Should US Leave NATO???

[Renegade7]

For the record, im not the one that voted yes, i picked not yet when i voted.

[PeterMP]

2 hours ago, Renegade7 said:

That's nkt what i said, so it's not meaningless.  I said they aren't even switching political parties peacefully, let alone systems of government.

 

You are paying attention to that social credit system in China?  Or it's not entirely clear the majority of Russia actually wants a western style systemor ever did?  I'm an optimist by nature, but I wouldn't hold my breathe on either of them and those are ones you need worry about most.  No matter what i want, a 1984 type scenario is not impossible when even US voted for authoritarianism recently.

 

Exactly why we shouldn't get out of NATO right now, even if we a lot of both, especially in 20th century.

 

1.  I'm not saying that there is no threat of the US falling into a totalitarian regime that does not practice democracy, liberty, or believe in free markets.  If that does happen, obviously that changes things.

 

2.  I don't care what happens in China (in terms of their social credit system) or Russia or what the people there want.   

 

I'm making a fundamental point.  if you believe that the best government is one that practices individual freedom and liberty, it is clear Russia and China have a poor government system and as such, that they are really a long term threat to us doesn't seem to be very realistic.  The only real threat to us is us (China and Russia can't make us embrace totalitarianism, that has to come from within).

 

(Though, in general, I think people are way to up tight over the Chinese social credit system.  Governments have long used various measures to try to get populations to behave in ways that are the best.  We use laws in terms of fines and jail, but also more subtle things like the tax code to incentive and punish certain behaviors.)

 

I'm generally not for pulling out of NATO.  I am also for assessing the risks to our country realistically.  China is not the threat that many people make it out to be.  Our biggest threat is ourselves (and to tie in an idea that made to @twa in the climate change thread, I think the our biggest threat is a loss of a sense of responsibility.  When I had Civics (years ago), we talked about rights and responsibilities.  Lots of people want to talk about their rights today, but there is a lot less talk about responsibilities.  You have a right to the freedom of speech, but that right comes with responsibilities.

[Renegade7]

@PeterMP i get what you trying to say, i just don't believe it's wise to say our system is better so we should only worry about changing our minds when Russia is actively trying to do that.  We haven't even gotten to how we are getting totally outspent in regards to non-kinetic such as cyber weapons or DoD has said they don't think we can fight China and Russia at same time in a full on kinetic one and win. It is a mistake to assume we will win just because we are right.

[PeterMP]

2 hours ago, Renegade7 said:

@PeterMP i get what you trying to say, i just don't believe it's wise to say our system is better so we should only worry about changing our minds when Russia is actively trying to do that.  We haven't even gotten to how we are getting totally outspent in regards to non-kinetic such as cyber weapons or DoD has said they don't think we can fight China and Russia at same time in a full on kinetic one and win. It is a mistake to assume we will win just because we are right.

 

Just to be clear, I didn't say are system was better.  I said, if you believe it is, then a lot of worry about China doesn't make much sense.  If you believe in American exceptionalism then....

 

Worrying about a combined China and Russia war makes no practical sense.  China and Russia have never really been allies even when they were both communist.  They have much more to be adversarial about than to be allies on.

 

Even combined China and Russia do not have the ability to project power (using non-nuclear weapons) to carry out an invasion of the continental US so we aren't losing a war to them both combined either.

 

Worrying about if our military can win a war against China and Russia in Asia or Eastern Europe is like worrying about if you have enough car insurance coverage that you are covered in one of those 20 car pile ups if you are found solely responsible, all of the other cars are Tesla's, are totaled, and all of the people in those cars died in the accident.

 

Yeah, it might be nice to have that much coverage and there is some slight chance you might actually need it, but is almost certainly it is a waste.  In the context of our military, it is an excuse for irrational military spending where the costs almost certainly out weight the pros.

[Renegade7]

@PeterMP you are annoyingly trying to win a debate versus have a conversation if from my last post you think you can just explain it away with an example on car insurance.  China is picking off our economic allies, Russia is picking off our military allies.  They don't need to invade us to win, isoltating and destroying us from within is what they are currently doing, scraping us off the other continents.

