Dukasaur wrote:betiko wrote:When the US gave the excuse of weapons of mass destruction to invade irak, Chirac gave Bush a little middle finger to stick right up his ass. The american people took it as a huge disrespect from france not to follow their lead. There was nothing personal there, we just thought it was not justified.
Yeah, yeah, Chirac talked a lot, but did he DO anything? Did he use France's seat on the U.S. Security Council to help pass a motion censuring the U.S. for its invasion of Iraq? No. That's precisely what patches is talking about. Talk is cheap. Anybody can go "blah, blah, blah, my principles reign supreme" for the news cameras, but behind the scenes they bend over and take it up the ass.
All kinds of European countries made irrelevant donkey noises about how the American actions were wrong, but did any of them actually take any meaningful actions? Did any of them actually bring a motion on the floor of the U.N. to sanction the U.S.? Did any of them actually launch a prosecution at the World Court to hang George Bush for his war crimes? (Don't say it was none of your business -- you spent millions hunting Milosevic, why didn't you spend millions hunting Bush, who was responsible for at least 100,000 needless deaths, 500 times more than Milosevic?) Did anybody actually embargo the U.S.? Refuse to sell titanium to American defense contractors? Freeze the assets of companies known to be selling arms to totalitarian regimes in the Middle East? Did you DO anything? Anything at all? No, just talk, talk, talk. It doesn't matter what the idiots with the news cameras think. It doesn't matter what the idiot lumpenproletariat thinks. What matters, is, did you take any ACTION to stop what was happening?
betiko wrote:We just have a very conservative vision of borders here, we just want nothing to change.
A lovely vision. But the gangsters in Washington and Peking and Moscow don't give a shit what you want or don't want. All they care about is -- do you have enough tanks to stop them when they come and take what they want?
betiko wrote:Each european nation is really different, and the current problems the EU is facing shows that we can't get much closer than we already are. Are we putting ourselves in a difficult situation? I don't think so. We pass on the lead. No need for it. This is like playing risk, dropping a smaller bonus and not attacking, just stacking while others are stacking more. You're still droping enough to make it uninteresting to be attacked if other guys are smart.
Well, yeah, you don't have to be Number 1 in the world. It's okay to be Number 5 or Number 10, as long as you're tough enough that others can't come and dictate to you. But unfortunately, that isn't the case.
Nailed it...
The problem is that although UK, France and Germany have 5-th,6-th and 7-th strongest armies, they all combined wont make army with capabilities of American, Russian or Chinese one.
Dukasaur wrote:You missed the relevant passage, so I've highlighted it for you. It's okay to be number 5 or number 10, (or numbers 5, 6, and 7),
as long as others can't dictate to you. If you travel to foreign wars merely as an auxiliary supplement to American forces, you're obviously not big enough, regardless of what cardinal number you console yourself with.
Those who don't study history are destined to repeat it. The West today is precisely analogous to the Delian League. Just as Athens became progressively more bold in exploiting its "allies" to pursue its own imperialistic agenda, so is the U.S., and just as Athens dragged its too-trusting friends into ruin, so will the American Imperium.
Nailed it again...
Dukasaur wrote:betiko wrote:which is more or less the rank those european countries have in terms of economical power. The thing here is that the US is over militarized, that budget is just ridiculous... and 19 aircraft carriers... pfff a bit of an overkill init?
Maybe it is. But Europe needs to at the very least be able to solve basic European problems. It doesn't need to go on foreign adventures in Afghanistan or whatnot, but it should at least be able to stop Russia from re-occupying Poland, for instance, without waiting for American help. It should have been able to resolve the situation in Bosnia without American help. It should be able to close the Bosporus at will, and the Straits of Gibraltar, and the Kattegat. At present, none of these basic European security concerns could be dealt with sans American help.
I think that Russians have no intentions to occupy Poland, but they have no intentions to give Ukraine to NATO/EU, and would fight until EU give up on Ukraine.
