I’m a Danish citizen. The story doesn’t really surprise me (given the news a few years back that US spy on EU MPs in Brussels by eavesdropping Belgian telcos). The worst part is the complete apathy from Danish politicians to stand up against this kind of spying and take action. It’s completely unacceptable and should be prosecuted; yet none of the centrist parties are interested in or motivated by standing up against the US and their illegal activities.
>> motivated by standing up against the US and their illegal activities.
They know they can't do much to stand up against US. I may be wrong but I think Denmark's security is based on US millitary support through NATO. This applies to most EU countries. Russia is too threatening to upset your security guarantor.
Here you have it, it's no secret:
Denmark opposes the creation of a "European army" to defend the E.U. from threats, Defense Minister Claus Hjort Frederiksen said Friday.
Speaking at the meeting of Denmark's 2019-2020 foreign and security policy, he said: "There is no such thing as Denmark will defend itself against the U.S. The U.S. is the cornerstone of our freedom."
German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Tuesday called for creating a European Union army, stressing that Europeans can no longer merely rely on the U.S. for their security.
>They know they can't do much to stand up against US. I may be wrong but I think Denmark's security is based on US millitary support through NATO. This applies to most EU countries. Russia is too threatening to upset your security guarantor.
It's amazing how this Cold War old-wives-tale is still what Americans believe...
Russia is not USSR - a superpower with half of Europe under its wings -, and is not a threat to anyone (and in no great shape to be a threat, even if they wanted), except immediate neighbors they have disputes with for centuries, and which, more often than not, are themselves armed and weaponized by NATO as proxies against it.
If we don't frame things as countries needing to ally with the US out of fear of Russia\China, we may have to realize that countries are forced to ally with the US as the ones that don't end up overthrown or facing endless economic warfare like Venezuela/Iran.
The beauty is that we don't need to even think about that. Russia and China are bad actors anyway so in a way you could say they are strengthening the alliance between U.S and EU. Also EU is neither Venezuela nor Iran.
Agreed. France alone probably has sufficient military power to balance Russia.
European countries can stand up to what is obviously unacceptable (industrial espionage conducted by US military intelligence). But Denmark in the later years have chosen not to.
Sarkozy and Cameron publicly pushing Clinton and Obama to join in on enforcement for weeks would indicate something else, given the marked policy difference between how that was handled and Syria. Libya is not really something America has a strategic interest in.
Exactly! If you watch Obama's past interviews he says explictely that US was disappointed by France's weakness on Libya. Not to mention that France made a big deal of its "decisive" action after the US took down the anti-air defense.
Because it's on Russia's doorstep, was part of Russia for 400 years until 1991, has a large Russian minority, the Russian Black Sea fleet is based in Sevastopol, the Russia-friendly government had just been toppled in a coup backed by the US and Western European powers, and Russia didn't want another NATO member on its doorstep.
I can't see what would possibly lead to a Russian invasion of Denmark.
They can also see the contrast with next-door Russia. The Ukraine is one of the poorest countries in Europe.
The overthrow of the government was effected by armed militias, with a heavy far-right presence (e.g., pictures of Stepan Bandera, the Nazi collaborator who ethnically cleansed Poles from Western Ukraine during WWII). The US government had a hand in picking the successor government - there's even audio of the behind-the-scenes discussions. There was obviously popular support in Western Ukraine for Maidan, but there was also a lot of foreign involvement and the seizure of power itself was violent and unconstitutional.
From Crimea being part of Russia for centuries, having 60% russian ethnicity population, Ukraine government being toppled by nationalists and neo-nazis with US support, etc...
Why would Russia go to war with Denmark, which controls access to the Baltic Sea, control of which has been a major priority for Russian foreign policy for the past 300 years?
In order to gain a direct way to the Atlantic ocean.
They can currently reach it trough the Arctic Ocean and Black Sea -> Mediterranean Sea. But direct way will be nice.
Another reason would be to insert themselves between Scandinavia and Germany.
> carriers and submarines loaded with nuclear missiles are not enough for you to project power in Greenland?
No. Nuclear deterrents work against nuclear threats. But a lot of modern warfare is by proxy. Subnuclear force is what matters.
More tangibly: Russia starts constructing a base on Greenland. Does France risk nuclear exchange to challenge it? For that matter, would America? Of course not.
Sanctions, blockading the construction site and threatening to build similarly near Russian assets would be the game. Each of these, individually, is within Paris' capacity. (Except, maybe, sanctions.) But collectively, no.
France alone probably has sufficient military power to balance Russia.
It depends on the theatre. At sea, probably, in a nuclear exchange France has sufficient deterrent capability. But in a land war, tank on tank the way God meant it to be, France’s 200 tanks are no match for Russia’s thousands.
Remember purchasing power parity. Russia may be poorer than France, but it’s stuff costs a lot less too.
France has 222 active Leclercs, with 260 more in storage. Around 400 AMX variants too. Russia has around 300 known T90s, which are the real threat that matches a Leclerc. The rest are T80s, T72s and older, which, while absolutely dwarfing the french numbers, forgets about a tiny thing: they are absolutely _awful_ tanks compared to modern stuff. A Leclerc will happily shrug off T72s.
Additionally, Rafales are more than a strong contender to Russia's Su35. A dozen Reapers too, for good measure.
France isn't the world's fifth military power and one of the biggest seller of weapons for no reason.
Numbers, yes, but also quality. The T-34 when it appeared shocked the Germans. While it had significant flaws the basic tank characteristics like armor, firepower and mobility were very good for the time.
The Germans thought so highly of the T-34 that they thought of cloning it, but came to the conclusion that designing a new tank to counter it was in the end a more feasible idea. This process eventually resulted in the Panther, often thought to be the best tank of the entire war. Although in practice it was beset by reliability issues, and of course it was too little too late in general by then.
Getting back to the original topic, the lesson seems that for tank vs tank combat, large numbers of good enough tanks win the day. Now, the T-72 did disastrously poorly in the Gulf war, but OTOH apparently 'domestic' USSR T-72's have better armor to begin with than the export versions used in Iraq, and further upgraded ones with more armor and modern sensors might be a much harder nut to crack.
Germany also had huge problems getting fuel for anything, really. They used a lot of horses for artillery. Building a huge number of tanks may not have worked out for them. When they couldn't reach Soviet oil fields, it was over.
It's 2020, you don't need tank to tank when you can simply deploy tactical nuclear warheads against large numbers (strategic too but there's no need for that in this scenario).
Tanks are not used for that anymore, they are used as little fortresses in cities, but fighting on a open field..well you have seen what happened in the first and second iraq war.
To quote from this book, about regarding how badly they faired in Chechnya (as mentioned above):
> High casualties, massive collateral damage, and heavy losses in vehicles and equipment all point to the apparent folly of using tanks in the urban fight. This chapter will discuss the 1995 battle for Grozny and examine why the Russian armor did not achieve the desired results.
So... the argument is that "Russians don't know how to use tanks". I don't find this argument particularly persuasive.
It's true that up-armourmed Abrams in Fallujah proved effective against RPG-7s (as mentioned in your link). But the RPG-29 was used in Syria successfully against them, and (more often) by Hezbollah against the Merkava tanks.
The A-10 (or equivalent) is highly effective against tanks so it would probably come down to air superiority which the Russians would probably win easily against anyone not (china or US)
Ukraine would not agree with that. Russia took Crimea and is supporting a civil war in eastern Ukraine. This may not be much for you but
>> except immediate neighbors
Yeah except the immediate neighbours and then the neighbours of the neighbours. Think of the Soviet Union era...
Speaking of neighbours Denmark, Sweden, Lithuania and few others are pretty close to Russia. I guess they are on your list of doomed neighbours anyway.
This is an important thing to note about Europe - they don't really care about the security of other European nations. There's no sense of unity.
If there were, they would collectively take a much much harder stance with Russia. This is why Eastern Europe is so much more pro-USA than Western Europe.
yeah it's still everyone for themselves. "Take back control" and "sovereignty" seems to win the more points than "solidarity" or "unity" in the political discourse of many EU countries.
>Ukraine would not agree with that. Russia took Crimea and is supporting a civil war in eastern Ukraine. This may not be much for you but
Crimea was part of Russia for centuries, it has 60%+ citizens of Russian ethnicity, and it had its government toppled and neo-nazis and nationalists come to power in a NATO proxy power play.
It would be like Mexico having an area (say Baja California) with 60% WASP Americans, that has been historically part of the US, and having Mexico's government toppled with the help of a foreign superpower and used against the US.
Would the US annex Baja California then?
Then again, the US have already annexed Texas, Florida, California, New Mexico, Arizona, etc, from Mexico, so there's that...
Outside of sources paid by Kremlin there is no serious confirmation that NATO was somehow involved in toppling Ukraine's govt. There is plainly no united fruit scenario, only a general distaste of russian government, same as elsewhere in eastern europe.
Of course, the US government supports affiliated NGOs as it does elsewhere in the world (and as everyone does), but "power play" means something else.
How doublespeak? That's exactly what support means. There are russian- and chinese- supported organizations and "institutes" everywhere, too. And always were. As long as they aren't doing crime, armed insurrections and shooting down civilian aircrafts by mistake, it's fine by me. If NATO is doing any of that, please provide evidence.
No, we're still in the age when a certain superpower messes up the whole world, supports fundamentalists and jihadis, destabilizes regions, invades countries, and then cries about the terrorism threat...
