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Comment by bufferoverflow | Hacker News Reader

He has been pretty vocal about exactly that. He said multiple times that European countries must increase defense budgets significantly.

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Yes, but he said that in the context of buying American products. He wanted the American economy to benefit from arms sales, not a more independent Europe.

Source please, that seems totally made up.

He has been clear about NATO %'s, very little room for your confusion.

EU is being threatened with tariffs because we’re not buying „enough” things from the US, including among others arms. The „suggestion” has always been to spend that money in the USA.

Almost every time he talks about it you’ll see some detail like this link shared by someone else:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-02-13/trump-tel...

Historically, an independent Europe has meant continental war after continental war, and Europe is again pushing for a continental war.

This isn’t “Europe” pushing for a war, that’s solely Russia. That’s also why this policy reversal is so shocking: until recently, pretty much everyone accepted the post-WWII consensus that the United States helping to stabilize Europe was better for everyone. Trump throwing in with Russia is not only a betrayal of our allies but also dramatically increasing the risk of war since it tells Russia and anyone else so inclined that wars of aggression are viable as long as you make it financially rewarding for him.

No, it’s Europe. Ukraine decided not to join the EU and the West supported a coup via the Maidan Revolution. The extent of that support? I don’t know, but at the very least we were verbally encouraging the violent overthrow of their government.

What are you talking about? Isn't it Russia that's pushing for a continental war, not Europe?

Yeah, but EU countries donated weapons like the F-16, which were bought from the US in the first place. So now we have to use another source for those weapon systems and the revenue/jobs won't end up in the US.

Is this really what the US wants?

That's US's problem. Which is very minor compared to Ukraine's or Europe's problems with this war.

Yes. To buy more American weapons.

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