Dukasaur wrote:betiko wrote:What is funny here, is that duka is from canada. Canada is by far much more the US's bitch and he should be looking in his own back yard first.
If I was Prime Minister, we would follow a more independent policy...

Still, no matter who or what ruled Canada, there's zero chance that Canada could seriously stand up to the U.S. and say "go f*ck yourself." A population one-tenth of the U.S., the world's longest border (which would be too long to defend completely even if we became a Spartan nation of full-time warriors) and an economy completely interlocked in almost every way, all mean that Canada will forever be a stable whore to the American. It can choose between being a completely loyal stable whore, or a somewhat feisty and smart-assed stable whore that sometimes says "no", but it will never be able to cross the street completely.
Europe doesn't face those limitations. Europe could reclaim its rightful position as the centre of civilization, instead of being an auxiliary.
European Union could be strong if it is united, currently it isn't. Basically none of its members dont put the interests of European Union in front of their countries interests... You cant have strong EU with that behavior. Americans, Russians and Chinese know this.
waauw wrote:The only reason the US can dictate over europe to the degrees we see today is because europe is divided. This is why europe should unite its armies. Jointly we'd have the demographically 3rd largest army in the world, with military technology that strongly rivals Russia. No nation on earth would even think of meddling with intra-european affairs if we'd ever reach that stage.
Jointly, europe holds the potential to re-become more powerful than the US.
Not really... Joined European Army still has no chances vs Russian army.
betiko wrote:The power in place in russia isn't a democracy anymore, it's corrupt as it can be and a big part of the russian population is against it. the rest are just brainwashed or just trying to save their priviledges. There is nothing much we can do to save russians from putin.
You are largely mistaking in your assumption. Russian population have never seen more democratic and less corrupted government in their history.
Thinking that Russian population is against their current government puts you in the losing position in any situation... Face it they are not against Putin, sooner you realize this fact the better for you.
And you look totally brainwashed

betiko wrote:let's face it: the EU has reached its limits. we'll go more backwards than frontwards in that union. The EU is immensely unpopular since the last 10 years, people blame everything on the EU. I think it's more about saving what we have now...
EU didn't reach its limits... EU expanded as far its influence reaches... If we include Balkan countries, Iceland and Norway, EU has no significant influence over other countries, both neighboring or distant.betiko wrote:mrswdk wrote:betiko wrote:There is as much difference between a french, a german and a russian. why would we all unite against russians?
You don't think France and Germany would have a vested interest in preventing Russia from invading and conquering Poland (the scenario put forward by Duk)?
oh come on, if such thing happened, that would be WW3. Putin can't be that stupid. Of course EU countries would retaliate somehow, but just saying that Poland has proved that they trust more in the american's help than EU countries throughout their military purchases. So they can just go cry at the americans before their fellow europeans.
1. Polish interests in front of European
2. French interests in front of European
You think that combined army will be strong... sorry but without US half of Europe will simply turn towards the Russians in 2 seconds... Thats how strong EU is.
saxitoxin wrote:waauw wrote:betiko wrote:which is more or less the rank those european countries have in terms of economical power. The thing here is that the US is over militarized, that budget is just ridiculous... and 19 aircraft carriers... pfff a bit of an overkill init?
What is funny here, is that duka is from canada. Canada is by far much more the US's bitch and he should be looking in his own back yard first.
well yeah, once the US runs out of money, they won't be able to afford their numerous foreign missions and fleets abroad.
Nations that have 19 aircraft carriers, as betiko observed, while the next strongest state has 2, don't run out of money. When it needs more money, it goes and takes it.
The U.S. has broken and flaunted international law since the end of WW2. Why would you think it would quietly and politely go bankrupt? A man with a gun in a town filled with pacifist farmers will never be hungry.
The time of diplomacy is long over... There are multiple rising giants(Russia, China, India) that want to sit on the World leading table and share the spoils... Unfortunately EU isn't one of them.