Well Russia already anexed Crimea and is fighting a proxy war in Ukraine. You may not find Ukraine enough European for you to count. Next: other Eastern European countries. Next: the baltic countries.
> Well Russia already annexed Crimea ..
Yet another show of either (willful) ignorance or (intentional) peddling of (Western) propaganda.
People may think whatever they want about what happened to Crimea and Eastern Ukraine, but to called that an annexation (or an invasion, as many have) is disingenuous as best.
It's no secret (in fact, it's on public record) that it was the USA who pumped copious amounts of money in getting a "favorable" group of very questionable "politicians" in power in Kiev. While presented as "spreading democracy and freedom", in the backdrop Western companies (with strong government ties) were making deals to take control of the natural resources in both Crimea and Eastern Ukraine.
Most importantly, those deals envisioned to take away the control (or even access) Russia (and the local population, for that matter) have/had over these resources. If anyone annexed anything, it was rather the USA than Russia. The key on all that is to observe which side was the one taking all the initiatives, and which side was basically just responding to what the other side did.
This fear mongering about Russian expansion simply doesn't match reality. If anyone has been expanding the last decade or so, it is NATO, not Russia. In reality, it probably should not surprise anyone. It's a well proven tactic to simply accuse your victims of being the one showing aggression, while in reality that is just resistance to your own (illegal) aggression. Just ask some of the older Poles. They still remember what Germany did.
It was an invasion and annexation according to international law. That is crystal clear and there is not even any leeway for interpretation about it. On a side note, the kind of justifications / rationalization you give for the annexation - somebody installed politicians there that were not pleasing Russia enough - are not only factually incorrect, too, they are also irrelevant to the question whether the Crimea was annexed by Russia or not.
I don't know where you think the "green men" militia came from, but I know for certain that they were Russian military (and no, not on vacation). And let's not forget that a Buk system was provided directly from Russia that then downed Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, killing all 283 crew and passengers. Dutch authorities and international investigators have uncovered and documented every single minute of this crime, from the arrival of the BUK system to its hasty departure afterwards, and identified the Russian officers involved in it by name and picture.
The problem is that people misunderstand "international law" and interpret it as something similar to the more familiar national law. It's not. Why do you think the US can bomb a hospital or school, civilians be damned? That's a war crime but the justification "but terrorists" or "but democracy" wipes it away. How many war crimes do you think were committed in the Middle East and how many were condemned by that "international law"? How much outside interference do you think the elections in Ukraine got and how much of it was condemned? There was no "innocent side" in the whole Crimean issue. Whether local or on the other side of the world, all parties involved played the same game to try to gain something. Civilians as usually took the brunt of the conflict.
Russia doesn't get sanctions because it "guilty" while the US does not because they're "innocent" in the eyes of the law. International law is as negotiable, debatable, and esoteric as it gets. If you have enough power and support from others you claim it's on your side and do what you need to do. And that support is critical, it's why the US needs the EU on their side: legitimacy. That's why the EU could contribute pocket lint to the NATO budget and still benefit from US spending.
Google "civilians dead in the middle east" and you'll see how "international law" works. Let's not play with words. Superpowers go to extreme lengths to maintain their status. The bigger the status, the longer the lengths, because they can afford to do more and more of that.
> The problem is that people misunderstand "international law" and interpret it as something similar to the more familiar national law.
It's far more basic than that. Enforcement of domestic laws is based on the monopoly on violence the government carries. In international law, the two parties do not acknowledge each other's monopoly on violence. They are extremely unlikely to just roll over and accept the punishment.
Enforcing international law is just war with added steps and a more morally palatable justification. Sometimes nations capitulate before war breaks out (typically because the punishment is less severe than war, or because their odds of winning are low), but it doesn't change that they're surrendering to violence.
> Russia doesn't get sanctions because it "guilty" while the US does not because they're "innocent" in the eyes of the law.
International law is largely broken. It's predicated on the idea that the combined military power of the rest of the world can overpower the "guilty" country. Nuclear weaponry means that in the event of international law enforcement that threatens the existence of a country, they have just as much ability to make the rest of the world uninhabitable as the alliance of nations does to destroy theirs. We can't meaningfully enforce international law against nuclear capable countries. This is why economy-ruining sanctions are only enforced on nations that lack nuclear armaments. Hypothetically, if Cuba had nuclear missiles, do you really think our embargo of them would have lasted this long?
It's just a further division of the world into have's and have nots.
Russia's old whinning: U.S is doing bad things (i.e in middle east) so we want to do bad things without sanctions as well...why the world gives us this "unfair" treatment?
You didn't actually contradict anything I said though. You just let your personal feelings decide which identical half of the coin looks better. Don't fall prey to emotion just because the facts make you angry or don't fit the narrative you learned to love.
All superpowers act from the same playbook. The more "super" the power, the worse they're willing to do to hang on to it. Look at history for a confirmation. Not accepting reality doesn't make you right. The US isn't inherently better or worse, more or less immoral than other superpowers but it does have the military, economic, and political power to do whatever they need to do to grow it or at least not lose any of it. If it means bombing a hospital, imposing sanctions on an enemy, or strongarming an ally they'll do it because not doing it means giving up an inch. One here, one there, pretty soon they're a mile behind. So no quarter given.
You're still misrepresenting international law, though. It's not as ephemeral as your portray it, most of it is based on existing treaties, declarations, and agreements, and the rest of it is also not arbitrary but rather based on convention and customary procedure among states.
There is a reason why countries like the US and Russia go at great length in arguing that what they do is not violating international law in cases when they are actually breaking it.
Moreover, even those states who occasionally break it most of the time conform with international law and resort to treaties and conflict resolution mechanisms associated with them. It's not as if Russia (or the US, for what it matters) ratify no international agreements at all or always break them or completely ignore international agreements.
Overall, your position is unrealistic and does not reflect the reality of international relations. Countries do not just do whatever they want out of a position of power, and for most part even those that break treaties, agreements, and habitual rules of conduct only do so as an exception to the rule. I can assure you that Russia cares a great deal about being recognized as a rational and reliable actor rather than as a mad rogue state.
What you say about the morality of states (whatever that means, to me the concept is meaningless) is clearly just your personal opinion, so let's ignore that.
Any specific existing treaty that forgives or wipes away a war crime? Or many. Despite the tens of thousands (conservatively) of dead civilians resulting from direct US military action, the US has not even been accused of a single instance of a war crime. Why do you think that is? Well I'll tell you, as someone who's been elbow deep into this for quite a few years of my life: international law is an esoteric, negotiable concept, it's a guideline, and it relies on consent and the power to apply your view. Kind of like the rules of conduct in a company. You don't slap your CEO even if they deserve it, and you don't go to an HR that is controlled by them. In the same vein, international relations is the "science" of agreeing on an outcome the stronger party wants and the weaker one can live with. International law is there as a framework but there's no accepted "Supreme Judge, Jury, and Executioner" who just presses charges, delivers a verdict, and carries out the sentence in the name of the victim or the planet, and everyone has to abide.
A strong enough player is untouchable, they can break a treaty and it's up to the others to decide the action... or let it slide. Who do you think has the power or guts to gather the necessary evidence and the international support to investigate the US for war crimes? And if it went through, who has the power to impose any kind of measures against the US? What kind of retaliation can they expect afterwards? Do you really think there are no perks to being the wold's biggest superpower?
Armchair international politics is a lot more fun than the real thing, I'll tell you that.
> Countries do not just do whatever they want out of a position of power
There is some give and take but for some it's literally what they do for a living. The US has openly pressured the EU to do things for decades, from supporting sanctions they didn't agree with, to changing Galileo frequencies to something that the US could more easily jam. And they've been doing it on every continent under threat of war, sanctions, or interference. It wasn't as a favor between friends, and it certainly wasn't in the spirit of cooperation and all those international treaties.
> the morality of states (whatever that means, to me the concept is meaningless) [...] so let's ignore that
A bit of reading comprehension goes a long way. That was exactly my point, that there are no good or bad, no moral and immoral/amoral countries. They do what they need to do to stay on top of the pile. Don't ignore something because you can't parse it. It's clearly the best way to form an uninformed opinion and then state it firmly, assuming you have an iron clad case.
There is no substantial disagreement between us, once I start to ignore some of your unnecessarily snippy and needlessly condescending remarks. Lack of enforcement of international law is due to lack of ratified treaties for such an enforcement. There is a reason why the US refuses to ratify the treaty for the International Court of Justice. So far, attempts to get better enforcement mechanisms were partly successful, but not successful when members of the UN Security Council are concerned. The problem is that allied powers decided to give the UN security council members veto rights. Any change would have to start there - a larger council and abandoning veto rights. In the current political situation that will not happen, but maybe in the future it will.
However, you're still under a false impression. You're just looking at a few global superpowers and former superpowers such as Russia, China, and the US. However, the UN has 193 member states and there are countless bilateral treaties that entangle countries in a positive way.
> There is some give and take but for some it's literally what they do for a living.
That's not true, as I've said, your view of international relations is unrealistic. You're thinking way too much in black and white terms. As I've mentioned earlier, even the countries who occasionally break international law normally adhere to it and consult their experts about it and try to avoid breaking it. Your remark is especially ironic in the context of a thread about Denmark. There are more countries than the US, China, and Russia. Most of these countries work quite well with each other on the basis of international law. For every case that you believe demonstrates arbitrary power abuse, you can find another case in which international treaties, conflict resolution mechanisms by UN, and diplomatic channels have worked.