[PleaseBlitz]

 

 

Hmmm, maybe Trump doesn't actually know **** about ****. 

[PeterMP]

47 minutes ago, Renegade7 said:

@PeterMP you are annoyingly trying to win a debate versus have a conversation if from my last post you think you can just explain it away with an example on car insurance.  China is picking off our economic allies, Russia is picking off our military allies.  They don't need to invade us to win, isoltating and destroying us from within is what they are currently doing, scraping us off the other continents.

 

Okay, then for what you've just described, why does our military matter?  Are you going to go to war with them either one of them (much less both of them) based on their current actions?

 

Are China and Russia something we should competely ignored- no.  Am I worried about them long term if we do the things we should do?  No.

 

Do I think we should try to have a military that can defeat China and Russia in a war?  No.

 

And Poland and Romania are not our normal military allies.

[Renegade7]

45 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

Okay, then for what you've just described, why does our military matter?  Are you going to go to war with them either one of them (much less both of them) based on their current actions?

 

Big picture, long game.  You keep talking about smaller timeframe then I am.  History shows world powers either disappearing or going throw periods of strength and weakness.  US has only been a world power a fraction of the time Russia and China has in the grand scheme of human history, you talking about Putin and Xi, what about after them?

 

Quote

Are China and Russia something we should competely ignored- no. 

 

Agreed.

 

Quote

 

Am I worried about them long term if we do the things we should do?  No.

 

Disagree, you're being optimistic on that a working or what things we need to do to ensure we shouldn't worry about them.  Keep in mind I'm saying we should stay in NATO, so I'm not sure what we doing outside of defending ourselves.  I'm open to hear what you think we should do from here, jus as much as I'm open to jus admitting I made a mistake, wait for Steve to show up and say I told you so  and let this thread fall back off the front page again.

 

Quote

Do I think we should try to have a military that can defeat China and Russia in a war?  No.

 

Yes, but way more efficiently.  We dont know what the future holds, but I know we didnt plan on Germany and Japan planning on land grabbing for resources at the same time, either.  I look at NATO as a way to counter balance what essentially is a 2-1 fight.  

 

I want to reiterate that I came in to change my vote because nothing we do will matter if we run out of friends, whether that's done democratically via authoritarianism or militarily via invasion.  I'm willing to leave it at that and move on. 

[PeterMP]

28 minutes ago, Renegade7 said:

 

Big picture, long game.  You keep talking about smaller timeframe then I am.  History shows world powers either disappearing or going throw periods of strength and weakness.  US has only been a world power a fraction of the time Russia and China has in the grand scheme of human history, you talking about Putin and Xi, what about after them?

 

 

Agreed.

 

 

Disagree, you're being optimistic on that a working or what things we need to do to e sure we shouldn't worry a out them.  Keep in mind I'm saying we should stay in NATO, so I'm not sure what we doing outside of defending ourselves.  I'm open to hear what you think we should do from here, jus as much ad I'm open to jus admitting I made a mistake, wait for Steve to show up and say I told you so  and let this thread fall back off the front page again.

 

 

Yes, but way more efficiently.  We dont know what the future holds, but I know we didnt plan on Germany and Japan planning on land grabbing for resources at the same time, either.  I look at NATO as a way to counter balance what essentially is a 2-1 fight.  

 

I want to reiterate that I came in to change my vote because nothing we do will matter if we run out of friends, whether that's done democratically via authoritarianism or militarily via invasion.  I'm willing to leave it at that and move on. 

 

But you aren't really talking about longer time frames or big picture.  You are talking about what is happening right now and being done by Putin and Xi.  Who the heck knows what we should do with respect to a post-Putin Russia.  It might devolve into a civil war and be so consumed with itself that it isn't an external threat to anybody.

 

Russia and China have never really been world powers for long periods of time.   Both have spent more times being very much divided (warring) territories than coherent countries that were capable of exerting power on neighboring countries. 

