Britain's opium wars "working" for a century before total collapse is exactly the point, short-term coercion produces long-term strategic failure, regardless of timeline.

If rome fell because it became overly reliant on foreign soldiers to defend itself, you've just described what happens when an empire alienate its allies and has to do everything alone, which is precisely what NATO withdrawal accelerates

calling europe vassal states that produce nothing is flatly unserious when the EU collectively fields the third largest economy on earth, operates nuclear arsenals, and runs intelligence services the US relies on daily for counterterrorism

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calling europe vassal states that produce nothing is flatly unserious when the EU collectively fields the third largest economy on earth

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"Collectively" meant something when it was the Common Market for trade. Now the EU is an unelected government that has helped ruin the economies of Europe.

whether the EU governance structure is good for europeans is their problem. the relevant fact for this discussion is that the economic output exists, the military infrastructure exists, and american strategy benefits from access to both regardless of how brussels organizes itself internally.

I honestly dont know if you are trolling at this point.

The East India company had the 2nd largest gdp in the world at one point in time, 2nd only to the British Empire itself, and it was all at the expense of a quickly dwindling China. The other country to take advantage of this situation was the US. Dominating the opium wars irrevocably transfered the balance of global powers from the east to the west and it hasn't relinquished since. Believe it or not, reforming our arrangement with Europe might be critical in maintaining that balance in power. NATO has made them fat and weak.



Yes, Europe has a large consumer economy and some extra money to kick around, largely because they hide behind Uncle Sam. This situation has allowed them to commit civilization suicide by running after insane things like Net Zero. Because of their insane energy prices they have completely destroyed their own industry.

Eyrope is less then 10% of the world's population but consumes 50% of the world's social welfare.

That's crazy. NATO made that crazy possible.

GeeBee said:

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A $750 million savings in US budget.

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Certainly it's a heck of a lot of more than that? Somalians are grifting more than that out of our coffers.

VP at Pierce and Pierce said:

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Europe is already toast due to mass immigration of third world people with different values. Their leadership is a bunch of limp wristed corrupt fools that have sold out. Let's part ways.

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Sadly this sounds a lot like our country and our leaders. The only difference is we are just a few more years behind them.

safety guy said:

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I really think it is more of a situation of the NATO countries pulling away from us to the point there is no longer a shared identity. We need to focus on North America and the western hemisphere.

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Yep, **** Europe! We've done our part but they've decided to commit cultural suicide. That's on them.

flakrat said:

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GeeBee said:

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A $750 million savings in US budget.

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Certainly it's a heck of a lot of more than that? Somalians are grifting more than that out of our coffers.

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That is the direct funding amount, what we directly hand NATO to spend itself. That doesn't account for the portion of our defense budget that we spend in support of NATO, ie bases, troops, equipment, etc.

Direct funding we are responsible for 16% of NATO funding, Indirect funding we account for 62%.

If we left NATO that indirect funding wouldn't necessarily be savings as a lot of it we would probably continue to spend but we would eliminate NATO influence on how/where we use those assets.

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Direct funding we are responsible for 16% of NATO funding

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Yep, same share as Germany.

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Indirect funding we account for 62%.

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What are you counting as indirect funding?

GAC06 said:

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Direct funding we are responsible for 16% of NATO funding

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Yep, same share as Germany.

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Indirect funding we account for 62%.

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What are you counting as indirect funding?

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From what I read, Direct funding is the money we hand to NATO for them to spend as part of their internal budget, we represent 550-750 million of a 3.3B billion budget. I didn't see any real details on how much of our defense budget is indirectly supporting NATO but it was estimated at 62% of what all NATO countries indirectly spend and I would assume that number is in the billions. Indirect funding would be the cost of us running NATO supported bases, providing NATO supported equipment, NATO supported troops, etc. Again this wouldn't necessarily become savings if we left, more than likely our spend would remain we would just be spending it elsewhere geographically (Greenland, UAE, SA, Poland, etc) at our discretion and without limitation of use during war.

BboroAg said:

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The real consequence of pulling out of NATO is that it destroys the modern version of the same playbook that led to WWI

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Im not exactly following. Do you mind elaborating your point?

Gordo14 said:

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So much stupidity to satisfy the emotional needs of our infantile president. Maybe he'll feel much better about the disaster he caused if he picks up his toys and leaves.

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Is there any chance you read any of thr comments and quality dialog from this thread ? If you did, there can be no chance you came away with that take.