You're generalizing from very few hand-picked nations, which are known to have particular geostrategical goals that other countries do not have. Denmark is not waging illegal wars or annexing regions of other countries, for instance. Most countries don't do these kind of things.
> That was exactly my point, that there are no good or bad, no moral and immoral/amoral countries. They do what they need to do to stay on top of the pile.
You did not understand this point. I'm saying that countries cannot be moral actors because they are not uniform entities. Countries are not actors at all. If at all, you can talk about particular governments this way, but these change all the time. Or, you could say that certain geostrategical goals seem to influence a government's actions, but that involve a lot of interpretation and background knowledge. You need to assign moral properties to decision makers, or perhaps governments. So it only appears as if we agree on this point.
Of course, there are immoral actions of governments, though. Russia's annexation of the Crimea is a prime example of one. So are US drone strikes, Guantanamo, and the false pretenses for the 2nd Golf War.
If your suggestion is that governments cannot be held accountable for their actions, then I have to say I'm baffled and have no idea what made you adopt this outlandish view. They are being held accountable all the time, as well as individual members of governments if it is clear they are responsible for a certain decision.
Sometimes people use the country name as a shortcut and if it's clear that they mean the governments and other institutions during a certain time period, then that's alright. But talking about countries in general as if they were uniform actors is always nonsense.
> Don't ignore something because you can't parse it. It's clearly the best way to form an uninformed opinion and then state it firmly, assuming you have an iron clad case.
You seem to be talking about yourself here. Psychologists call this projection. As I've said, there does not seem to be any substantial disagreement between us - now that you've changed your mind about international law, or at least chose to change the subject to a more general topic. Yes, a few countries such as the US and Russia sometimes break international law, presumably because they think they can afford it in light of too tame opposition. If that's your big geopolitical insight, so be it.
> If your suggestion is that governments cannot be held accountable for their actions, then I have to say I'm baffled and have no idea what made you adopt this outlandish view.
No, their argument is "The US has done bad things, so Russia should do bad things too, and it is UNFAIR to react to that." The rest is just pseudo-intellectual justification for that position.
Mark those words carefully, because you are likely going to regret them.
To a degree it's understandable that those who are constantly bombarded by their own relentless propaganda fail to see that they are indeed the bad guys. But this machinery that has so many so thorough brainwashed, has no intention of stopping. Also, it will have to get increasingly more criminal to sustain itself.
As so many of these systems before it, it will eventually turn on itself (it is already doing that, big time) and eventually destroy itself from the inside out. Only the strongest believers will be able to hold on to their faith in being the good guys. Others will wonder: "Why didn't we see it (coming)", ignorant of how many outsiders did already see it coming for a long time. Either way, a lot of people will have a similarly painful realization as the Germans had after WW2.
> It was an invasion and annexation according to international law. That is crystal clear and there is not even any leeway for interpretation about it.
It is always a bit amusing, though also somewhat infuriating, whenever somebody writes something like this. It often is a good indicator of what likely is to follow.
Truly ironic, that the people who (apparently) know the least about international law are usually the first to mention it. Even more that most of these people appear to come from countries that probably are the biggest violators of international laws, by historical track record.
I'm not even going to argue with you, for you rather obviously take personal convictions over actual knowledge. Good luck with that.
Here is a fact for you: the forces/interest behind most of this will come back to roost one day. Maybe rather sooner than you think. One thing I'm pretty sure of: you're not going to like. Don't say that nobody tried to warn you, when it turns out that the joke was always on you.
Your comment is an irrelevant ad-hominem argument. That's may be okay for Reddit but I'd expect a bit more from someone posting on HN. Besides, that international law was broken by Russia is not my personal opinion, it's backed up by the majority of countries and by almost all scholars in international law, see e.g. [1] for a good analysis.
You may call it an ad-hominem attack, if you like.
However, what I am doing is calling you out .. I honestly don't know if you are a deliberate propaganda mouth piece or just an unfortunate victim of it.
Either way, the moment you mentioned international law in relation to this issue, and even had to nerve to declare that the truth of your convictions are factually undeniable, you yourself were the one who pretty much shoved all-in and closed the door for any meaningful discussion. Maybe you should take a look in the mirror first, if you want to blame someone for being called out for that.
I have a pretty decent track record of being rather respectful (definitely beyond and above average) towards to opinions of other. Just maybe not for people who talk like you. You can take your (abuse of) political correctness and ..
EDIT: I see what you are trying, but you still don't get it (regarding international law). Good luck and goodbye.
You're again just raising ad-hominem attacks. There is not a single point worth discussing in your last two posts. I'll leave my original reply to you standing as is - Crimea was annexed by Russia in violation of international law, as the paper I've linked to also concludes.
On a side note, there is no respect in your posts at all. On the contrary, after two ad-hominem attacks you even make up a completely new topic of "political correctness" that has nothing to do with anything that has been said so far.
> I honestly don't know if you are a deliberate propaganda mouth piece or just an unfortunate victim of it.
> Russia also regularly crosses neighbouring countries' (Sweden, Finland, Alaska, etc.) borders with fighter planes, boats and submarines.
That's something all capable militaries do on a regular basis. "Accidentally", of course. The US does this, Russia does it, China does it and so on. While it's of course not nice, it's disingenuous to use it in any kind of argument.
Georgia is much more complicated. Georgia invaded the de facto independent state of South Ossetia. Russia sent troops into South Ossetia to repel the Georgian invasion and then chased Georgian troops into Georgia proper.
South Ossetia was an autonomous oblast in the Georgian SSR. When the USSR disintegrated, Georgia and South Ossetia fought a war, which ended up with a truce that lasted until the Georgian invasion in 2008.
So Russia annexed Crimea and is supporting a civil war in Eastern Ukraine to save them from the invasion of U.S capital and U.S energy corporations. Good to know that Russia is there to annex countries that are about to fall for this nefarious american trap.
Some would say Denmark is already in this unthinkable situation so the poor people of Denmark can only hope that one day, some green patriotic Russians will land on danish soil to save them.
>> USA who pumped copious amounts of money in getting a "favorable" group of very questionable "politicians"
Let's not talk about questionable "politicians" supported by Putin. They are all either dictators or wanna be soviet/communist, oligarchs or the worst shady thing you could possible imagine.
Until Russia realises that nobody wants (except Russia) the Soviet era back these small countries have no choice but support U.S's interests. The way Russia is doing business & diplomacy is just ugly(albeit efficient at times).
I think part of this narrative is the US spends an incredible amount on the military. If they don't continue to cast the entire world as with us or against us then that amount of money becomes harder to justify.
> Russia is not USSR - a superpower with half of Europe under its wings -, and is not a threat to anyone
Not by choice, Russians still think the collapse of USSR a tragic mistake, and Putin’s rhetoric ties directly back to it.
Russian “defence” spending is skyrocketing, Russia is holding frequent manoeuvres righ in NATO borders, keeps flying bombers ever-so-slightly into NATO country airspace’s... and most of all, Russia shows it is more than happy to apply brute force to achieve political goals. In Ukraine, Georgia, who’s next?
Denmark, Poland and Sweden, not to mention the Baltic states, are rightly concerned about Russia’s posturing. If it’s not meant to be intimidating and creating a low-level Cold War, then it’s a very odd way of showing neighbourly love.
I’m sure comparisons to American imperialism will follow, and maybe justifiably so. But crucially, US does not invade European countries, voila the pertinent difference.
The US is irrelevant for European defense though. They're no longer a reliable partner and nobody seriously believes we can rely on them if anything does happen. So we're down to France and Germany, and I'm not sure Germany's military is particularly competent. The way I see it, Russia is far more efficient at defense spending than most of the EU countries, so they're a legitimate threat even if they "only" match France in spending.
> Russia is too threatening to upset your security guarantor.
Come on stop spreading this dumb western propaganda, Russia isn't threatening anybody in western Europe.
They took Crimea back and sabotaged Ukraine because strategically they can't afford to have yet another NATO country right at their doorstep. They're not going to invade Poland any time soon (what for anyway?).
They're not crazy nor blood thirsty. This is the same with North Korea: their actions make perfect sense once you look past our propaganda.
Geopolitics are an interesting thing. It's also interesting how 2 regimes with totally different ideologies ended having similar borders (Imperial Russia and the USSR).
> Russia isn't threatening anybody in western Europe
Those poor schmucks not in Western Europe can just be thrown under the bus like the last 2 times, right? :-)
They won't invade Poland or Baltics because those countries are in NATO and EU and it's way too risky. Russia seems pretty involved in all the hotspots lately including starting a war in Ukraine. Very likely same fate would be for Poland and Baltics if they didn't protect themselves with stronger allies.
And even if current Russia is not interested/capable to cause trouble to east EU - that doesn't mean it won't change in the future. Country leader shouldn't just look in the last 2 years - he needs to prepare country for the next 50 years.
I guess a big factor must be to ask what they would gain. Domestic PR / distraction is one thing, but Crimea also has warm-water ports, and a (largely?) ethnic Russian population.
Eastern Poland has... some farmland, some ancient forests? People with a 5-generation deep tradition of suicidal attempts to kick the Russians out? Whereas the Baltics are sandwiched with Kalinngrad, and some have fair-sized Russian populations, who can be painted as oppressed. That seems much more concerning.
In case you didn't get that memo: the shit in the Ukraine didn't start with Russian involvement.
