25 August 2008

One of Many Reasons for the Emasculated Nature of the European Union and People

Under the defense umbrella of the US military, NATO and Europe long ago gave up any credible pretense of providing for their own defense. Instead, Europe spent its defense budgets on social programs, and began to pretend that the US--its defender--was the primary enemy that it must fight. Europe's primary weapons against the evil US empire were the concocted words and images of its incredibly biased news media. Generations have been raised under this propaganda campaign--this feint, if you will, distracting the people of Europe from the abject failure of their leaders to provide a credible defense from enemies foreign and domestic.

Understanding the "Catch-22" that their leaders have placed them under, European military forces are increasingly refusing to fight. Even when given direct orders to engage the enemy, European commanders and their troops are refusing to raise their weapons against deadly threats.
Over a decade of shrinking budgets has meant less money for realistic training. There are also equipment shortages. The net result is several layers of leadership that are really not well prepared for a shooting war....several Czech helicopter pilots, when told they were going to Afghanistan, basically said no. Not unless they got more training, and helicopters that could handle that kind of tricky flying. The crew of an Italian helicopter gunship was recently sent home because they refused to fire in combat. No one will say exactly what happened there, but that sort of thing is usually the result of poor preparation, and leadership. And then there's the recent ambush of a French patrol, which resulted in ten French paratroopers killed. Most of the casualties occurred because the troops had not practiced dealing with ambushes, and the way the Taliban operate. Worse, the French troops were trapped under fire for many hours, long past the time when air cover or ground reinforcements should have arrived. Again, this has all the marks of bad leadership and poor training.

... _StrategyPage
It is not just the post-cold war euphoria that led to cutting of defense budgets in Europe. As stated earlier, European governments had already decided to let the US taxpayer carry the load of defending Europe. Europe decided that it had grown beyond the conflict stage of human evolution. Given such a high level of evolution, homo Euro would simply allow a despised ally to take care of the dirty work of dealing with the more unsavoury aspects of existing on this planet.

If a group of people exists for along enough time in this protected limbo state, their sense of reality regarding foreign relations does tend to suffer a bit. The EU, after all, has no divisions. NATO has divisions. But without the US, NATO is a laughing stock. Since the member nations of NATO (other than new members from Eastern Europe) scorn the US as a Neanderthal, and the greatest threat to planet Earth, you can imagine the solidity of the alliance--and part of the reason why Russia has begun a new phase of expansionist neo-imperialism.

Self-emasculated homo Euro. The new androgynous reality of an old, shrinking subcontinent. Let's all hold a group shriek over Abu Ghraib, shall we? Or how about a round of condemnations over Guantanamo. Show those war-monger colonials who the civilised people are, shall we?

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3 Comments:

Blogger Markku said...

Under the defense umbrella of the US military, NATO and Europe long ago gave up any credible pretense of providing for their own defense. Instead, Europe spent its defense budgets on social programs, and began to pretend that the US--its defender--was the primary enemy that it must fight.

For your information: until the early 1990's, virtually every Western European nation trained and equipped huge conscript armies. Almost every male Western European had served up to a year in the military as a conscript until the end of Cold War (including myself). The lost economic output owing to conscription (compulsory military service and reservist training) did not show in any military expenditure statistics because it was wholly indirect. The USA gave up for conscription in already in the 1970's. The difference in military expenditures was not as large as it seems.

You seem to have a problem with the lack of militarism in Europe. Are you really sure you'd like us to be the way we used to be in the early 20th century again?

I do not count myself as anti-American. For the most part, the USA has had an enormously positive influence on the world. But I cannot help but deem the invasion of Iraq as nothing but an excercise in folly (whereas I think the invasion of Afganistan was a just and necessary punishment of the Taliban). The benefits to the USA itself are non-existent and the costs are huge. Iraq is in a state of low-level civil war and clients of Iran in it are gaining strentgh.

Tuesday, 26 August, 2008  
Blogger Ugh said...

The legacy of European military incursions into different regions of the world left a real mess. Look at Africa and the Middle East specifically. While America is now called the Great Satin and is blamed for all troubles in this part of the world much of the mayhem is fallout from the actions of Europeans. The creation of modern Iraq is a prime example of British actions after WWII. This is not to say the U.S. is innocent - that was then, this is now. But clearly the holier-than-thou arrogance of the neo-pacifists in Europe is hard to stomach.

Tuesday, 26 August, 2008  
Blogger al fin said...

Markuu, I wonder if you would mind providing some numbers to support your claims. Conscription is not the same thing as good quality training with good quality equipment. That is what seems to be lacking among European militaries and contingents in NATO, which partially explains their lack of competence and confidence anywhere close to combat situations. A nation being able and willing to defend itself is a far cry from a continent constantly on the brink of war.

Right, Craig. I blame much of the problem on a completely out-of-touch European media, although the American media is barely better if at all. Most of the masses believe what they are told to believe.

I was opposed to the Iraq war as soon as I heard about the plans, and for some time thereafter. Once the decision had clearly been made, like most people I wanted to make the best of a bad situation.

Many critics of the Iraq war seem to be living in the past, and even seem to want the country to explode into chaos and unmitigated blood-letting.

If they think the Iraq "war" has been an actual war in the bloodiest sense of the term (forget the bogus Lancet "research" based on figures from a Saddam loyalist--a disgrace to the epidemiologic profession) they should read more about World War I trench warfare, the US Civil War, the US Marines in the South Pacific in WWII, Gallipoli, etc.

If you are basing your mental pictures of the Iraq war on what the media is telling you, you are living in an illusion.

Tuesday, 26 August, 2008  

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“During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act” _George Orwell

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