 

Generally, China is natural resource poor.  Unless something happens and there is global demand for some natural resource that is heavily only found in China, they are always going to struggle to be a world power as compared to other countries that are of similar sizes.  The only thing that makes China a wold power is their size and that most of the world uses an economic system that puts a large value on consumers (and so China has value in terms of having people that at least potentially can be consumers).

 

Russia at least has the natural resources to be a world power.  We should worry about after Putin by doing what we can do to support democratic institutions and organizations that support democracy in Russia in hopes of having a western style democracy come out of Russia that would align with general western interests  (This would be a much better use of our money than building a military that has capability of taking on both Russia and China at the same time).  Though we can also significantly weaken Russia (now and in the future) by aggressively moving to alternative energy (another better use of our money than building a military that has the capability of both Russia and China).

 

And we didn't have a military designed to beat Germany and Japan at the same time and still (relatively) easily beat them.  (which sort of is my point).   During the Great Depression, we could have worried about building a military that at any time could have simultaneously beaten Japan and Germany or we could have funded the TVA.  We were better off funding the TVA and building a military that could beat Germany and then Japan (not really at the same time), when we actually needed it.

 

There is no evidence that we can more efficiently have a military that is capable of beating China and Russia at the same time in war than what we are already doing.  Even given a NATO backbone, there's no evidence that in practice that we can build a military that is capable of taking on Russia and China at the same time without a huge increase in the investment in our military.

 

(And I'll point out, that such an investment is almost certainly going to be funded by borrowing from China so while our military gets stronger economically we become more dependent on them (to the point that us making war on China is not practical making the use of the military you've built nill). )

[Renegade7]

1 hour ago, PeterMP said:

 

But you aren't really talking about longer time frames or big picture.  You are talking about what is happening right now and being done by Putin and Xi.  Who the heck knows what we should do with respect to a post-Putin Russia.  It might devolve into a civil war and be so consumed with itself that it isn't an external threat to anybody.

 

As a reference point to why we should stay in NATO now and immediate future, I've given examples of past powers that didn't have enough friends and that these two are actively undermining the ones we have.  Until that changes that's what they are doing, NATO is more then just military, and we've talked about how American Exceptionalism is a fancy term for sticking our fingers in our ears and claiming were right and have nothing to worry about.  We haven't been around long enough to really know what it's like to all the sudden not be a super power anymore.

 

1 hour ago, PeterMP said:

Russia and China have never really been world powers for long periods of time.   Both have spent more times being very much divided (warring) territories than coherent countries that were capable of exerting power on neighboring countries. 

 

China once had a Navy that made it all the way around the tip of Africa before Columbus even made it to America.  I'd love anyone to tell Estonia not to worry about being powerless against Russian cyberattacks on their power grind because they wouldn't stand a chance in a conventional war, not to mention reacting to invasion by pushing back all the way into western Europe not once but twice.  Them going up and down in power is normal, we just haven't seen what would happen if something like that happen to us knowing they both want to be taken seriously now and can be.  They won't stop that anytime soon.

 

1 hour ago, PeterMP said:

Generally, China is natural resource poor.  Unless something happens and there is global demand for some natural resource that is heavily only found in China, they are always going to struggle to be a world power as compared to other countries that are of similar sizes.  The only thing that makes China a wold power is their size and that most of the world uses an economic system that puts a large value on consumers (and so China has value in terms of having people that at least potentially can be consumers).

 

Why they would invade neighboring countries if they had to, what they are doing in South China sea is them just showing how little Fs they give in regards to what they want in the region.

 

1 hour ago, PeterMP said:

Russia at least has the natural resources to be a world power.  We should worry about after Putin by doing what we can do to support democratic institutions and organizations that support democracy in Russia in hopes of having a western style democracy come out of Russia that would align with general western interests  (This would be a much better use of our money than building a military that has capability of taking on both Russia and China at the same time).  Though we can also significantly weaken Russia (now and in the future) by aggressively moving to alternative energy (another better use of our money than building a military that has the capability of both Russia and China).