It started with very active meddling, spending copious amounts of money, into the internal politics of the country. It should also be noted that much of that money went to ultra-right-wing militant organizations, who have zero respect for democracy or freedom. Essentially, the USA bought itself a (fascist) private army to take control (or at least try to) over the natural resources in East Ukraine and Crimea. Russia responded rather predictably to that.
Some might even argue that they had every right to do so. I'd love to see Americans react, if Russia were to sponsor some kind of anti-US militia in Alaska, that would subsequently take control of state (military bases with missile launch facilities included). I'm pretty sure that US citizens would call that for what it is: an act of aggression.
No, the reason Russia doesn't invade Poland or the Baltic countries isn't because of NATO. Ironically, if those countries are at risk in any way, it's probably rather because of NATO. NATO (and its members) keeps insisting that the organization is defensive in nature only, yet its actions tell a rather different story (and it has done so for a long time, at least since the '90).
If only you could see the irony in your response. I guess that you have to be oblivious to it. But thank for providing a little piece of entertainment for me today.
Warm water port + not wanting a NATO country within driving distance of Moscow. Same reason why Russia is heavily invested in maintaining its hegemony over Belarus.
If you look past the propaganda, basically there are a bunch of countries in the world. One would assume that Russia/North Korea/China/the UK/Kazakhstan/Somalia etc want to invade other places about as much as America does.
So if you look at America's record for foreign 'Peacekeeping' it seems prudent to keep a sizeable army on hand to defend against the Russians. Places with strong armies invade places that aren't protected by strong armies.
> I resent the dumb propaganda that is served to us and has no basis in reality
I suggest ignoring "geopolitics", and considering to what extent your input matters even in local political matters. If you find that such impact is minimal locally, then from a political consideration, it is a waste of your time to spend energy on "Russian threat" or any other geopolitical narrative (many dating to 19th century.) You should focus on your local issues.
Geopolitical policy is opaque to uninitiated and uninformed. It is not clear to me why the elite make a show of discussing geopolitics for the public at large. Join CFR in a meaningful capacity and you may get a whif of what actually are the dynamics and issues that drive international relations.
Geopolitics matter even for simple people like me: first it's always better to not live in the matrix of lies of someone else and secondly it can help understand what's happening or what is going to happen.
> it can help understand what's happening or what is going to happen.
This is hopelessly naive, imho. The information asymmetry is off the charts, and a rational "analyst/reader" (the role you want to play) of geopolitics should be aware of this fact, and its implications. You simply have no idea what is really going on. You don't have the data and it is naive to assume what is printed in a handful of outlets by an equally limited number of promoted authors are the "geopolitical facts".
So, yes geopolitics certainly "matter" but that was not the point.
They have literally been caught financing Brexit and every major alt-right, antidemocratic, Europe-skeptic party there is - Germany's AfD, France's FN, Italy's Salvini bunch.
Russia is a threat to democracy and an enemy of Europe, directly competing with China.
Russia can't compete with any Western country in open warfare.
Cyber warfare and nation destabilizing by propaganda campaigns however? That is way cheaper, and the Russians have quite a history of such actions with the KGB. The side benefit is that, in contrast to a Russian airplane dumping Russian bombs on a city, the Russian government can easily deny that they are responsible for a group of hackers or an oligarch's "donation" to a far right party.
If Russian Federation can be beaten by west military, then it's stupid to threat western countries in any way. They can bluff West for a few years, but then what?
Your argument is that EU countries will not stand up to the US, because they are afraid of losing American protection.
However, in case of Germany you linked evidence that goes directly against your argument:
>German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Tuesday called for creating a European Union army, stressing that Europeans can no longer merely rely on the U.S. for their security.
Given the context of the thread, this quote reads like the Germans want to build their own army to spite the US. For example, because the US spied on them.
---
As far as Denmark goes, their feelings regarding the US are probably genuine, but I very much doubt that the Danes see Russia as an existential threat.
The last country to invade and occupy Denmark was Germany, not Russia. If you read between the lines you find that the main security benefit of US/NATO is keeping Europeans from fighting each other rather than defending them from some external threat.
I that sense, I completely agree that US and NATO are the cornerstone of European security. And that's why industrial espionage against them is a bad idea. It makes European countries suspicious of the US and suspicious of each other. The resulting fragmentation leads to insecurity and then we are back to 1939 eyeing each other as our next meal.
> The last country to invade and occupy Denmark was Germany, not Russia.
Technically, Russia did occupy the Danish Island of Bornholm following the German occupation.
The gave it up in 1946, but still it spent almost a year under soviet occupation.
On topic, I think we just like Americans and buying planes from the US was more or less a forgone conclusion :)
Besides nobody has ever been fired for buying the most advanced plane from the US -- hopefully we only need them because they are cool, hehe, so what does it matter if they can fly?
How is the argument that EU countries won't stand up to the US refuted by the desire of some politicians in the EU to create an EU army.
As long as that army doesn't exist those EU countries still rely heavily on the US for security, and therefore the dynamic the GP is proposing might exist today.
I find the idea of a European army to be the stuff of fantasy.
The reason Europe is so dependent on the US is because European NATO members have for decades chosen not to honour their spending and capability obligations to that treaty. Certainly this includes Denmark. A quick google suggests this rich nation is spending 1.3% instead of the 2% minimum.
Meanwhile, Russia, a less prosperous nation with a history of muscular military engagement, is spending more than six percent of its much larger GDP on military.
Due to its regular shadow operations in other countries, Russia has a ready supply of veteran soldiers who could be drawn on in a hostile engagement. European nations could have used the ‘NATO’ Afghanistan invasion as an opportunity to develop a similar pool, but made only token efforts.
Germany is even worse than Denmark. It is laughable for Merkel to make these comments. She has been in power for fifteen years. All through that time, Germany has been amongst the worst NATO members against it’s treaty obligations.
Beyond the realities of military capability, there are the political problems. The European group have no history of coordinated executive action. Structurally, they are in a weaker position to coordinate a war even than the US was in its articles of confederation era.
If you count only France and Germany they spend already more than Russia. The European Union together spend more money in defense that any other country in the world except the USA (and around the same that China).
So, what's the reason for demanding more spending?
Recently, there was a decision to increase spending at the European level, but the project was to spend it in local industry instead of buying the weapons to the Americans. The pentagon reacted really offended (1).
This "you should spend more in defense" is not about defense, it's about money, and where that money goes.
I think a better question that why the Europeans don't spend more in "defense", it's: why the Americans spend so much?
Among reasons for the American spend (1) it helps to support the nuclear non-proliferation cause, and has historically been used to dissuade Australia and Japan and South Korea and West Germany from creating their own nuclear weapons programs; (2) because the US has historically guaranteed northern Europe against a USSR tank invasion, though this may no longer be relevant; (3) the US is security guarantor for much of east Asia, including the Korean Peninsula. Asian nations currently have strong concern about the rise of wolf warrior China.
If Europe is not freeloading, why was there so much negative reaction by European leaders to Trump reducing presence in Europe? Surely this should be celebrated!
If NATO is no longer relevant, then nations should drop out of it. There is a clear path to this. If they want to be members, they should honour their obligations.
Europe maybe freeloading, but can you really blame them? Everybody knows they can get away with that and stay in NATO. Heck, look at what Turkey is doing and they are still in NATO. U.S. wants to preserve NATO the most, almost at any cost. Other countries know this and are more lukewarm to NATO and these things are to their advantage when deciding how much they really have to spend.
Australia doesn't have nukes because they don't want them, not because the US told them not to or promised to use them on it's behalf. it's so historically uninterested that it doesn't even have a nuclear power industry.
>>" it helps to support the nuclear non-proliferation cause [..]"
The non-proliferation cause it's another way of saying "we are the only one that should have nuclear capability". It doesn't look like to me that the USA is interested in a world without nuclear weapons (1), only in a world where the others don't have nuclear weapons.
>>"If Europe is not freeloading, why was there so much negative reaction by European leaders to Trump reducing presence in Europe? Surely this should be celebrated!"
If the problem is freeloading and defense, instead of "business", why being against spending the money in European military industry?
I notice that you don't address the question that Europe already spend more than Russia.
> only in a world where the others don't
> have nuclear weapons
It's a world where only Russia, (mainland) China, the US, France and the UK have nuclear weapons, in pursuit of a strategic balance.
> If the problem is freeloading and defense, instead
> of "business", why being against spending the money
> in European military industry?
Yeah, it doesn't surprise me to hear the pentagon whinge about people spending money with other vendors.
On this theme - there was an interesting Foreign Policy paper arguing that the F35 program serves as a US version of the belt-and-roads initiative. Still, it must be half-decent or countries would not buy it. e.g. Australia is licensing its recent sub design from France. But, it is buying the F-35, despite the lock-in problems. Israel produces an astonishing amount of its own tech but, likewise, is buying the F-35.
> I notice that you don't address the question
> that Europe already spend more than Russia.
I thought my comments about the relevance of NATO to be a response to this. It is or it isn't, countries should decide. There are non-NATO European countries that spend less than 2%.
My themes in the original comment was the notion of the European military on two grounds. (1) If military goals were important, nations would/should have been lifting their weight in NATO. (2) There are obstacles to creating a command structure for a European military, which is a very weak federation.
