During desert Storm, Iraq and Afghanistan most of their support was "in the rear with the gear". How many countries sent combat units to fight?
My thoughts on our NATO friends.
- Thread starter Rockport Zebra
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Who sent combat units to war. Our youth suffered a disproportionate causality rate and you know it. Most of the coalition sent rear personal. How long are we going to stay in Europe. 500 years?
Would you rather it revert back to the Europe of Pre-1949? This has been the most peaceful 70 years in the long, bloody history of the continent.
Are you naive enough to believe our presence there and membership in NATO isn't a major reason for that? Their problems eventually become our problems and if you don't believe that, then you don't really know your history.
I don't disagree. But the question still stands, how many combat units did they contribute in this 30 years conflict? Germany sent shit and they disengaged ASAP.
This guy in our neighborhood wanted to join the Marines when he turned 18 so he could kill people.
What's the problem?
Germany is like a recovering alcoholic, the world is better if they lay off the (war) sauce. I thought the French and Brits supplied a fair amount of airpower.
If you want a good reason to be allied with them, it prevents them from being allied with Russia. One Europe, from Britain to Russia, would be pretty powerful. Britain spent 100 years making sure France, Russia and Germany could not ally, for if they did Britain would be in trouble. Think of our policy similarly. If western Europe is with us, even marginally, they are not with Russia or China.
Not sure, I know the Brits had quite a few, but it doesn't matter The US had the superior combat force and one that was more cohesive in battle, why would they send in second stringers or ones that weren't as well trained to work with the main force and only for some superficial show of political balance and national responsibility?
That would have been a really dumb strategic move and would have caused more casualties and chaos for the coalition. The US military may possibly have been at that time the most effective combat arm in history surpassing even the Roman army of the 1st century. Why would we not use it when we wanted to fight a battle that we wanted to win?
You strategize like Tom Crean coached, superficiality is not tactically sound. A bit disappointing for a person who wore a Screaming Eagle patch.
Or like I told a general on day, we are here to keep them from doing it again.
The Germans are still good fighters. I served with them. Lack of combat support was political for them and didn't have anything to do with bench warmers. Your last comment is bush.
NATO's most important function is as a bulwark to Russia and it's a damn effective one. I don't really care if other member countries don't jump in with both feet to Middle East wars that are controversial to American citizens, let alone Europeans.
Obviously the fact that other member countries don't contribute their 2% of GDP annually is a problem and I don't mind Trump chiding them over that.
However, the poorly timed Russia meeting, threatening to lessen our presence in Europe, and continued general criticism of the Alliance as a whole doesn't do any good for anyone except Russia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coalition_casualties_in_Afghanistan
Ask Rockport to tell that of the mothers rear-guard NATO soldiers.
Yea, but the US at that time had become a digital army with mostly untested tactics and though we cross-trained with coalition forces, we were far more efficient alone and out front if only due to familiarity.
The more forces added that had language differences, tactical differences, equipment differences etc, the more chaos. Chaos is not good, though unavoidable in battle, adding to it just isn't smart.
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That chart supports my point.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coalition_casualties_in_Afghanistan
Ask Rockport to tell that of the mothers rear-guard NATO soldiers.
Do you think Trump would support Article 5 if it was invoked by a European member?
For political optics, sure .. but it's a role the US always wanted. The military arm supports the political and economic arm. We don't do it without some return gain which in most cases is political influence, which in turn is also economic influence. You don't like money?
Yea, what they don't get is that giving up our military/political/economic stranglehold on the world (and they are each reliant on the others) will open it up and cause a power vacuum which two fairly hostile powers will gladly fill. The other NATO nations can build their militaries but it will take time.
Which is exactly why it's currently being pushed by the parrot trainers. It may be a great thing to do with planning and in a more stable future but doing it now will only make Russia and China greater. Not us.
We need to sleep in the bed we made at least for awhile. And, what's fk'd up was it was their chosen party who made this dynamic to begin with
That is your position? We like money and will send our youth to fight so the other NATO countries can stand in the rear and claim coalition support.