Great points have been made by both sides in this thread. Try reading that instead of consuming the "news".

GAC06 said:

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Quote:

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Direct funding we are responsible for 16% of NATO funding

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Yep, same share as Germany.

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Indirect funding we account for 62%.

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What are you counting as indirect funding?

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You don't understand the funding. Suggest you study. The ME wars expenditures reveal the funding. I posted this before.

What we do in case of war (a NATO country invoking article five) is already entirely at our discretion

I've explained it here repeatedly. Find someone else to follow around.

GAC06 said:

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I've explained it here repeatedly. Find someone else to follow around.

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I only am commenting on false information. You provide plently.

Point it out then.

even granting that NATO enabled european complacency on defense, the question is whether a remilitarized europe operating independently of american command structures actually serves US interests. europe rearming on its own terms means an independent european defense apparatus with its own strategic priorities, its own arms industry competing with america's, and its own foreign policy unconstrained by alliance obligations to washington.

the US doesn't just want europe to spend more on defense, it wants europe to spend more on defense within a framework that the US leads. withdrawal achieves the first and guarantees the loss of the second.

If you ask most people "what started WWI" the typical answer is "the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand"…and there is truth to that.

But that leads to a question of "how could that be"?

The answer is that in 1914 the government/monarchies of Europe had commitments with each other to go to war if the other went to war.

The Austrian-Hungary empire had agreements with Germany. The assassin was from Serbia. Russia had agreements with Serbia. England had agreements with Russia. France had agreements with England.

Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, Russia sided with Serbia, Germany declared war on Russia, England declared war on Germany, France sided with England …and voila - WWI.

NATO (an alliance created to stop the USSR - which by the way ended in 1992) looks a lot like the agreements between European countries in 1914.

Those are valid concerns. The problem is that Europe seldom acts in concert and we can exploit that by individual agreements with eastern Euro countries like Romania, Poland and Bulgaria. The closer to Russia and the more bitter their histories with Russia, the more advantages to us, to be Machiavellian about it. If Turkey decides Incrlik is no longer viable with our presence or Spain decides Rota should no longer host US forces or if even Italy becomes restrictive we should choose alternatives: Morocco, which has longstanding disputes with Spain over territory or Greece and Bulgaria or Albania, all of which would welcome US cash. We don't need to build Cold War era permanent bases given the mercurial shifts in European polities.

It wasn't the alliance structure…

Without getting insanely nerdy…Imperial Prussian irredentism, its perception of being left out of the colonial expansion period, an Wilhelm II/Germanic paranoia of the Imperial British Navy created a tinderbox that caused WWI.

Blaming it on the alliance structure is like blaming a woman who was raped for wearing a short dress…it completely ignores the fact that Prussian attitudes built up the pressure box that caused it explode in the first place.

Never going to happen, military industrial complex force is strong.

BboroAg said:

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If you ask most people "what started WWI" the typical answer is "the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand"…and there is truth to that.

But that leads to a question of "how could that be"?

The answer is that in 1914 the government/monarchies of Europe had commitments with each other to go to war if the other went to war.

The Austrian-Hungary empire had agreements with Germany. The assassin was from Serbia. Russia had agreements with Serbia. England had agreements with Russia. France had agreements with England.

Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, Russia sided with Serbia, Germany declared war on Russia, England declared war on Germany, France sided with England …and voila - WWI.

NATO (an alliance created to stop the USSR - which by the way ended in 1992) looks a lot like the agreements between European countries in 1914.

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NATO had a reason to exist and deter during the Cold War because there was a countervailing Soviet alliance with satellite countries, the Warsaw Pact. Those satellite regions were the buffer zones for Mother Russia.

Simple fact was that Europe was devastated after WWII and needed us to be the force to back them while they recovered from the destruction. At least that was Eisenhower's justification and reasoning. And the Marshall Plan was the way those European nations were going to recover. That made sense back then.

But then Stalin died and Nikita Khrushchev came into power and was directly verbally threatening Europe and the US followed up by the kinetic action of sending in missiles to Cuba to back up that threat. So the rationale for NATO changed at that point.

I always recommend "The Guns of August" (Barbara Tuchman) to folks who really want to understand the outbreak of WW1, from a micro-perspective historically, but the Germans had been planning to conquer France quickly for over 50 years, is the bottom line, and then to rapidly shift forces to defend Prussia from the Russians.

