alt.hn

2/19/2026 at 11:19:03 AM

Without America to rely on, EU gearing up to be a global power in its own right

 https://www.theatlantic.com/international/2026/02/european-union-defense-spending/685983/

by saubeidl

2/19/2026 at 4:17:29 PM

I suspect that this has more to do with Ukraine than it does the USA. Russia seemed like one of those plastic owls to fend off birds then suddenly turned its head and ate one.

by foxyv

2/19/2026 at 4:54:41 PM

https://youtu.be/NFw7ZifqhTg?si=IujBLjIsaQysNHmp&t=267

4:27

“The time when we conveniently let the United States carry the burden for our security is over. The US is absolutely committed to NATO, but this commitment comes with a clear and long standing expectation, that Europe and Canada take more responsibly for their own security, and I believe that is only fair.” -Mark Rutte

by shaboinkin

2/19/2026 at 10:08:14 PM

Notably Mark Rutte in the role of Secretary General of NATO, no longer as Prime Minister of the Netherlands.

by waffleiron

2/19/2026 at 1:13:26 PM

I don’t think Trump is particularly crazy like a fox, but Europe taking its defense into its own hands in a coherent, credible manner has been the goal of US European policy across at least the last six or seven administrations of both parties.

by twoodfin

2/19/2026 at 1:32:35 PM

It's been the goal of several administrations for the EU to increase spending, and the lip service goal of this one. But I don't think anyone really wanted the EU to stop purchasing US weapons or abandon the very useful economic/military dependencies that benefited the US. This administration appears to have pushed hard enough to actually break those ties, and I don't think they (and their supporters) fully appreciate how bad that could be.

by matthewdgreen

2/19/2026 at 5:00:09 PM

As an American, if an outcome of the Trump administration is even a slight deterioration of the US military industrial complex, I don’t think I’ll mind that. I’d rather spend that money on the poor and the young.

by ta9000

2/19/2026 at 7:01:04 PM

I agree 100%. I find it odd how many people will claim to be against the MIC and promote a drop in military spending, yet they act how Europeans spending money with European defense companies rather than American ones is a terrible thing. I suppose they think that we'll just spend less money and nothing will happen otherwise?

by GenerWork

2/19/2026 at 5:42:47 PM

The military is a huge jobs program though, it does provide a way out if you are low income. Some of my good friends had bad childhoods and 4 years in the military (navy, marines) did work out a lot of their issues, pay for their college and get them on some kind of path.

It would be way better if we had jobs programs that built infrastructure and improved public works, but I don't know if converting from `military` -> `direct handouts` would be an improvement.

by ericmcer

2/19/2026 at 6:19:33 PM

Military and defense contractors are two separate things. Both are jobs programs, the latter for upper middle class white people in flyover states.

by ta9000

2/19/2026 at 5:51:28 PM

> I’d rather spend that money on the poor and the young.

Me too, but that's not how things would play out.

by jghn

2/19/2026 at 1:49:45 PM

Not sure about that; why does the US have a huge number of troops in Germany in the first place? Defence, or occupation?

It seems to me that the objectives until ~2014 were to (a) provide moral and a small amount of physical support for the War on Terror; (b) sell US weapons, such as the F-35; and (c) ensure that European defence centered around NATO, under US control, and not the EU. The US wanted Europe to have enough capability to assist the US, but not to go off on adventures of its own and certainly not (going all the way back to the Washington Naval Treaty here) enough military might to resist the US or start another European empire.

That is, the strategy from WW2 until fairly recently was to prevent Germany re-arming. Just as the large deployment in Japan is to prevent Japan from re-arming just as much as it is there to defend the Pacific from China.

by pjc50

2/19/2026 at 3:21:31 PM

The time when Europe had the capability to go off on adventures of its own or be a threat to the US is past. European economies are no longer big enough proportionately. Compare a lit of the world's largest economies from 40 years ago to now.

by graemep

2/19/2026 at 3:43:36 PM

In purchasing power parity terms, a glance at Wikipedia yields

China: $43.491 trillion [1]

USA: $31.821 trillion [2]

EU: $30.184 trillion [3]

UK: $4.59 trillion [4]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_China

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_the_United_States

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_the_European_Union

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_the_United_Kingdom

by T-A

2/19/2026 at 4:20:45 PM

Now compare that to the same numbers from 40 years ago.

Then do the same with nominal GDP which is a better measure for this IMO as you cannot buy anything in global markets at PPP.

by graemep

2/19/2026 at 2:13:59 PM

I would also say (d) make it clear to the Soviet Union that, if they invaded West Germany, it would not just be an intra-European war; it would be a world war.

by Taikonerd

2/19/2026 at 2:34:13 PM

Sure, but that rationale went away in the early 1990s and they stayed for thirty years longer than that.

by pjc50

2/19/2026 at 4:08:12 PM

True. Institutions like that have a lot of momentum, and they sometimes outlive their original rationale.

But on the other hand, Russian aggression is back in the headlines these days...

by Taikonerd

2/19/2026 at 4:21:22 PM

Aircraft carriers cannot replace military bases. That is why they stayed.

The US can support all of its military operations in Africa and the Middle East from its vast cold war era infrastructure in Europe.

by expedition32

2/19/2026 at 2:11:58 PM

An intricate plan designed to further US interests, wrecked by an ignoramus who didn't understand it.

by saubeidl

2/19/2026 at 4:57:28 PM

"huge number of troops in Germany in the first place?"

I wouldn't call 35000 troops of mostly non-combat specializations a "huge number". In the Cold War, the American presence in West Germany was an order of magnitude larger, about quarter a million soldiers.

"Defence, or occupation?"

Neither/nor. Logistics for various distant operations. Rhineland is a very practical stop located between the US and the Middle East + North Africa (MENA), closer to MENA, with highly developed maintenance and repair facilities, communication facilities, top-notch hospitals for casualties etc.

If a GI Joe gets seriously injured in Kabul or Baghdad or now possibly Tehran, they are airlifted to Ramstein. If an armored vehicle gets damaged by a roadside bomb and the local mechanics cannot fix it on the spot, dtto.

General Hodges wrote several articles on how dumb the current administration is to alienate Europe, because without access to such facilities, any deployment in the wider region becomes very challenging. Even the original invasion of Iraq was somewhat complicated by the Irish refusing the use of Shannon airport for US military aircraft.

by inglor_cz

2/19/2026 at 3:18:40 PM

No I disagree. The goal was Europe spends more on defence while be dependent on the US. What happens: Europe spends more on defence while be less dependent on the US. Trump and many Americans think the US is some kind of special country and will be always on the top. Quite the opposite.

by lava_pidgeon

2/19/2026 at 2:27:49 PM

They are not in a position to do that successfully

by brodouevencode

2/19/2026 at 2:57:03 PM

Nobody ever is. You’re forced into it by external events, and you either kinda make it work, or don’t. It was, after all, changing times and dumb moves by a mad despot that caused the US to revolt and form a country.

by jwhitlark

2/19/2026 at 2:48:31 PM

Care to expand?

by greggoB

2/19/2026 at 5:57:16 PM

The US makes up approximately 15% of NATO funding and I don't think the EU is in an economic position to make that up any time soon. NATO is arguably underfunded as is.

by brodouevencode

2/19/2026 at 4:33:25 PM

[dead]

by black_13