Wondering where your tax dollars are going?
Ukrainian MP Hennadiy Vatsak has become first European owner of a $600,000 Rolls Royce.
Europe is a continent of pacifists – no amount of money can fix Nato
The region is neither militarily or politically prepared to uphold her treaty commitments
Excerpt:
.....it is obvious that the current incarnation of the US-Nato relationship cannot continue.
The debate over military spending in Europe and in the US shows no sign of resolution, in spite of very recent spending increases from a few European countries. A wide gap persists between the 3.5 per cent of GDP commitment of the US and the below 2 per cent average in Europe. While this disparity has long been an irritant, now there is a serious political challenge of a growing number of Congressional members who seek to force Europe to do her part by reducing US funding.
However, military spending is a very poor measure of each country’s actual contribution to the military strength of the alliance. One major distortion is the almost universal practice of purchasing weapons from local manufacturers regardless of their merits or their unit costs.
Italy is just now introducing its new NARP rifle, which is so advanced that it even sports an English name (New Assault Rifle Platform), and which happens to be manufactured by Beretta, the private manufacturer that just happens to supply all the small arms of all Italian military and police forces.
As Italy’s own weapon aficionados immediately pointed out, there is nothing particularly novel about the NARP, which is not manufactured in the modern-style drastically shortened “bullpup” weapon with a recessed barrel like the British SA80 or Israel’s Tavor (which actual combatants greatly prefer), but just another variant of Mr Stoner’s sixty-year old AR-15 that remains in US and global service as the M4: except for the fact that the NARP costs more than three times as much.
Altogether more expensive than Beretta’s rifle monopoly in Italy is France’s Dassault monopoly over all French combat aircraft, which produces beautiful designs at fabulous unit costs, not to speak of the warships made in very, very small numbers in every European country that has a navy of any size.
Poland, now praised for its increased military spending, is actually using a great deal of the money to become a “Baltic naval power”, complete with its own shipyards. For a country that faces an overland threat from Russia with an army that is only now beginning to increase from absurdly low numbers (42,000 soldiers when Ukraine was invaded), any sort of naval spending must be counted as a luxury, and more so in Poland’s case when it pays to build up shipyards rather than for ships.
.....the amount in question must both be very large and yet nowhere near as consequential as the wide gap between nominal and actual combat capabilities in the ground, air and naval forces of most Nato members.
All over Europe there are infantry battalions, tank companies, artillery batteries, fighter-bomber squadrons and others such which all the required facilities and equipment for their respective roles, which mostly do a good job of looking the part –some are splendidly turned out, and even the least of them are more military-looking than Israel’s ragged troops in Gaza – but whose one defect is that they have no actual combat capabilities, and least of all against Russian forces.
.....if supplying weapons, munitions and money to the Ukraine is no longer enough, and Nato troops must be sent to stop the Russian army, how many could your country supply?
The answer I received was uniformly zero, not presented as the result of any sort of strategic calculation but simply as a matter-of-fact political inevitability. One minister put it very simply: if my government sends even one soldier to Ukraine, it falls from power. When I noted that for once his government had a large parliamentary majority, he replied that his own (center-right) party would vote against its leaders if any soldiers were sent to Ukraine.
Next I talked to some senior officers of that country. They candidly explained that the minister’s political judgement was political yes, but also mandated by cultural realities.
.....For the United States the horrendous problem of this military version of false book-keeping is that Nato plans are all based on nominal rather than actual capabilities, .....
The refusal to spend enough money is weakening Nato in ways that may become suddenly dangerous. Even so, money alone will not be enough if Russia really does want to conquer the whole of Ukraine, bringing its forces right into central Europe.
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The author is only correct in describing Europe’s ‘war’ capabilities. He tries to sound like there is a valid war beat going against Russia when there isn’t and that the US supports it which we don’t. Article shows how NATO is really the US supporting everyone else.
Upon Trump’s return NATO needs to be revamped or dissolved. Europe and their Brussels whores need to go it alone. We have no skin in the game.
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As I have mentioned before, we are paying the salaries, benefits and retirement of Ukrainian govt employees👈🤷 Insane❗ How is that doing anything to defeat Russia❓