I just mean, theres all this drama about what if the Congressional Republicans screw Ukraine, and its like, the EU’s GDP is way higher and the US is always complaining about them shirking their 2% committments they all agreed to. Why not get everyone paid up towards this effort, especially since its in their own side yard?
If the US fails to get it done, Europe and the rest of NATO need to step up and do the right thing. It shouldn’t matter if the US gets bogged down in its own ridiculous internal politics, Europe needs to stop playing poor and open their very dusty checkbooks, including fucking Hungary and Turkey (but i’m not that naïve)
The USA’s GDP is larger than the EU’s, but the EU has given more to Ukraine than America has. That’s without including contributions by individual nations in the EU or contributions by non-EU European countries like Norway and the UK either.
Im just saying that Europe needs to make it clearif it really gets problematic on the American side that they will step in as a backup. I get the drama and suspense helps bolster the morale of all involved and motivates increased participation/giving but its a little disheartening that we have to play these games for every stakeholder to get their house in order and start making gurantees to bolster the faith and morale of the Ukrainians themselves
BTW, you side-stepped the suggestion on individual NATO members not meeting their agreed-upon commitment of 2%(GDP) per annum, can you speak more specifically to that allegation?
And I’m saying that Europe is already doing that. Europe is not the backup because most of Ukraine’s aid is coming from Europe. America is a very large contributor and therefore important, and it has the biggest military industry to turn towards production, but to say that Europe “needs to stop playing poor and open their very dusty checkbooks” when Europe is already significantly outspending Ukraine’s other supporters only makes sense if you’ve just never looked at the actual numbers
I didn’t side-step the bit about individual domestic military spending commitments because I’m not looking to argue that part. 10 European NATO nations are meeting it this year. The others should do what they said they’d do, but it wouldn’t actually help Ukraine unless we’re all sending actual troops in.
They should just pledge and give the shortfall and then everyone’s happy.
I get you don’t want to discuss that because its a problem with regard to your thesis. Just because Europe is giving more comparitively, doesn’t conflict with the reality that they are still not meeting their NATO funding commitments on the basis of 2%/GDP.
Now maybe the US or at least the US government doesn’t really care about that anr chalk it up to a cost of doing business as the world’s policeman and dominant hegemonic actor, but let’s not get in a pissing match or dick-measuring contest about who’s ponying up more when certain parties aren’t even meeting the baseline level of that which they freely and voluntarily commited to (even if thats on the part of EU as a bloc as opposed to individual members)
let’s not get in a pissing match or dick-measuring contest about who’s ponying up more
literally your entire presence in this thread is dick-measuring about how europe isn’t doing enough
I get you don’t want to discuss that because its a problem with regard to your thesis
No, it isn’t. My point is that Europe is giving more to Ukraine and that while the European NATO members should meet the 2% commitment, doing so would not actually help Ukraine. If you want to have a general discussion about Europe’s defence capacity then sure, have fun somewhere, but I had figured that since you commented on an article you were commenting about the article
Well, I think thats a bit disingenuous. I am commenting more about how ridiculously beholden the viabillity of this entire effort (supporting Ukraine’s war defense) seems to be on the participation of the US (in terms of financial backing) and its vulnerabillity to the US’ internal political machinations when Europe should be underwriting and guranteeing this for the most part and anything the US provides should probably seen more as the “sprinkles” or a cherry on top.
Zelensky has certainly portrayed it as such (US blocking more funding == existential threat to Ukraine), and I’m not criticizing him for putting on that show because ultimately I think it will help in many ways but I sincerly hope their troops (to the extent they are in any way aware of what is happening on the larger world-level) are advised that they are going to be fine and morale is not affected by the soap opera aspect to all of this
Edit: its so goddamn sad the West needs a damn fairtyale to entertain ourselves sufficiently for us to drop $1/€ in the hat😤
I just mean, theres all this drama about what if the Congressional Republicans screw Ukraine, and its like, the EU’s GDP is way higher and the US is always complaining about them shirking their 2% committments they all agreed to. Why not get everyone paid up towards this effort, especially since its in their own side yard?
If the US fails to get it done, Europe and the rest of NATO need to step up and do the right thing. It shouldn’t matter if the US gets bogged down in its own ridiculous internal politics, Europe needs to stop playing poor and open their very dusty checkbooks, including fucking Hungary and Turkey (but i’m not that naïve)
Downvote away, thoughful downvoters
The USA’s GDP is larger than the EU’s, but the EU has given more to Ukraine than America has. That’s without including contributions by individual nations in the EU or contributions by non-EU European countries like Norway and the UK either.
Im just saying that Europe needs to make it clearif it really gets problematic on the American side that they will step in as a backup. I get the drama and suspense helps bolster the morale of all involved and motivates increased participation/giving but its a little disheartening that we have to play these games for every stakeholder to get their house in order and start making gurantees to bolster the faith and morale of the Ukrainians themselves
BTW, you side-stepped the suggestion on individual NATO members not meeting their agreed-upon commitment of 2%(GDP) per annum, can you speak more specifically to that allegation?
And I’m saying that Europe is already doing that. Europe is not the backup because most of Ukraine’s aid is coming from Europe. America is a very large contributor and therefore important, and it has the biggest military industry to turn towards production, but to say that Europe “needs to stop playing poor and open their very dusty checkbooks” when Europe is already significantly outspending Ukraine’s other supporters only makes sense if you’ve just never looked at the actual numbers
I didn’t side-step the bit about individual domestic military spending commitments because I’m not looking to argue that part. 10 European NATO nations are meeting it this year. The others should do what they said they’d do, but it wouldn’t actually help Ukraine unless we’re all sending actual troops in.
They should just pledge and give the shortfall and then everyone’s happy.
I get you don’t want to discuss that because its a problem with regard to your thesis. Just because Europe is giving more comparitively, doesn’t conflict with the reality that they are still not meeting their NATO funding commitments on the basis of 2%/GDP.
Now maybe the US or at least the US government doesn’t really care about that anr chalk it up to a cost of doing business as the world’s policeman and dominant hegemonic actor, but let’s not get in a pissing match or dick-measuring contest about who’s ponying up more when certain parties aren’t even meeting the baseline level of that which they freely and voluntarily commited to (even if thats on the part of EU as a bloc as opposed to individual members)
literally your entire presence in this thread is dick-measuring about how europe isn’t doing enough
No, it isn’t. My point is that Europe is giving more to Ukraine and that while the European NATO members should meet the 2% commitment, doing so would not actually help Ukraine. If you want to have a general discussion about Europe’s defence capacity then sure, have fun somewhere, but I had figured that since you commented on an article you were commenting about the article
Well, I think thats a bit disingenuous. I am commenting more about how ridiculously beholden the viabillity of this entire effort (supporting Ukraine’s war defense) seems to be on the participation of the US (in terms of financial backing) and its vulnerabillity to the US’ internal political machinations when Europe should be underwriting and guranteeing this for the most part and anything the US provides should probably seen more as the “sprinkles” or a cherry on top.
Zelensky has certainly portrayed it as such (US blocking more funding == existential threat to Ukraine), and I’m not criticizing him for putting on that show because ultimately I think it will help in many ways but I sincerly hope their troops (to the extent they are in any way aware of what is happening on the larger world-level) are advised that they are going to be fine and morale is not affected by the soap opera aspect to all of this
Edit: its so goddamn sad the West needs a damn fairtyale to entertain ourselves sufficiently for us to drop $1/€ in the hat😤