Lots of F35 teething issues affecting procurement decision 10 years ago. People unironically comparing F35 with Gripen. It's a great piece of kit worth locking in now. But last few years of US commitment uncertainty meant countries are now refocusing on indigenous defense industries, military goals are important now. Every previous billion that goes into F35 from foreign purchases improves F35 competitiveness while depriving competitors and foreign indigenous efforts, which was fine if US is dependable, i.e. Japan complained about how little US provided tech transfers and cooperation in the joint F2 program. I imagine it's in US interest to kill these upstart efforts or SAAB and Dessault when it comes to European procurement hence need for espionage. EU market size + existing industrial base could be a viable competitor to US MIC.
I'm actually pretty disappointed with the Danish politicians answers as to why we're not at 2%. They try to put "cyber defense" in as a military expect, even if the job description suggests that it's actually just police work and therefor should count in the 2%. We also frequently claim that foreign aid should be counted as part of our NATO contribution, because it prevents war. While that may be true, Danish politicians should and do know that the 2% for defense was never meant as anything but pure military expenses. Claiming that we don't need to spend as much as 2% of GDP isn't the point, we promised our NATO partners that we would. If 2% is to much, then work to change the NATO rules, don't just ignore them.
The US is absolutely right to be upset that it's NATO partners isn't fulfilling their part of the deal and instead rely on US tax payers for their defense.
> Meanwhile, Russia, a developing nation with a history of muscular military engagements in the region, is spending more than six percent of its much larger GDB on military.
Economically, Russia is a midget compared to the EU. They do have lots of nukes, though.
When the U.S says that more should be spent on NATO that usually means to buy more U.S equipment at inflated prices rather than to make Europe's defense more effective and efficient.
>> The European group have no history of coordinated executive action.
Yeah, perhaps they should start working on a coordinated executive action(i.e an EU army) or...just accept US protection for a "fee". It's been a good trade so far anyway. The only issue is that recently US started to double guess its past agreements.
>> I find the idea of a European army to be the stuff of fantasy.
You are not alone. That's why some EU countries prefer to buy US millitary equipment(often at inflated prices), support US's interests in the region and beyond(i.e Iraq invasion), accept US's interferences and be done with it. The EU army project is too risky politically and strategically. Things may change if US becomes too erratic(i.e think of a super Trump presidency)
Well, reality is not static, what's laughable today may be very reasonable tomorrow.
EU generally would like to play ball with the US as long as the relationship is palatable predictable stable and generally cooperative.
But a strong EU and an unpredictable, bullish and erratic behaviour by certain US presidents, might change this.
The problem with an European Army is that the French or the Italians or even the Germans won't send their young men to die at the Eastern border in order to defend Poland or Romania, it's as simple as that (see also the "phoney war" that only ended when Nazi Germany actually decided to invade France and the Benelux). The Americans inspire a little more trust, even though they live half a world away (maybe because of that). Source: me, living in Romania.
>The problem with an European Army is that the French or the Italians or even the Germans won't send their young men to die at the Eastern border in order to defend Poland or Romania, it's as simple as that
What makes you think that ? I often read those sorts of reactions from Eastern Europeans (yes, yes, I know Poland is in « Central Europe ») but that's just giving us intentions we don't have. One other trope is framing the desire for a European Army as a master plan to sell more French weaponry.
Speaking from a French perspective, we'd be completely comfortable sending people fight for the sake of Poland, Romania or any EU member without too much of a second thought. We already send people to Africa all the time.
Most recently Macron's overtures towards Russia, so much so that even the Financial Times [1] felt the need the to blame it in one of its opinion pieces, and that is saying something (they generally are pretty neutral to "liberal" European leaders like Macron, even more so when they happen to be former investment bankers).
> One other trope is framing the desire for a European Army as a master plan to sell more French weaponry.
That does indeed happen and it's an active concern, one of the scandals that is about to erupt here in Romania is of the Romanian Army buying military stuff without following proper procurement procedures directly from an US company (via some Swiss and Israeli intermediaries/shell companies, depending on how you look at them). The French are fuming because apparently they were in contention for that contract, too.
The main problem with a single European army is one of authority: what would the chain of command look like? I think no single nation would cede control of their military to a supernational entity, so an EU army would look more like a UN task force than a cohesive army: multiple independent divisions operating under a central strategic command.
But yes, I agree (partly) with your assessment, there doesn't seem to be a lot of willingness in the Western nations to support Eastern Europe militarily (or sometimes, to even acknowledge they have a military). However, when it comes to it, they may not have a choice: an occupied Poland puts the enemy within striking distance of Berlin, so defending Poland is of strategic importance. The same applies (to a lesser extent) to Finland and the Baltic states, losing them means losing control of the Baltic Sea.
I'm not sure exactly how that would work out for Romania, from a purely West-European point of view I would draw that line across Slovakia/Hungary rather than further to the east, however as things as are now, Hungary and the former Yugoslavian nations would be a liability, so Romania may be essential to defending Italy and Austria.
That being said, I very much hope the above remains idle speculation.
USA did not send his young men to die at Easterner border, despite the guarantees of safety for Ukraine. Ukraine exchanged nuclear weapons for guarantees of safety (Budapest memorandum) by RF, GB, and USA, and then screwed.
It’s the same thing with NATO. If Russia invades Baltic’s tomorrow, you think USA will send boots on the ground and all European NATO members will sit still?
>Meanwhile, Russia, a developing nation with a history of muscular military engagements in the region, is spending more than six percent of its much larger GDB on military.
The Russia GDP is less than 10% of the GDP of EU, or the same size as the Benelux (Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg) countries.
Its population is shrinking rapidly due to low birth rates and very high death rates.
Its ruled by a totalitarian dictator that regularly tries to murder his opponents.
It seeks by all means to stir up unrest in its surroundings by misinformation.
Its one of the most corrupt countries in the world.
All of these are good reasons why the EU should rapidly invest in its own defense force. Putin will step-down one way or another the next 20 years and then it may get ugly, nobody knows who are waiting in the wings...
Loosely I agree with commenters remarking that the Cold War is over. (Though not the disrespect for the Russian capability. That is a country that still knows how to fight a war.)
But if not for Russia, why does Europe need a military? To get strategic independence from the US? In that case, where is the money? Why the howling about Trump wanting to reduce the US contribution?
And how is the command going to work?
These are rhetorical questions. I think Merkel is insincere, and playing to a domestic audience.
> But if not for Russia, why does Europe need a military?
I guess Turkey is the obvious other candidate. Not so many nukes, of course, but invaded a now EU member in 1974. Plays games with the edges of Greek airspace every week or so? Officially still in NATO but who knows what that means.
> I think Merkel is insincere, and playing to a domestic audience.
Its a global world, EU as one of the biggest blocks needs its own military for many reasons. Its time to cut the reliance of the US, but remain very close allies.
If defense spending is done right, purchased locally by local companies, a lot of the money circles back into the economy.
>The reason Europe is so dependent on the US is because European NATO members have for decades chosen not to honour their spending and capability obligations to that treaty. Certainly this includes Denmark. A quick google suggests this rich nation is spending 1.3% instead of the 2% minimum.
That "treaty" was pushed to European nations, mafia style, and voted in by right-wing parties and politicians (sometimes right-wing to the point of dictatorship), in the Cold War era, as protection against USSR.
It's still pushed now through diplomatic pressure, profitable handouts to vote in favor, etc., not because those nations really want it.
Americans won't know this history. They also don't know that weak countries prefer to remain neutral rather than join NATO. Joining NATO also makes you a target. US tried hard to get everyone to join, including a fair bit of meddling in nation politics.
Despite this neither Finland nor Sweden are in NATO.
Finland not being in NATO is more a result of it's successful strategy of surviving the cold war by sitting on the fence playing both sides [1]. Since the collapse of the USSR and Finland joining the EU the situation is quite different, but old habits, particularly successful ones, are hard to shake.
[1] One can of course speculate what would have happened if the cold war would have turned hot. Would ostensibly neutral Finland have been left alone, or would both NATO and the Warsaw Pact have nuked it just to be sure. Or would the massive nuclear strikes on the nearby Murmansk and Leningrad areas have caused such massive fallout that it would have been a moot point anyway?
German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Tuesday called for creating a European Union army, stressing that Europeans can no longer merely rely on the U.S. for their security.
It will never happen. There has been - on paper - a Franco-German brigade for decades, it’s never deployed anywhere. Meanwhile supposed arch-rivals UK and France have been doing joint operations all over the place and this is only set to increase.
Besides it was all triggered by Trump saying some NATO countries were failing to meet their commitments, and no one knows what Biden thinks about it
Denmark is somewhat more reliant on the US than the average European country because of Greenland. Eastern countries like Poland are similarly beholden to NATO because Russia is an immediate threat for them. Everyone else is basically just lazy: relying on the Americans saves us a lot of money and effort that European public opinion is unwilling to spend. This allows e.g. France to play “Africa’s cop” to prop up their own economy and influence.
This laziness will probably bite us in the ass at some point. Trump was the first but won’t be the last US president pushing for disengagement from the Old World. You cannot build a superpower-sized army in a few months, and direct threats are only increasing (as well as Russia we now have Turkey, Lybia, Egypt, Algeria, Serbia - they could all go rogue at short notice and literally start firing shots at the continent).
> Trump was the first but won’t be the last US president pushing for disengagement from the Old World[...]
It was Obama who started pushing for the 2% policy and got NATO countries to agree to ramp spending up to that before 2024[1].
Before that there's been decades of the US trying to push Europe to take defense spending more seriously.
Trump's had more juvenile rhetoric on the issue, but he fundamentally wasn't saying anything to NATO or enacting any policies that Obama pursuing before him.