 

I agree with this, I just have a bad feeling unless we really come correct in good faith, it wont work.  Or they may turn it down anyway, goes back to reality some people actually prefer living in an authoritrian country as long as it doesn't interfere too much with what their doing from day to day.  That's the future I keep warning about, its already here, really.

 

1 hour ago, PeterMP said:

And we didn't have a military designed to beat Germany and Japan at the same time and still (relatively) easily beat them.  (which sort of is my point).   During the Great Depression, we could have worried about building a military that at any time could have simultaneously beaten Japan and Germany or we could have funded the TVA.  We were better off funding the TVA and building a military that could beat Germany and then Japan (not really at the same time), when we actually needed it.

 

Never said easily beat them both same time in Germany and Japan, nor Russia and China.  We did devote more resources to fighting Germany then Japan at first.  The disconnect here is comparing that to a hypothetical between China and Russia.  We were cutting Japan off from getting oil from us so we found focus more on Germany first, what reason would Russia not give China fuel if they were on the same team?

 

1 hour ago, PeterMP said:

There is no evidence that we can more efficiently have a military that is capable of beating China and Russia at the same time in war than what we are already doing.  Even given a NATO backbone, there's no evidence that in practice that we can build a military that is capable of taking on Russia and China at the same time without a huge increase in the investment in our military.

 

This comes back to needing more friends and being more efficient with a resources.  It rediculous how much we spend that we heading from nit being able to be both to possibly not able to best either even with a budget several times larger then theirs.  Something is wrong here, and recommendations aren't asking for much, just why does it cost so much? It's like health care, wtf?

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-military-edge-has-eroded-to-a-dangerous-degree-study-for-congress-finds/2018/11/13/ea83fd96-e7bc-11e8-bd89-eecf3b178206_story.html
 

 

1 hour ago, PeterMP said:

(And I'll point out, that such an investment is almost certainly going to be funded by borrowing from China so while our military gets stronger economically we become more dependent on them (to the point that us making war on China is not practical making the use of the military you've built nill). )

 

That's if we're idiots and don't raise taxes, in which case, we reap what we sow.

 

In all, I still believe you are too optimistic about Russia's and China's capabilities and intentions now and in the future.  I stand by that statement.

[PeterMP]

3 hours ago, Renegade7 said:

 

As a reference point to why we should stay in NATO now and immediate future, I've given examples of past powers that didn't have enough friends and that these two are actively undermining the ones we have.  Until that changes that's what they are doing, NATO is more then just military, and we've talked about how American Exceptionalism is a fancy term for sticking our fingers in our ears and claiming were right and have nothing to worry about.  We haven't been around long enough to really know what it's like to all the sudden not be a super power anymore.

 

 

China once had a Navy that made it all the way around the tip of Africa before Columbus even made it to America.  I'd love anyone to tell Estonia not to worry about being powerless against Russian cyberattacks on their power grind because they wouldn't stand a chance in a conventional war, not to mention reacting to invasion by pushing back all the way into western Europe not once but twice.  Them going up and down in power is normal, we just haven't seen what would happen if something like that happen to us knowing they both want to be taken seriously now and can be.  They won't stop that anytime soon.

 

 

Why they would invade neighboring countries if they had to, what they are doing in South China sea is them just showing how little Fs they give in regards to what they want in the region.

 

 

I agree with this, I just have a bad feeling unless we really come correct in good faith, it wont work.  Or they may turn it down anyway, goes back to reality some people actually prefer living in an authoritrian country as long as it doesn't interfere too much with what their doing from day to day.  That's the future I keep warning about, its already here, really.

 

 

Never said easily beat them both same time in Germany and Japan, nor Russia and China.  We did devote more resources to fighting Germany then Japan at first.  The disconnect here is comparing that to a hypothetical between China and Russia.  We were cutting Japan off from getting oil from us so we found focus more on Germany first, what reason would Russia not give China fuel if they were on the same team?

 

 

This comes back to needing more friends and being more efficient with a resources.  It rediculous how much we spend that we heading from nit being able to be both to possibly not able to best either even with a budget several times larger then theirs.  Something is wrong here, and recommendations aren't asking for much, just why does it cost so much? It's like health care, wtf?

