European Reassurance Initiative, NATO, Trump

[fstarcstar]

[Spider]

I think NATO is basically a ziplock bag of applesauce, these days, when it comes to actually following through as a mutual defense alliance. If Putin decided to pick off one of the Baltic states tomorrow, I'm pretty sure NATO would respond with the military equivalent of a flaccid penis tucked protectively between a pair of creamy, quivering thighs.

We'd start talking about sanctions while Estonia burned.

[spacemonkey]

If the USA pulled out of NATO, NATO would cease to exist.

[John Galt]

[Edarmoc]

I think we've reached the point of enough mutually assured destruction that there wouldn't be a case in which Russia would just march into the Baltics and start claiming Poland. As unhinged as Putin is, he still engineered his annexing of Crimea very slowly and carefully, and made sure that it was in no way publicly attached with the actual Russian military (at least on the front end). When Putin sensed some pushback on the Russian backing of Assad, he wrote an op-ed to the New York Times about it, very carefully trying to paint it as a desire to maintain peace and order. There's clearly some desire on his part to seem within the bounds of international law and goodwill, even if his actions often contradict that image. I just don't see him being so brazen as to try a land grab that would be decried by the entire rest of the world and would almost certainly lead to more economic harm than benefit (even if it didn't come to actual military conflict)

[IndependentProfessor]

I don't mind funding most of NATO, as opposed to funding most of the UN. NATO is basically a way for the US to impose our will upon European and other countries, while maintaining some semblance of "multi-nationalism". The actions/positions that NATO takes is almost always in-line with US interests. Therefore, since the US profits, I don't mind us finding.

The UN, on the other hand, does a lot of shit that doesn't benefit us. So, why fund it?

[John Galt]

[The Comrade]

[IndependentProfessor]

[Indy]