Yeah but with Obama and his predecessors it was just about money, everyone knew the score. This could be bargained at diplomatic level with other stuff. Trump looked willing and able to actually do the unthinkable and redeploy away, irrespective of strategic considerations, and his closeness with Putin and Erdogan was unsettling.
Biden will likely mark a return to the old haggling, but in 4 years' time the US might get another strongman and we'd be at risk again. Democracy will always need an arsenal, and it's not a given anymore that the US really want to be that arsenal.
Good point - as an european, I see for example Turkey as much bigger threat currently compared to Russia. They are aggressive as hell, directly (Syria, Greece, semi-open support of ISIS in the region) and indirectly (ie Karabach). Putin will be gone one day, and the idea that somebody more like Erdogan would be leading Russia gives me goosebumps.
You don't have to project power to distant places only directly via supercarriers and local military bases, various subversions can get you pretty far.
Yep. It's not hard to think of a scenario where Bulgaria or Greece get in turmoil because of economic or social woes and Turkish troops advance into their territories to "ensure security" like they did in Syria.
>> German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Tuesday called for creating a European Union army, stressing that Europeans can no longer merely rely on the U.S. for their security.
Source? She said that two years ago [1] but on Tuesday her defense minister sounded much less enthusiastic about it [2].
> German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Tuesday called for creating a European Union army, stressing that Europeans can no longer merely rely on the U.S. for their security.
What I don't get is why the US doesn't just ask the questions they would like to have answered. In most cases our politicians would pretty much just tell them what they need to know.
In the case of the F35 it especially make no sense, AT ALL. The selection process for a new fighter jet was so heavily skewed in favor of the F35 that other manufacturers didn't even want to bid. At no point did anyone seriously believe that any other plane was even an option.
It's my belief that letting the NSA do their spying is a move done to ensure that our own politicians cannot be held responsible for informing the US about internal affairs. As you say, they show a complete apathy towards the situation.
The current generation of politicians has an unhealthy positive view of surveillance in general, while attempting to keep the press and public out from anything they deem to be "confidential government decisions".
> What I don't get is why the US doesn't just ask the questions they would like to have answered. In most cases our politicians would pretty much just tell them what they need to know.
I imagine part of the mission is counter-intelligence. Verifying Danish negotiators aren't leaking sensitive information to e.g. Russia or China. In those cases, the NSA is probing for information the politicians do not have.
Not trying to being sceptic here, but before and after seeing the latest Greenland movie, I think USA owns already Greenland de facto for all practical purposes. Denmark just has it on paper and pays the costs. If Russia wanted to take Greenland (why?), then USA will fight of course because it is already theirs.
I don't agree with this, and neither does the Greenland Home Rule: https://naalakkersuisut.gl/en
USA has a base to the very north east of Greenland (Thule Air Base), but most of the workforce there is people from Denmark and Greenland. They used to have other bases (e.g. Sonderstrom), but are currently primarily based on Thule.
However, after the POTUS offer on buying Greenland, USA is now (re)opening a consulate there.
Source: I'm Danish and have worked at Thule Air Base several years ago.
The main issue for EU with regard to NSA/USA, is that NSA makes no difference on data collection and USA government makes no difference in intelligence use. NSA collects all data they can and USA government uses that to maximize USA interests, no matter if it is terrorism or industrial espionage and information sharing with their US national businesses against EU. Unlike USA, EU has nothing that organized in place to match that threat.
Please let the EU develop its own standing military force independent of NATO and US. It's truly about time this happened. We need a third counterpart to China and the USA.
We just don't have public figures in the EU who can do what an American president can do.
Trump might not be able to command the loyalty of NATO if it came down to it. But we would listen to Bush, Clinton or Obama, I don't see a figure in the EU who can address the world in this way.
When Bush said we were going into Afghanistan (right or wrong) we did it.
Who in the EU can speak on behalf of the free world?
I'm european, and I've heard we have an EU president -- but I have no clue who that is, or what it means.
Why would a European army be directed by Germans ? They're notoriously incompetent in military affairs. They don't have the personnel nor the expertise required to take control of the army to begin with.
Times have changed. A big German army isn't the thing anyone in 2020 worries anymore.
The last times they worried, Germany was 10% of the world economy and growing fast and Europe itself was probably 50% of the world economy (probably more considering all the territories). Now Germany is something like 3% and Europe is at 20% and going down.
> In 2017, according to the CIA's World Factbook, the GWP was around US $80.27 trillion in nominal terms and totaled approximately 127.8 trillion international dollars in terms of purchasing power parity (PPP).
> German GDP: $3,780 trillion, $4.454 trillion PPP.
So, Germany is 4% of the world GDP in nominal terms and 3.4% in PPP terms. And that was back in 2017, developing countries are growing faster, so Germany's share probably went down.
So Europe is 22% of the world GDP in nominal terms and 14% in PPP terms. And it's definitely going down as a share of the world economy.
Germany also is only only about 20% of EU GDP in nominal terms and 24% in PPP terms. This part is also going down.
You're conflating the EU with Europe. Europe has quite a few economies outside the EU: UK, Russia, Switzerland, Norway, etc. Germany is probably 12-15% of the European economy, or maybe less.
>Your info is out of date by a decade or more, I think.
The German economy is the fourth-largest in the world and accounted for one quarter (24.7%) of the European Union’s GDP in 2019.
The second biggest in the EU (now France) is one third smaller. 3,449.050 (Germany) 2,425.708 (France)
>So, Germany is 4% of the world GDP in nominal terms and 3.4% in PPP terms.
That's not important in terms of the EU
>You're conflating the EU with Europe. Europe has quite a few economies outside the EU: UK, Russia, Switzerland, Norway, etc. Germany is probably 12-15% of the European economy, or maybe less.
No i don't because i live in one of that Non EU but European/Schengen country's..again nothing todo with a EU-Army
>And it's definitely going down as a share of the world economy.
Again it's not about the World but the EU and the Schengen-Space
Nope, I linked the wrong thing. It still doesn't invalidate my other numbers. Germany is at best 25% of the EU economy and going down. Not "more than a third" (33%) as you claimed.
In any case, fear of Germany is overblown in 2020. I'd definitely want a EU army with a major German contribution. Don't be a general fighting the previous war ;-)
>Which country's army do you think doesn't have far right people in it?
True but Germany is really famous for it, and it looks like they just don't get it under control, example? The most elite Fighting-force (KSK) has a big Nazi Problem...for years now.
>So which country would you want to take the lead.
Non of them, hence my idea to make a pact like Nato and not a European Army.
I'm not sure precisely when we decided that intelligence gathering wasn't a part of all diplomatic relations?
I expect my government to be spying on everyone to some degree or other, friend or foe. I have to assume the same is therefore being done to us. The US simply has more money and more resources allocated to doing so.
Why can't we just talk and discuss with each other like normal human beings? Why do we have to result to all this deceiving, tricking, spying each other?
Because we're not talking about human beings. We're talking about huge, huge collectives of humans that are impossible to trust or predict. Think of states like you do of corproations: You wouldn't trust a corporation to do "the right thing" or "act nice", wouldn't you? Now image the corporation has nukes and tanks and lives next to your back door. We have a saying: "Trust is nice, surveillance is better" (which is used in different context but applies very nicely for this situation).
I know it’s not a popular opinion, but I’d like you to at least consider the possibility that spying between both allies increases peace and diplomatic cooperation.
The outcome of spying is that we know what our allies are going to do. If our intelligence verifies something our allies told us already, this process fosters trust and better relations. If our intelligence uncovers lies, we have forewarning and are not caught completely off guard.
I like both outcomes, though I can see how being spied on would feel bad. I suspect governments have come to much the same conclusion, because it seems tolerated that pretty much every embassy on earth is 50% spies. Yes, even european embassies in the US. In fact, opening new embassies in allied countries and increasing the number of staff in them is seen as a mark of friendship.
Expect the standard 'Mistakes made, Accidental access, Lessons Learned & Never happen again' response from the NSA.
And this only a mere 5 years after [1] " American spies may have snooped on Angela Merkel's mobile phone for more than ten years, according to reports in Germany."
Lessons Learned, Accidental, Never Happen Again etc etc indeed.
The NSA has a budget bigger than entire countries economic output. Not everyone spies on everyone to the same extent.
Not everyone breaks their own laws constantly to the same extent.
Not everyone hides behind some bullshit moral argument to justify their actions to same extent.
The rot is real. They now have more power than any elected official including the President and repeatedly lie under sworn oath. These people are no longer public servants they are public masters.
> The NSA has a budget bigger than entire countries economic output. Not everyone spies on everyone to the same extent.
Very few countries have vast global interests, you can count them on one hand. Of course the US has extensive global spying efforts and of course its spying activities do not compare to smaller nations, nations with smaller economies, nations with a fraction of the military responsibilities that the US has, and so on.
The US doesn't have any interest in what direction allies and enemies go with their military hardware, such that espionage would be warranted to know in advance if at all possible? Is that a joke?
Macron has been saying variations of this: "Europe can no longer rely on the United States for its security" - for the past several years (pushing for his pet European defense force idea). Do you know what that means? That's one of the world's most powerful nations openly admitting Europe presently depends on the US for its security. That has been true for over seven decades now. That's a massive responsibility, and the same is true for the US in Asia. Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand all depend on the US for their security in one form or another (against China specifically and going forward in particular, as China will grow far more powerful and threatening). Numerous other nations in Asia will join that list, eg Vietnam will come to depend on the US as a military hedge against China.