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-military-edge-has-eroded-to-a-dangerous-degree-study-for-congress-finds/2018/11/13/ea83fd96-e7bc-11e8-bd89-eecf3b178206_story.html
 

 

 

That's if we're idiots and don't raise taxes, in which case, we reap what we sow.

 

In all, I still believe you are too optimistic about Russia's and China's capabilities and intentions now and in the future.  I stand by that statement.

 

1.  And the Vikings discovered Americas before Columbus and the Spanish first sent large numbers of people to the Americas.  But guess what, nobody considers Spain or Denmark long term world powers.  The Danes have never really been world powers (even at the height of the Vikings, they were very much just N. European dominant), and the Spanish had a relatively short window as a world power.  China is a large an old country.  Not unexpectedly at times, they have done some great things.  That does not mean they are some sort of long term world power.

 

2.  If I were Estonian, I've be worried about the Russia and very worried about the future of being an independent state.  I'm not Estonian, and we aren't talking about Estonia.

 

3.  What neighbor are they going to invade that is resource rich?  Japan, nope resource poor.  Korea, nope resource poor.  Vietnam, nope resource poor.   Keep going down the list.  You come up with one country that makes sense for them to invade that is a neighbor for resources- Russia.  

 

4.  If they were on the same team, that would be an issue, but there's no reason to think they would be on the same team.  The most direct place that China can go to get what they need is into Russia.  Russia knows this.  And under Putin, Russia's primary objective is to make Putin and his friends richer.  It is hard to imagine how a Chinese/Russian war against the US, that realistically is being funded by Russia's natural resources, is going to make Putin richer.  If Putin is spending Russian natural resources to help China fight a war against the US that's money from those natural resources that aren't going into his pocket.

 

(Now, yes it is possible that there will be change in the future in the Russian government and a larger change in the geopolitical situation where a Russian/Chinese partnership against the US will make more sense, but to build a US military that is capable of beating Russia and China because at some time in the future Putin is going to be gone and their interest might align more with China is a nonsensical use of resources.  And it isn't a use of resources that any other country in the world is under taking.  Canada, Australia, Germany, India, etc aren't building a military because in the future they might be subject to a Russian/Chinese partnership.)

 

5.  I'd generally suggest that you go back and read stuff from the Cold War.  Russia wasn't in shape to feed its population and certainly couldn't have mobilized its army (many of whom were also agricultural workers) and feed a marching army for more than 2 months.  But western organizations (Congress, DOD, etc.) continued to warn we were behind or closer to falling behind Russia.  The Russian upper military knew it.  That's one reason why the Cold War didn't end with a big war.  The Russians knew they had these big detailed military plans for invading Western Europe and fighting on a war on two fronts, and all of these sorts of things.  But they also knew there was no way they could ever actually execute those plans.

 

Western society has always seen the boogeyman in totalitarian regimes.  Which brings me back to my original point, if you believe in the exceptionalism of the American system (e.g. democracy, liberty, freedom, and a basically free market system), then saying that countries like Russia and China are a big threat seems nonsensical.  Yes, if you are Estonia or Burma you might be in trouble, but there's a huge difference between that and being a threat to the US.

 

Russia and China together couldn't successfully invade Canada or Mexico (even if we didn't help them at all).  Talking about either one of them beating us in a real war is stupid.  The only way we loose a war to China or Russia is if we are trying to defend somewhere iike Estonia or Burma from an invasion AND the native population of the country rolls over like dogs to the invasion.

 

6.  (In terms of taxes, while I support an increase in taxes, balancing our current budget in any sort of reasonable time frame (e.g. not 30+ years) with an increase in taxes alone is impossible.  To balance our budget in something not like 30+ years is going to take a decrease in spending.  So for the foreseeable future changes to the military to be designed to win a war against a combined China and Russia is going to have be funded through borrowing.)

 

In the next 20 years, there's a better chance of a Russia-China war then a Russia-US or China-US war, much less a Russia and China-US war.

