If Russia Started a War in the Baltics, NATO Would Lose — Quickly

Yahoo.com ^

[TigerClaws]

If Russian tanks and troops rolled into the Baltics tomorrow, outgunned and outnumbered NATO forces would be overrun in under three days. That’s the sobering conclusion of war games carried out by a think tank with American military officers and civilian officials.

“The games’ findings are unambiguous: As currently postured, NATO cannot successfully defend the territory of its most exposed members,” said a report by the RAND Corp., which led the war gaming research.

In numerous tabletop war games played over several months between 2014-2015, Russian forces were knocking on the doors of the Estonian capital of Tallinn or the Latvian capital of Riga within 36 to 60 hours. U.S. and Baltic troops — and American airpower — proved unable to halt the advance of mechanized Russian units and suffered heavy casualties, the report said.

[Lagmeister]

Soviets have a couple divisions of well organized troops but beyond that they are untrained and lack quality operational equipment. Sure, they could take land, but could they hold it. We proved in Iraq that we have the best quality armament and fighting force. And sadly, we are always at war somewhere.

We actually took Afghanistan quite quickly, whereas the Russians could never get a grip. If we decided to defend Europe, we could defend Europe even if it means taking it back.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

More like Panzerblitz (Avalon Hill)

I loved Avalon-Hill games back in the day. Rail Baron...and on the Atari 800...Midway and Conflict 2500. Hours of fun.

[DIRTYSECRET]

Jimmy Carter unilaterally gave up the neutron bomb. It was a defensive weapon designed to counter the Russian advantage in tanks. Russians gave nothing in return.

[Forward the Light Brigade]

World history is filled with two forced: 1) Imperialism—a state taking over other states and forming superstates (think Rome) and 2) Balkanism where big states are broken up into smaller and smaller states. Balkanism is the force in play at the moment and has been since the Second World War—most recent empire to fall was the USSR. But, things may well be changing back to Empire. Putin sees this and is taking advantage of these forces. China is also in play as is a hand full of other nations—Even ISIS is in the new Empire Building Mode.

[17th Miss Regt]

Absolutely unsurprising. Russia can use a much larger force and they know the area very well.

[If You Want It Fixed - Fix It]

Our diversity-powered armed forces are undefeatable in the social world....so THERE RUSSIAN BULLIES!!!

[Zhang Fei]

NATO has gotten flabby, clumsy, lazy and partially deaf. Similar to the UN.

This isn't a new development. Even back during the days of the Cold War, British, French and US forces in FRG were at best a speed bump, a tripwire force whose primary function was to bring France, Britain and the US into the war via the destruction of those forces by the Warsaw Pact armies. And in the case of the Baltic states, there isn't even a tripwire force, meaning there are no armored divisions or air force wings from allied NATO countries positioned there.

To make things worse - Cold War armies were financed by a significant % of each member country's GDP - in many cases, around 5%. The Baltic states aren't even spending 1%. They expect the Russians to not invade, and if an invasion happens, for other NATO countries to do most of the fighting.

[Harpotoo]

I’m sure Russia is happy to know that:-)

[dfwgator]

And they will have a lot of ethnic-Russian Fifth-Columnists to help them.

[17th Miss Regt]

About a third of the population if I recall.

[kearnyirish2]

They’re holding half of Ukraine, and certainly didn’t end the invasion of Georgia because of any response by the West.

The USSR’s “invasion” of Afghanistan was similar to our war in Vietnam; the Afghan government requested their assistance, and survived for a few years after they left. They were never there to add Afghanistan to their territory.

[PIF]

In the 60s, once the Russians came through the Fulda gap with 3-4 Russian armies and 35,000 tanks, after the use of tactical nukes, the Russians 1st rest top was 60km behind where I was - 4km from the east-west border. 72 hours later they would be at the English channel.

Nothing has changed.

[Rebelbase]

“If we decided to defend Europe, we could defend Europe even if it means taking it back. “

The two generations that have succeeded those who fought in WWII and stayed home to support the war are too soft to fight a war with mass casualties. We can’t do it. Unless we let nukes fly, Europe is lost if the Bear decides to rampage.

[baltimorepoet]

The two generations that have succeeded those who fought in WWII and stayed home to support the war are too soft to fight a war with mass casualties. We can’t do it. Unless we let nukes fly, Europe is lost if the Bear decides to rampage.

Even though they don't pull their own weight, I think the European NATO countries still have the boots and equipment. I guess the issue would be will to use it.

The European willingness to accept dhimmitude makes me question their willing to defend themselves against the Russians.

I still remember the Greens in Germany protesting the nukes in Europe against Reagan. And then the Wall came down. What is WRONG with Europeans?