Now kindly point out all the other various nations that have similar global responsibilities on their shoulders.
"except those who cannot muster the resources to do so" is about power of countryA vs countryB. Your parent is writing about power of countryAspies vs countryApeople/countryAdemocraticprocess.
This is the unfortunate truth. Intelligence agencies have to learn to do more with less information if we want basic privacy to survive as a natural right.
Even in Denmark where the political system is much more cooperative than in the US, politics is still a “dirty job” full of spin and personal sacrifice, exposure etc. As a result many good people would never put it on themselves to enter politics.
> I'd be extremely surprised if our intelligence agencies didn't give them stolen tech.
I'd be extremely surprised if any tech that is stolen is better than what they have / are working on. There is lots to criticize about America, their funding and continuous innovation in war tech is not one of those things.
> Boeing or Lockheed Martin on the other hand, I'd be extremely surprised if our intelligence agencies didn't give them stolen tech.
Assuming we’re talking about military tech. Why should they? What tech is the military and defense industry lacking in that would provide a battlefield advantage that other countries have?
There’s only a handful of non-US weapon systems that can potentially compete with US weapon systems.
I think the scope of your consideration is a bit narrow. Lockheed Martin probably isn't very interested in stealing technology from Sukhoi to clone and put in their own jets. However it seems quite likely that Lockheed has an interest in the particulars of Sukhoi jets, their weapon systems, radars and EW systems, and airframe capabilities, so that Lockheed may better design systems meant to counter those systems. Certainly the design of effective stealth aircraft required knowledge of opposition radar systems.
As for the American military being top dog by a long mile... that seems true, but you don't stay that way by being complacent.
In simple scenarios with two actors perhaps, but I don't think that holds true for complex scenarios with multiple participants. Somebody who steals the best from everybody and is always one generation behind the state of the art in every regard may still prevail against all others because they are a Jack of all trades, master of none.
I'm not saying there isn't use for knowing your adversary's capabilities (especially in designing your own offense/defensive systems) but very little of that knowledge informs the core of future arms programs.
I am sorry but for me there is a difference between, let's spy those Iranians to see what they're up to and, spy that Japanese company to steal secrets for its American competitor.
> Setting a moral example by Doing the Right Thing would be a ridiculously huge mistake.
OK, cool, but this can be applied then to not only spying, this can be used to justify ANYTHING done by a government.
>> Setting a moral example by Doing the Right Thing would be a ridiculously huge mistake.
> OK, cool, but this can be applied then to not only spying, this can be used to justify ANYTHING done by a government.
Apply that logic to police forces and you get the situation we are in now.
That article proves the opposite point, despite the intense message-warping attempted.
The report in question is a hypothetical "what if" scenario analysis (one of many) that outlines one possible strategy to address a future where US corporate innovation is not in the top tier. It's not real and it's speculative about the medium-to-long term future.
Despite falling over itself to try to imply the US might actually be guilty of trade secret theft for corporations... it fails to provide a single example.
I am easily as aware of the activities of US intelligence SIGINT programs as nearly any civilian on this site, and just as reflexively critical of them as you would expect of a HN poster (my interest stems from my opposition), but I have never seen any indication of industrial espionage on behalf of American businesses à la China in at least the post-Church committee period. If you make a strong claim, you should be able to support it with evidence.
It’s worth noting that the article only references a leaked memo for a potential plan for the future, rather than concretely describing current activities. Not to say you’re necessarily wrong, but that article isn’t the strongest evidence IMO.
> Setting a moral example by Doing the Right Thing would be a ridiculously huge mistake
It seems like we need moral people in leadership positions around world the at the top who don't care about game theory. Game theory is a curse that needs to be eliminated. Prisoner's dilemma does no one good.
The biggest impediment to trust is non trustworthy people at top.
Geopolitics IS for nice people, we just need to make sure nice people are involved in geopolitics and make it to the top. I know people with power who have been absolutely moral despite no oversight. The could've given their children or themselves so much benefit but they did everything for collective good of everyone. People like that exist, but they also prefer hanging out with people like them. Not opportunists. Humans win collectively with cooperation.
The problem is the prisoners didn't put themselves in prison – they find themselves there as a consequence of international politics and must play the game to the best of their abilities
I think the problem is that the sanctity of the 5-Eyes data-sharing was abused. While what you say is both true and also valid, the promises offered were (excuse the phrase) ass-raped by the US and extremely one sided.
Sure, there was a great deal of naivety on the part of the European Nations that were lining up to share the Great Firehose (As you say, 'If you could, Why wouldn't you?').
It is also true that there was a certain amount of 'beers, bribes & hoe's for the bros' involved but I honestly don't think that anyone in Europe ever truly considered that any intel gathered would be used by the US in the way it was.
Everyone doesn't do it because they can't and it it's still more than fine.
The US is the world's sole military superpower and post WW2 has been singularly responsible for the world being the safest it has been in recorded history, both in terms of large wars (including large powers going to war with eachother) and weaker nations getting annexed by stronger powers (a now rare event and historically common).
If North Korea wants to invade and annex South Korea, they'd have to go through the US. If China wants to take territory from Japan, they have to go through the US (ask Biden, he just confirmed that for Japan, to their delight). If China wants Taiwan, they're afraid they'd have to go through the US (or they'd have already taken it). If Russia wants the Baltics, a chunk of Finland, part of Poland, or Romania's Black Sea territory, it has to go through the US.
Who else provides that blanket for the world?
The US should be spying on what everyone is doing militarily, without exception.
Thanks for saying this. In one case we set a moral example by agreeing to let China and Co. sell us cheap disposable goods with the explicit goal of lifting their farming class out of poverty. We did this at the expense of millions upon millions of Americans and their descendants. It's a real shame that neither political party can agree on a set of actions to reverse that trend.
Tbh the USA has some agreements exclusively with the UAE and Israel that they don't spy on them and stuff like that. They just write out "monitoring reports" from their embassies.
I don't know about the US spying on Israel, but Israel and the UAE actively spy on the US, and this arrangement is pretty much allowed. I do know that US embassies in both places "monitor" their host countries, which is significantly different from spying and intercepting comms.
Interesting that the US doesn't actively spy on its partners, at least in their home countries, yet they allow it to be done to them. I don't follow this stuff closely so I can't really contribute. I'm sure others here would like to hear more.
I do remember when Israel's cell tower interceptors were found in D.C.
It probably has something to do with Israel being very popular with wide swaths of the American public (particularly evangelical Christians), to such an extent that it's not terribly uncommon to hear American politicians praise Israel to garner more support from themselves.
Israel gladly accepts all the help it can from the US, but is well aware of the large support that American anti-zionist and pro-palestinian causes receive. They also don't trust certain administrations to always have their back, even if stated publicly.
In summary, Israel always has a bunker mentality of "us vs. the world". The US, while an ally, isn't immune from suspicion and active and aggressive spying efforts.
I mean, perhaps not on the ground in Israel (which amounts to a small technicality). They still keep tabs on Israel activity everywhere else.
Allies in general don't mind being spied on, as long as that intel is shared. For example, German security forces had no idea about the Hamburg cell plotting 9/11 in their country. They would very much wanted a tip off, even from an allied spy agency.
You are correct regarding SIGINT, that allies don't mind being spied upon. What they do mind is when they themselves are being spied upon. Like Merkel's phone being tapped. Or the US recruiting on ground assets in Saudi Arabia.
> What they do mind is when they themselves are being spied upon
That's what SIGINT is.
> Like Merkel's phone being tapped.
Which is an example of SIGINT. And it was leaked which is why it became an issue. World leader's are always surveilled.
There's a certain level of aggression you use against acknowledged enemies that would be awkward if exposed against allies, that is not to say it doesn't still happen.
Oh, my bad at that, got a brain fart I suppose. Sweeped surveillance (which is usually SIGINT) is not minded, and often the backbone of programmes such as Five Eyes relies on that. Targeted surveillance (SIGINT cases that I mentioned) and espionage (mostly HUMINT) is frowned upon. HUMINT is especially frowned upon since it means you're actively investing in recruiting citizens against their government, and the intel is usually much more valuable and more expensive to garner. HUMINT Intel isn't practiced between staunch allies either, but maybe between uneasy allies and enemies.
The world will have a master. The question is, who do you want the master to be?
Your choices are America, China, or Russia. That's it.
You may not like it, but you can't do anything about it, and denying it and raising a fuss about it is childish naivety, not at its finest, but at its absolute worst.
> Your choices are America, China, or Russia. That's it.
Don't sleep on the EU. They are largest economic/political entity in the world. Not america, not china, not russia. The EU represents the world's largest market, has a larger population than the US, larger defense budget than china, currency that could possibly replace the dollar one day and a legacy/network of former colonial possessions all over the world.
The problem for EU is they haven't forged a nation like what US or India has done in spite of their cultural diversity. They're still essential squabbling little countries. How horrifically the south European countries were treated during the financial crisis instead of the EU pulling together just demonstrates how bad the situation is. Unless it federalizes, it will have little or no political impact.
>"The world will have a master. The question is, who do you want the master to be?"
I prefer not to have a single master but a multi-polar world where countries learn to use a diplomacy and do things for a mutual benefit rather than submit to the biggest dick on a street. And I think this is where the world is going.