 

The Chinese economy is already in trouble and without us it completely collapses.  Russia is about making Putin and his friends rich a real shooting war directly involving Russia is almost certainly going to hurt that.  Best case for a war is the Chinese economy continues to decline the Chinese get desperate see the natural resources in Siberia pretty poorly defended as an opportunity and decide to strike and Putin sees the loss of those natural resources as real loss of his wealth.

 

**EDIT**

Over the course of my life time, I've decided that we (Americans) aren't actually collectively very brave.  We spend a lot of time and resources worrying about these worse case scenarios that are very unlikely that no other country worries about (much).  We're not brave.  We're that anxious back seat drive that yells brake every time the break lights on the car in front of blink on.  And the result is not benefit to the US, but is a detriment.

[Renegade7]

21 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

1.  And the Vikings discovered Americas before Columbus and the Spanish first sent large numbers of people to the Americas.  But guess what, nobody considers Spain or Denmark long term world powers.  The Danes have never really been world powers (even at the height of the Vikings, they were very much just N. European dominant), and the Spanish had a relatively short window as a world power.  China is a large an old country.  Not unexpectedly at times, they have done some great things.  That does not mean they are some sort of long term world power.

 

Did you read the article I posted about our militaries assessment of Russia and China?  Short window is an interesting way of noting Spain had conquered almost the entire western hemisphere, not sure how I feel about that one.

 

21 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

2.  If I were Estonian, I've be worried about the Russia and very worried about the future of being an independent state.  I'm not Estonian, and we aren't talking about Estonia.

 

Estonia is a small state, NATO for most part is a collection of small states and regional powers.  Not worrying about a smaller country misses the point if they start falling like dominos.

 

21 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

3.  What neighbor are they going to invade that is resource rich?  Japan, nope resource poor.  Korea, nope resource poor.  Vietnam, nope resource poor.   Keep going down the list.  You come up with one country that makes sense for them to invade that is a neighbor for resources- Russia.  

 

Why do you think China is taking over the south china sea?  There's oil and natural gas, looking at British geological survey on mineral production in China's neighbors.

 

21 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

4.  If they were on the same team, that would be an issue, but there's no reason to think they would be on the same team.  The most direct place that China can go to get what they need is into Russia.  Russia knows this.  And under Putin, Russia's primary objective is to make Putin and his friends richer.  It is hard to imagine how a Chinese/Russian war against the US, that realistically is being funded by Russia's natural resources, is going to make Putin richer.  If Putin is spending Russian natural resources to help China fight a war against the US that's money from those natural resources that aren't going into his pocket.

 

(Now, yes it is possible that there will be change in the future in the Russian government and a larger change in the geopolitical situation where a Russian/Chinese partnership against the US will make more sense, but to build a US military that is capable of beating Russia and China because at some time in the future Putin is going to be gone and their interest might align more with China is a nonsensical use of resources.  And it isn't a use of resources that any other country in the world is under taking.  Canada, Australia, Germany, India, etc aren't building a military because in the future they might be subject to a Russian/Chinese partnership.)

 

We should be fair an acknowledge most countries dont look at spending a fraction of what we do because we already do it.  This was a co plaint of Trump with NATO members, too much reliance on us being a superpower that supposedly would always win of we got involved (illusion broken or shoulda never existed to begin with)

 

21 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

5.  I'd generally suggest that you go back and read stuff from the Cold War.  Russia wasn't in shape to feed its population and certainly couldn't have mobilized its army (many of whom were also agricultural workers) and feed a marching army for more than 2 months.  But western organizations (Congress, DOD, etc.) continued to warn we were behind or closer to falling behind Russia.  The Russian upper military knew it.  That's one reason why the Cold War didn't end with a big war.  The Russians knew they had these big detailed military plans for invading Western Europe and fighting on a war on two fronts, and all of these sorts of things.  But they also knew there was no way they could ever actually execute those plans.

 

Some of what you are saying I've hear and will take your advice.  I dont think kur military is bluffing right now.

