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Comment by nolok | Hacker News Reader

Agreed, the moment we allowed MBDA to put some american component in our (French) missiles made with european allies (Scalp, Meteor), the US blocked our sales to Egypt because they wanted to sell their own instead, using ITAR, forcing us to fix it for the french version.

The US has repeatedly proven that ITAR is for them as much of a military thing as it is an economic one, and that they're willing to use it against allies. If we refuse to learn that lesson, it's on us not them.

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> The US has repeatedly proven that ITAR is for them as much of a military thing as it is an economic one, and that they're willing to use it against allies. If we refuse to learn that lesson, it's on us not them.

I'm actually surprised anyone ever thought it was not a military thing.

Maybe I phrased it wrong, it's not my native language ? I meant it "it's not just a military restriction thing when they think there is military danger, it's an economic thing for when they can take advantage over a seller, and who the buyer is doesn't even matter".

I mean it's expected behaviour in one sense but in another it's becoming a bigger geopolitical risk to rely on the US for defence components/technology in the current world, the risk always existed, it's just shifted more one way.

There are a whole bunch of military suppliers across Europe who are in the same boat as MBDA.

Simply put, the US as an ally is less predictable than previously and that has knock-on effects across every sphere.

The European and US weapons industry is heavily intertwined because of the cold war.

In hindsight the whole world should have planned for the "what if America goes Nazi" eventuality.

It's going to take time to unwind that and it's going to be a slow process (unless they do something so utterly stupid they make it a fast process).

I think Canada might recognize that it needs to be a much faster process than anyone expected. Europe is getting some pretty strong signals and should be accelerating the process. Ukraine is obviously already in a full war footing to accelerate as fast as they can. They are pulling Europe along simply because the U.S. has abandoned them and walked away from almost every promise they ever made.

How utterly stupid any individual action is will be a matter of discussion for decades. But the pace has moved towards urgent for at least half a dozen prominent countries.

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