Well we have progressed since then a little, don't you think? What used to be solved by force is now solved by diplomacy more often. And large scale wars are less likely because of nukes. Otherwise we are going to a dictatorship on international scale. Fuck that
"An important developed nation is picking a new fighter. Let's know nothing until it's over with." is hardly good stewardship of your own nation's trust and resources. It's the NSA's job to monitor who is friends with whom so policy makers can make policy.
That's not to say the NSA should do anything they can. But it is their proper job to spy on non-Americans for America.
This is a good model to refer to from time to time.
I would add that "ally" doesn't mean co-operate in all spheres. It's perfectly reasonable for two nations to have border skirmishes and have bi/multi-lateral trade agreements simultaneously.
A nation is a multifaceted entity and it isn't possible to model it as one single blob. Inter-nation relationships are very fluid, and evolving all the time.
I find it funny when I see Indian social media flare up with "ban Chinese goods" whenever there are border skirmishes. It's as if trade and border-disputes somehow won't fit together and that there is a very sharp line between "ally" and "enemy".
Unfortunately, politicians take advantage of this sharp divide in people's mind to rally large groups of people against an imagined threat from a nation to garner support/votes. My father-in-law was very agitated about India-China border skirmish thanks to all the media coverage. In his mind Indian economy would be doomed. I asked him if the condition of the shitty public road he travels by each day improve if India won that dispute. He is perfectly fine to accept the crappy day-to-day life (non-existent roads, shitty power supply, un-usable water etc.,) but would suddenly get riled with some random dispute thousands of miles away!
I guess you are not from a military family. It is pretty well known in military intelligence circles that China wishes to annex the eastern Indian states. They already consider several areas of the Indian eastern states within their national borders - see the official national maps of the PLA.
PLA has official strategy - part of their SOP inculcated into their officer corps - to regularly push incursions into Indian territory and check the response of the Indian central government. We have already lost 1000 square km over the last couple of years. 38,000 square km over the last decade if you consider our formally acknowledged boundaries.
So, yes, unless you wish to lose the Indian eastern states, access to natural resources and secede control over the vast majority of the Indian water supply, one will need to remain vigilant and ready. That includes heavy military readiness.
The other option is to kneel to China and become a vassal state. No double the condition of roads would improve ? All you have to do is love the CCP.
> Nations should spy on enemies, not friends, lest they find themselves without friends.
It's an established norm that nations spy on their friends. Everyone wants to know what their friends are thinking. It's often much more consequential than what their adversaries are thinking.
> Nations should spy on enemies, not friends, lest they find themselves without friends.
Nations should spy on friends as well, lest they find out too late that who those whom they thought were their friends were actually working with their enemies against them.
Lets take the Turkey case for example. For all intents and purposes, they are a close NATO ally since the Cold War. They were part of the F-35 program, where the specific electronic and radar profile are paramount to the tactical advantage of the weapon system. But Turkey decided they wanted to buy into the Russian S400 antiair system as well (given that their alternatives like Pariot is frankly quite lackluster).
Now lets put aside the potential of hidden Russian code providing telemetry back to the motherland about what is going on. Similar performance information about F-35 detections could easily be acquired through non technological means as well through human intelligence. The entire premise of the F-35 program is essentially that OpFor doens't really have great knowledge in the radar profile of what the F-35 looks like, meaning it could lead to an inefficient deployment of resources/unknown vulnerability in radar coverage.
So much of modern air war doctrine is premised on this notion, that the concern of what nation buys into what system creates systemic risk. If it's a narrow program that is intended to understand potential risk, I think it is easily justified. If it is to try to win contracts for American companies for a profit in a form of state sponsored industrial espionage a la China, I am fully against.
There's a world of difference between "occasional incidental radar profiling of F-35 from the OpFor perspective" and "Consistent friendly profiling of F-35 as they land at Incirlik air base".
The problem isn't the spying, it's their duty after all. The problem is the suspected strong arming that may or may not have occurred behind the scenes.
I remember a Dutch politician that was vehemently opposed to the F35 that died in mysterious circumstances. I would normally put this on coincidences but when the stakes are that high I won't go for Ockham razor first.
Do you have any source for that with any evidence?
It seems like a huge overreaction to murder a single vocally opposed politician just over a aircraft fighter deal - even if he was a critical decision maker (which I'm going to guess he wasn't).
So under this data sharing agreement where the US is sharing data with them, would you say the Danish FE would be failing at their job if they weren't using this system to target American politicians?
The article lays out the expectations (and law) of the Danes re hosting the NSA espionage center and ground rules about its non-use against Danish interests, which sound pretty modest.
For the Danes to trust spies requires willful naïveté, no? I wouldn't be surprised to hear key Danish politicians got bribed or blackmailed into being so credulous in the first place.
They are neither bribed or blackmailed, every danish government for the past 20 years have been informed about this agreement and has complied. It's absolutely a crime against the population (since innocent Danes are also being spied on). The reason the politicians are complying is that we are reliant on US for military support through Nato (which I guess you can call a bribe, of sorts)
Diplomacy and military alliances are complicated. When you catch another country breaking their promises you make a fuss (sometimes public, sometimes not), doesn't necessarily have anything to do with whether you were are aware of the possibility before.
I think we should expect nations to manipulate other nation’s elections as well. The US has a long history of doing that yet is horrified when other nations do it to us.
Plot twist: Huawei hardware is more secure than American hardware.
We all know that Cisco equipment has already been compromised by the NSA. And that all the major American tech companies are in collusion with the federal government.
What we don’t know yet, is how secure Chinese built hardware and software is.
I don't hope foreign intelligence services succeed. I hope our people and systems are better than theirs. But I do expect them to do it. It would be wrong for them not to do everything they can to secure their nations too.
I'm Danish... On the one hand none of this surprises me.
On the other hand, I wish the US would trust our politicians a bit more. There is no way we could have bought anything other than the F35, why even bother spying? :)
At the end of the day I hope we'll never use the air planes -- so what does it matter if they can't fly :D
Seriously, though... It might be best if I trust that the politicians we've elected makes reasonable deals. When it comes to geo politics they might know better than me.
At the end of the day, I kind of trust the US more than anyone else, regardless.
(Not saying I don't wish the world was different, just that in practice all of this hopefully doesn't matter much)
Hey, please don't break the site guidelines like this, no matter how wrong another user is or you feel they are. I understand very well how frustrating it can be, but responding this way only wrecks this place even further.
I fought on the ground in Afghanistan. I know what it's like to fear dying, see friends blown apart, and expect not to see my family again. Believe it or not that's exactly why I think "trust then verify" is a good policy when handing over such a sophisticated weapon. Too many lives are at stake, on all sides, not to.
While perversion of national-security spying for generic & narrow commercial gain is concerning, arms deals are a hybrid case. To the extent a case involves government-on-government spying, it's hard for me to get angry. I tend to see it as a rare horizontal form of transparency/accountability among entities that often have too few checks on their corruption & skulduggery.
Even between friendly governments, maybe friends that spy on each other achieve an even greater mutual trust - an assurance there's nothing being planned internally that conflicts with the claims made via official channels.
"If you've got nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear" is a shitty principle when hypocritically deployed by the powerful against private people.
But doesn't it kind of make sense when applied to governments? What right-to-privacy, exactly, does a government have against its citizens or allies?
When both allies were spying on each other, then sure, you can go "hehe look at us sillies xD".
But when it's just one party doing the spying, it violates trust, not builds it, as the US has learned.
It's hard to measure how much the Snowden revelations have contributed to the distancing of US allies, since there was also someone else who contributed greatly to the ongoing political isolation of the US, but it certainly didn't help build trust.
It's super ironic various EU government parts want to introduce encryption backdoors "for the good guys" (sic), without understanding they'll be opening themselves up to more scenarios like this. :/
I can't say I'm surprised they spied on their allies, it's a US spy agency after all. It does underline the fact that countries within the EU should move away from US deals for industries their member states compete in. The US simply cannot be trusted.
It’s just about money. The entire dealing was unneeded and seemed driven primarily by the need of corrupt officials to get paid. Makes perfect sense that they spied on officials, likely some where made to fall in line using intelligence instead of bags of money and promises of extravagant consulting jobs later down the line.
There's no way the Pentagon actually cares what planes Denmark buys, so some Lockheed executive probably asked a congressman to do it at some DC luncheon, and then the congressman made a bunch of noise at the Pentagon, and somebody at the Pentagon made a bunch of noise at the NSA, and the NSA had some Georgetown flunky query a database with some names and email addresses and write a report.
The question is: Did the NSA spy on Danish companies for political reasons or industrial espionage reasons?
I think the former is to be expected while the latter is not.
As an aside.. say the NSA finds out some great industrial espionage info.. how do they actually give the information to the correct US companies? Drop a USB stick in front of the CEOs door?
Considering that any knowledge of importance in this context will go to the military–industrial complex, I don't think the act of actually sharing the information is an issue.
In this post-Snowden revelations world isn't it wise to assume the NSA is spying on absolutely everything and everyone they possibly can with the goal of strategic, military and financial gain of the USA?
I mean.... that's their job, and we know they have the tools to do it.
It's not often you read headlines about the NSA actually doing what they're meant to do. I'm glad to hear they still find time for real work, not just spying on everybody's dick pics.
That denmark should not have a defence? I think thats wrong, even if it cant resist the enemies on its own. Its a lot easier to get your allies to help you while you are figthing to defend yourself instead of asking your allies to reconquer your contry.
I take your 4 hour surrender snark, but saying its preferred is properly too much for a one time occurence.