 

21 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

Western society has always seen the boogeyman in totalitarian regimes.  Which brings me back to my original point, if you believe in the exceptionalism of the American system (e.g. democracy, liberty, freedom, and a basically free market system), then saying that countries like Russia and China are a big threat seems nonsensical.  Yes, if you are Estonia or Burma you might be in trouble, but there's a huge difference between that and being a threat to the US.

 

You keep saying this Russia jus got an authoritarian president in power in our own country. How does that not count as a threat?

 

21 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

6.  (In terms of taxes, while I support an increase in taxes, balancing our current budget in any sort of reasonable time frame (e.g. not 30+ years) with an increase in taxes alone is impossible.  To balance our budget in something not like 30+ years is going to take a decrease in spending.  So for the foreseeable future changes to the military to be designed to win a war against a combined China and Russia is going to have be funded through borrowing.)

 

I never said taxes alone and have mentioned in other threads the need to be more efficient with spending along with tax increases.  That's realistic.

 

21 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

In the next 20 years, there's a better chance of a Russia-China war then a Russia-US or China-US war, much less a Russia and China-US war.

 

The Chinese economy is already in trouble and without us it completely collapses.  Russia is about making Putin and his friends rich a real shooting war directly involving Russia is almost certainly going to hurt that.  Best case for a war is the Chinese economy continues to decline the Chinese get desperate see the natural resources in Siberia pretty poorly defended as an opportunity and decide to strike and Putin sees the loss of those natural resources as real loss of his wealth.

 

Think we already had this discussion a couple pages ago.

 

21 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

**EDIT**

Over the course of my life time, I've decided that we (Americans) aren't actually collectively very brave.  We spend a lot of time and resources worrying about these worse case scenarios that are very unlikely that no other country worries about (much).  We're not brave.  We're that anxious back seat drive that yells brake every time the break lights on the car in front of blink on.  And the result is not benefit to the US, but is a detriment.

 

You should reconsider your wording here.

[PeterMP]

10 hours ago, Renegade7 said:

 

Did you read the article I posted about our militaries assessment of Russia and China?  Short window is an interesting way of noting Spain had conquered almost the entire western hemisphere, not sure how I feel about that one.

 

 

Estonia is a small state, NATO for most part is a collection of small states and regional powers.  Not worrying about a smaller country misses the point if they start falling like dominos.

 

 

Why do you think China is taking over the south china sea?  There's oil and natural gas, looking at British geological survey on mineral production in China's neighbors.

 

 

We should be fair an acknowledge most countries dont look at spending a fraction of what we do because we already do it.  This was a co plaint of Trump with NATO members, too much reliance on us being a superpower that supposedly would always win of we got involved (illusion broken or shoulda never existed to begin with)

 

 

Some of what you are saying I've hear and will take your advice.  I dont think kur military is bluffing right now.

 

 

You keep saying this Russia jus got an authoritarian president in power in our own country. How does that not count as a threat?

 

 

I never said taxes alone and have mentioned in other threads the need to be more efficient with spending along with tax increases.  That's realistic.

 

 

Think we already had this discussion a couple pages ago.

 

 

You should reconsider your wording here.

 

1.  Estonian independence and security has essentially no bearing on US independence or security.  Estonia was part of the Soviet Union.  The US didn't become more free or more independent when Estonia became an independent state.  The US didn't become less free or less secure when Estonia initially feel under Russian control in the 1700s.

 

2.  What China is doing in the South China Sea is stupid.  In the face of rising sea levels they are building islands mostly made from sand pumped from the bottom of the ocean, which is the lightest and least dense sand and so the most easy to erode away again, to gain access to resources that help contribute to rising sea levels.  In addition to that, most of the reserves in the South China Sea are not easily accessed so the point that extraction will heavily become economically viable is far into the future out to never.

 

What China is doing in the South China Sea is almost certainly going to be an economic negative and the costs (building and long term maintenance of their islands) are going to out weigh the benefits.  It is exactly the sort of stupid things that totalitarian governments do to accelerate their demise.

 

(And we should loudly point this out regularly, while also declaring that we support historical, international, UN norms and guidelines with respect to the free movement of ships and natural resource ownership and will use our Navy to ensure those norms and guidelines are respected in the South China Sea.  By making what China is doing in the South China Sea seem like something that actually makes sense and not stupid like it actually is only stokes fear of China.)