Everything's transactional in their world. Not sure its the chicken or the egg with them and Trump.
No that's not my position. It's the reality of the current situation. I would much prefer we not be the world's police and gut our military spending and instead invest in our people and nation, but I can separate ideology and practicality no matter how strongly I feel about the ideology when practically dictates it is wise.
No. Pubs have been pro military spending, the Dems have always been against. Right? The Dems want to close bases and bring troops home and the Pubs want to open bases and expand the military and its influence. Right? Or did I wake up in some bizarro world in the multiverse this morning?
I'm arguing with a conservative who is basically anti military influence and I'm on the pro side. I must have stepped into the wrong multiverse this morning. This is ridiculous. Usually it's only my socks that disappear.
Not all conservatives fit into a mold, I will concede that point. Cards loose last pitch. Argue more on the 4th.
Actually, if you compare a lot of those numbers to the relative sizes of the countries' populations, it doesn't. The UK has one-fifth the people, but sent one-fourth the personnel and suffered one-fourth the casualties, for example.
We get it. You’ve been convinced by the con man Donald Trump that the US should leave NATO. That’s really what this post is about.
Man...I’m glad you weren’t serving during the Cold War...it would have been “Back in the USSR”.
Man...I’m glad you weren’t serving during the Cold War...it would have been “Back in the USSR”.
I thought Iraq was the mother of all coalitions. I’ll bet anything you voted twice for the people who got us into that shit show. Now that Trumpy-Bear is running his mouth about NATO and everything else, you’ve decided to come on here and act concerned? LOL
During the Cold War, US troops in West Germany liked to say that the only way the Russians were going to come through the Fulda Gap was for us to send busses over and bring them to Munich for Octoberfest. NATO is a farce.
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anon_mlxxvlbug9dpa
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Well we had no business going into Iraq in 2003 in the first place so you don’t have a valid point there. In the other Iraq war Afghanistan, our allies used special forces extensively in theater. I also patrolled next to British forces in several zones. So I don’t really know what you’re point is. We have the largest force and budget of all of the allies by several orders of magnitude. Simple math would let you know that we will have disproportionately sized contributions to NATO engagements.
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anon_mlxxvlbug9dpa
Guest
It absolutely refutes your point. Use a calculator Top. Aside from Goat’s point about population sizes, the casualty rate of the US and Britain are nearly identical. Canada’s is doubled.
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It hastened the fall of the USSR which controlled much of eastern Europe and probably kept even more countries from coming under its control. How soon people forget what an ogre Russia and USSR were.
I don’t think anyone is for pulling out of NATO! Major reset? You Bet.
The "West" is pro: civil rights for women, minorities, gays and immigrants; international law; free trade, and democracy. The "West" is anti: authoritarianism; communism; fascism; and nationalism. NATO, UN, WTO, EU, NAFTA, International Court etc are all the apparatus of the West. Trump, Putin and other authoritarians and nationalists are fundamentally anti-Western. The right in this country is much more in-sync with those like Putin who are opposed to the West than with the values of the West. So...the attacks on our NATO allies are really attacks on the West.
One of my favorite quotes on world war 1 was that it took the Kaiser to get Britain and France to ally. Hundreds of years of hatred conquered by a single man totally inept at foreign policy.
Don't bet the farm that cannot happen again.
One simple question:
Is the US involved with NATO and other defence agreements worldwide out of our generosity to help those hapless folks or for self-interest?
I will be more specific. If we pull out of NATO and other defence agreements worldwide, and the bad guys do bad things, will we be hunky-dory?
I agree with your assessment of the US Military and of the other forces. Slightly off subject, but this is also why many in the military oppose being placed under the command of foreign commanders. It is truly easy to see why a commander might be unable to appropriately determine a units capability’s when they have not truly trained with and commanded those forces. I.e. the argument in the late 90’s about allowing us troops under UN command in the field....
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