It didn't work, but perhaps the greatest/most professional army in history, imho (Germans of WW1). A remarkable series of events/relationships at the time, zero doubt, but I would note nato, nor modern Germany, are in any way equivalent to that situation over a century ago, nor capable of adjusting to prevent it. It's at the very least highly contentious whether our eventual entry into the conflict, nor support for the French/Brits, really led to a better outcome than the opposite would have facilitated. I feel the same way about our role in Nato today.

rotational basing is not a terrible strategy, and the pentagon is already moving that direction, but that flexibility exists because NATO's legal framework provides the status-of-forces agreements, logistics standardization, and intelligence sharing protocols that make rapid deployments to those countries possible

strip away NATO and every one of those bilateral deals requires its own negotiated SOFA, its own logistics chain, its own intelligence-sharing treaty, each subject to the same mercurial political shifts you're worried about, but now without any institutional glue holding the network together. you're describing a more expensive, more fragile version of what NATO already provides.

And that more fragile alliance system could be the new reality geopolitically. We have several factors in our favor: thermonuclear forces which have little tactical utility but massive strategic deterrence; a very strong market system with sustained growth which Europeans cannot match and our geographical/natural resource advantages, especially energy plus raw materials. If Europe acted with the strength they potentially have, Mark Rutte wouldn't be coming hat in hand to Washington to admit that NATO is wrong when it doesn't support the US in this war. With respect to Rutte, he is probably 2x smarter than most European politicians and doesn't have to answer to a class of voters heavily dependent on government subsidies to just basically live.

it could be the new reality, but it doesn't need to be. no one disputes that the US holds the strongest cards. but those advantages exist with or without NATO, which means the question isn't whether america can survive outside the alliance (obviously it can), but whether it's stronger inside or outside it.

nuclear weapons deter existential threats, but don't help you project conventional power across the middle east and africa, which requires exactly the kind of distributed basing and overflight networks you're proposing to rebuild from scratch bilaterally

rutte coming to washinton hat in hand (debatable framing of the visit) is actually evidence the current leverage is working. if the US walks away, the next generation of european leaders has no hat to bring and no hand to extend, because the relationship that compels deference no longer exists.

aggiehawg said:

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BboroAg said:

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If you ask most people "what started WWI" the typical answer is "the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand"…and there is truth to that.

But that leads to a question of "how could that be"?

The answer is that in 1914 the government/monarchies of Europe had commitments with each other to go to war if the other went to war.

The Austrian-Hungary empire had agreements with Germany. The assassin was from Serbia. Russia had agreements with Serbia. England had agreements with Russia. France had agreements with England.

Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, Russia sided with Serbia, Germany declared war on Russia, England declared war on Germany, France sided with England …and voila - WWI.

NATO (an alliance created to stop the USSR - which by the way ended in 1992) looks a lot like the agreements between European countries in 1914.

---

NATO had a reason to exist and deter during the Cold War because there was a countervailing Soviet alliance with satellite countries, the Warsaw Pact. Those satellite regions were the buffer zones for Mother Russia.

Simple fact was that Europe was devastated after WWII and needed us to be the force to back them while they recovered from the destruction. At least that was Eisenhower's justification and reasoning. And the Marshall Plan was the way those European nations were going to recover. That made sense back then.

But then Stalin died and Nikita Khrushchev came into power and was directly verbally threatening Europe and the US followed up by the kinetic action of sending in missiles to Cuba to back up that threat. So the rationale for NATO changed at that point.

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Yep

nortex97 said:

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I always recommend "The Guns of August" (Barbara Tuchman) to folks who really want to understand the outbreak of WW1, from a micro-perspective historically, but the Germans had been planning to conquer France quickly for over 50 years, is the bottom line, and then to rapidly shift forces to defend Prussia from the Russians.

It didn't work, but perhaps the greatest/most professional army in history, imho (Germans of WW1). A remarkable series of events/relationships at the time, zero doubt, but I would note nato, nor modern Germany, are in any way equivalent to that situation over a century ago, nor capable of adjusting to prevent it. It's at the very least highly contentious whether our eventual entry into the conflict, nor support for the French/Brits, really led to a better outcome than the opposite would have facilitated. I feel the same way about our role in Nato today.

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Agree on Guns of August. I know Tuchman gets a lot of hate but that first chapter on King George's funeral may be the best piece of historical writing ever done.

I know you tend towards "introversion" (won't use the isolationism) and that is a legitimate course (I wildly disagree with it)…

But my critique is to the larger group is we can't have our cake and eat it to. Pursuing those options where we pull out of NATO has costs…and I want to spell them out.

