The U.S. Is Quietly Pausing Some Arms Sales to Europe | Hacker News Reader

The U.S. Is Quietly Pausing Some Arms Sales to Europe

theatlantic.com

19 pointsbreve13 comments

Sauce for the goose... Europe et al should pause Arms Purchases from the US to help them build up their stockpile. Keep the cash local, develop similar technology and reduce the dependency on unreliable countries.

To import, all you have to do is write a check.

Vs. buying highly the complex manufactured goods locally, at scale, requires a high-functioning weapons industry. And even if you have the will and the skill to set that up - there's still quite a lead time.

https://archive.ph/zSzpF

...I'm putting a new Molotov-Ribentrop pact on the board with like 3,000:1 odds.

Europe is split between Russia and America. North America and the islands (Greenland, Iceland, Great Britain, Ireland, Faroes, Canaries, Azores, *et cetera) go to America. Central and Eastern Europe go to Moscow. France, being a nuclear state, is left as a sovereign buffer state; maybe Iberia, Belgium, the Netherlands and Italy (basically, a rump of the First French Empire), go under their umbrella.

Uk has nukes of some kind, and there’s Germany…. The problem with such a grand pact is that the pawns might not want to be on that particular chessboard. Lots of military tradition there, and guns, jeeps and trucks don’t take much to make in quantity.

And the us isn’t well positioned to hold land. The navy and Air Force can only destroy. Not that many grunts in the states, and they might be busy holding it together in such a scenario. And if they try to eject the women and undesirables from the us forces they’ll have significant gaps to fill. Enlisted troops don’t get paid squat to start.

> Uk has nukes of some kind, and there’s Germany

Are the U.K.'s nukes on an independent platform?

Germany's military has no ranged capability to speak of--not in the same league.

> Lots of military tradition there, and guns, jeeps and trucks don’t take much to make in quantity

They do take time. If, as I suspect, we're at the precipice of the normalisation of tacitcal nukes, I don't think it would be too difficult to suppress. Or maybe it would! (I'd hope it would.) Either way, stupid aftermath doesn't seem to figure into the calculus of either Putin or Trump.

Btw, I'm not making odds for a deal that works. Just a deal that happens. Germany didn't keep anything from M-R.

> the us isn’t well positioned to hold land. The navy and Air Force can only destroy.

Holding Canada, Iceland, Greenland and--at arms length, perhaps as a territory, perhaps as a sovereign nation in name only--the U.K. and Ireland wouldn't take a lot of manpower or coercing.

Holding the blue states will take some effort.

> Either way, stupid aftermath doesn't seem to figure into the calculus of either Putin or Trump.

Maybe they can share the Nobel Peace Prize that the U.S. president so covets.

>the U.K. and Ireland wouldn't take a lot of manpower or coercing.

You don't know us if you think that.

As a suzerainty? I’m not saying American annexation. When I think of what a suzerain UK would entail, I honestly struggle to see what would be different from now.

> Are the U.K.'s nukes on an independent platform?

Yes.

Is Polaris still fielded? I thought Britain had transitioned to Tridents.

It keeps seeming more and more like the Trump administration is in fact a Russian assets. They're also shutting down military aid to Taiwan too. While allowing unchecked Russian aggression. Donny sometimes makes some noises about Russia, but then it's all surprise conference where the red carpet is literally rolled out & the chief bad guy of the 21st century is allowed to open with whatever remarks he wants.

Meanwhile Gabbard could not be doing a better job of insuring that foreign influence campaigns and disinformation are left utterly unchecked.

These people seem like they are gunning against the allied powers, in every way.

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