 

But I will point out, in doing so they actually haven't invaded any of their neighbors.

 

3.  No, most countries spend a fraction of what we do because they don't actually fear a Russian invasion.  Germany isn't not just spending the same amount of money on their military as us, they are having pipelines built between Russia and Germany, which gives Russia another weapon over them.  They are doing this because they realize the most important thing in maintaining a vibrant and successful society not having a large military.

 

The same thing was true during most of the Cold War.  West Germany spent much less money on their military and generally didn't want nuclear weapons present in Germany.  That's because that the German fear of the Soviets deciding, 'Hey isn't communism great.  We need our military to take over all of these other countries so that they can become communist' was essentially nil for most of the Cold War.  However, that was a significant fear for the US and US institutions.  For most of the Cold War, the Germans were much more fearful that we would do something that would provoke a Soviet attack than the Soviets would sort of independently decide to invade Germany.  The fear of Red Dawn scenario (where the Soviets presumably because they felt like the could do it successfully and that alone was a good reason to do it, implemented a surprise attack) were essentially zero in West Germany for most of the Cold War.

 

(I will point out, I think German concerns over other countries, like Estonia, is essentially nil.  German security is mostly based on creating a vibrant and successful German state (and not a large military), which requires natural resources.  The acquisition of those natural resources is important and if acquiring those resources from Russia means a country like Estonia is more likely to fall under Russian dominance that's at best tertiary concern for the Germans.)

 

4.  I didn't say our military was bluffing, but they are still wrong.  Institutionally the military is setup to under estimate its own abilities, while over estimating its opponents.  You can look at the first Gulf War (and realistically the invasion component of the Iraq War).  Things like pre-war estimates of US casualties far exceeded actual US casualties.  When this happens, it doesn't make the press as a negative thing.  There are no Congressional hearings about what went wrong.  There is no penalty to the military for having things go better than expected.  But when the military does the opposite and things go wrong, it becomes a very big deal.  That becomes part of the institutional memory and preventing it becomes part of the institutional structure and so generally you get over estimates of opponent capabilities with under estimates of our own.

 

Furthermore, what we see in authoritarian governments is generally be punished for lying is not more harsh more likely than punishment for "failing".  In the Soviet Union, military reports were often falsified.  In exercises, people would be given time frames to reach goals, they'd fail to reach them in the established time frame, but claim they did.  If they were caught lying later, the punishment would not likely be greater than having reported that they failed to meet the goal in the first place.  The end result is that they end up lying to themselves (at least in records/officially) and so our intelligence agencies end up over estimating them because for the most part our intelligence estimates are based on intercepted official records.  From there, for propaganda reasons, authoritarian governments over report successes and bury failures.  The result is general further over estimates of ability by US institutions.

 

5.  Trump being elected is an issue.  However, Trump being elected is mostly our fault and mostly due to (mostly irrational) fears.  Trump is something we've done to ourselves because he tapped into deep American fears.  Trump has been coming for decades.  And certainly even given Russia credit for their role (which I'm not going to claim is 0), a stronger US military does not help protect your from that in the future.  Building a stronger military to protect from future Russian influence in our elections is like building a tank to be protected from getting malaria or West Nile virus.  It is a waste. 

 

Our largest obstacle is us and our (mostly irrational) fears.  I'll also point out historically, Trump isn't actually that unusual.  There is a long history in the US of people stocking fears about a new type of immigrant for political gain.  This has played out over history as the ethnicity of the majority of the migrants coming to the US has changed (e.g. the Irish, the Italians, the Eastern Europeans, The Chinese (especially on the West Coast)).  Trump has tapped into a great American tradition in face of the rise of Central and South Americans becoming the dominant immigrant pool in the late 20th and early 21st century.

 

Money would be better spent on securing our elections then on building a military that can defeat Russian and China combined in a war.

 

6.  There's no evidence that further efficiency can be achieved.  That isn't realistic.