> I think you are lacking some imagination here. There can be no doubt that after the events of the last couple of months (starting with the Hungarians opening their borders) there is no way back the the previous post-war state. With East and West loosing more and more reasons to be scared of each other, the military blocks will loose importance - they may be gone soon.

> Sure, all the politicians in east and west keep telling the opposite, but that's just because they would rather keep things the way they were. For those in power, the status quo was much more comfortable as it is now, where no one really knows what's going to happen. How do they want to motivate further spending on arms when all those bad guys aren't bad any more? Sooner or later (and I believe sooner) the peoples of Europe will be fed up with this (if they aren't already), and what good are those military blocks then?????

> The East bloc obviously start disintegrating, politically and militarily. The West bloc won't survive that; if there is no East bloc, NATO will fall apart quickly. So, what's the problem? I certainly will feel more at ease with _less_ weapons. So will most people, I think. And besides, I think it's time Europe is being run by Europeans, not by Americans and Russians.

Oh, you sweet summer child…