wars. WW2 was extremely different from WW1 and already had its far share of in fighting in some countries, this time it could be worse and happen in basically every country involved.
Do you think the global militaries haven’t spend a considerable amount of time strategizing possible war scenarios? If every country on earth had no strategic planning, then perhaps it would evolve into some wars within each country. But many countries have been running simulations for the scenarios since before electricity.
But many countries have been running simulations for the scenarios since before electricity.
Right, I was gonna make that point, but it seems you made it for me. Because despite doing that, most wars in recent history, especially the world wars, did not go at all as predicted. Both world wars played out very different from previous wars and from what was to be expected. A standout example is British strategy for both world wars: in the first they made shitty trenches because they didn't realize they'd be used so much; in the second they made much better and more comfortable trenches because they had learned from the first war, and they turned out to be mostly useless because the trenches used were no longer static.
Spain even had a civil war as a prelude to the second world war, then during WW2 you even had Vichy France and the French Resistance fighting each other, and recently we had the Syrian civil war. Right now, it seems the USA might be on the brink of civil war as well. Not sure what makes you so sure WW3 wouldn't devolve into several civil wars when people are so much more connected with people from other countries nowadays.
It’s war, very obviously it’s hard to control by nature. It’s hard to hold water because of its nature. I love your British example because it proves my point. Americans have lots of war experience do they know what war time tools are outdated, like tanks. It’s not just money that makes the US a military leader but experience. The more experience, the more accurate the war games are or are not. Gamblers get better with experience. Gamblers call it ‘beginners luck’ because those without experience are rarely the best.
The British example goes straight against what you are saying, because at the time of both world wars, and especially the first, the British had plenty of war experience. And not just the British, but every empire at the time had plenty of war experience, but the war did not go at all like most were expecting it to. For a modern example of that with the US, just look at the war in Vietnam and in Iraq.
But more importantly than all of this, you are working under the assumption that the US is being led by extremely qualified people, and that every soldier would fall in line; however not only has the current US government been firing extremely qualified top officials because of "DEI", but I doubt everyone in the military would happily invade a NATO member - with whom they've been allied and trained side by side for years - without even blinking an eye. Military experience does nothing to prevent a civil war, because one thing has nothing to do with the other. The military is made up of people too, who like I said before are a lot more connected with the rest of the world than they used to be.
Finally, even if it's true that the US would somehow be immune to a civil war, that would still not mean the majority of countries would not fall into a civil war. To give just one example, Germany has a very big nazi far-right party that has been directly supported by Musk and Vance; if Germany went to war with the US, those people might take up arms against their own country.
With the ego of the average European, I don’t think Europe could ever lose in the court of public opinion. Too white, too much history, too much wealth. Maybe if South America can come up properly or South Africa continues to be a destination, but America is predisposed to be a public opinion loser after decades of controlling western media, being the global police, and providing rights to people when other countries refused to provide those rights. While all of those things are beneficial and can be good, Europe is fundamentally not the leader of global freedom. They are the leader of Western culture, not freedom. Western culture is very popular but freedom isn’t always popular.
I'm sorry, but that's absolutely patently false information.
https://www.worldatlas.com/society/the-largest-standing-armies-of-the-european-union.html
Top 10 Largest Standing Militaries Of The European Union
| Rank | Country | Army Size |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Italy | 338,000 |
| 2 | France | 304,000 |
| 3 | Spain | 199,000 |
| 4 | Poland | 189,000 |
| 5 | Germany | 183,000 |
| 6 | Greece | 147,000 |
| 7 | Romania | 128,000 |
| 8 | Portugal | 52,000 |
| 9 | Hungary | 46,000 |
| 10 | Netherlands | 41,000 |
(Yes, I may be showing off that I learned how to make tables today).
If that were true then what have EU countries been sending to Ukraine this entire time? IOUs?
Trump can act this brash because Europe is nearly defenseless. Just considering the land mass and population sizes, there is no competition. But then consider that Europe isn’t as coordinated as America, there is room for reduced performance in war. But the biggest factor is that Europe has no defense money. They have relied on America to save them for over a century and the consequences are: Europe can’t intervene with them Trump Putin talks because they didn’t earn a seat at the table.