Ultimately, from my foxhole, the reason why NATO is worth it is largely found in Churchill's aphorism about allies:

"The only thing worse than having allies, is having none at all."

Quote:

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If you ask most people "what started WWI" the typical answer is "the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand"…and there is truth to that.

But that leads to a question of "how could that be"?

The answer is that in 1914 the government/monarchies of Europe had commitments with each other to go to war if the other went to war.

The Austrian-Hungary empire had agreements with Germany. The assassin was from Serbia. Russia had agreements with Serbia. England had agreements with Russia. France had agreements with England.

Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia, Russia sided with Serbia, Germany declared war on Russia, England declared war on Germany, France sided with England …and voila - WWI.

NATO (an alliance created to stop the USSR - which by the way ended in 1992) looks a lot like the agreements between European countries in 1914.

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What you described looks nothing like NATO.

Old McDonald said:

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Silent For Too Long said:

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Old McDonald said:

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Silent For Too Long said:

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Old McDonald said:

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NATO is the only alliance in history where the dominant military power gets 31 countries to organize their entire defense architecture around american leadership, american equipment, american interoperability standards, and american strategic priorities.

leaving surrenders the most favorable strategic arrangement any great power has ever negotiated and hands the board to russia and china for free.

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Everything you posted is false.

Throughout history, hegemonic countries have exacted tribute to keep the wheels of global economy well greased while shouldering the brunt of the military load. Egypt, Assiyia, Babylon , Persia, Greece, Rome, the Mongols, the United Kingdom...

We are the most taken advantage of super power in history.

Don't be so naive.

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every empire on that list collapsed, and the ones that lasted longest (Rome and Britain) did so precisely because they built alliance systems rather than ruling purely by extraction, which is the lesson you're ignoring in favor of a vibes-based reading of ancient history

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Built alliances? The British empire capitulated one of the most powerful empires in history by parking capital ships in Chinese harbors and demanding they buy their opium or else.

Rome contolled the central trade routes of the world and demanded much in return for the pleasure. You either participated in global trade and paid Rome for the pleasure to do so or you stayed in isolation.

You really know nothing of history.

In no other time in history has the world super power bent over backwards so much to make their vassal states happy.

**** them. They know they project literally nothing on the global scale without us.

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if that's the case then you know less than nothing

rome is actually the perfect example for my argument. the empire collapsed because it stretched itself across every frontier simultaneously, hollowed out its core, and alienated the federated allies whose troops it depended on to hold the borders. britain's gunboat diplomacy in china produced a century of resentment that ultimately expelled them from asia altogether, which is a strange model to hold up as a success.

the US built something genuinely unprecedented, a voluntary alliance network where the other nations subsidize american force projection with basing, intelligence sharing, and diplomatic cover. calling them vassal states rather than strategic assets is silly. that confuses domination with leverage in a way that every fallen empire would recognize too late.

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That was a very small contributing factor in the overall fall of the Roman empire. Rome more or less held it's borders for about a millenia, the major contributing factors are pretty complext but generally can be boiled down to political unrest, separation of classes, incompetence in leadership and inability to control borders mostly because the influx of outisde peoples eventually became more than they could manage and, over a period of a couple of generations, became an internal political force that helped fracture and eventually kill the empire as a whole. A lot of other factors as well.

We have allies in the Pacific without nato/spain. And the same will be true after nato is dead and buried in Europe.

The NATO alliance looks and acts nothing like the mutual aggression pacts that preceded WWI - though with two major historical exceptions - the interventions in the Bosnian and Yugoslavian wars during the 1990's.

It's a defensive pact that enables member states to call on the alliance for mutual defense in the invent of an attack by another nation (primary threat Russia) or organization via Article 5. NATO as an organization did go to bat for the US in Afghanistan in this manner.

It does NOT require the alliance to go to aid of another nation that gets into a war by itself, see US vs. N. Korea & China in the 50's, Vietnam in the 60-70's, Iran in 2025 and 2026, Panama, Grenada, Uk vs. Argentina, Libya (both in the 1980's with the US and in the 2000's French-British-American overthrow of Kaddafi), the French in Africa, the Suez crisis. The first Gulf War fought under a UN Coalition that not all NATO members joined and the second Iraq war was not a NATO action even though many NATO members participated (France, Turkey, Poland stayed out).

Does it make for a sometimes contentious coalition - absolutely, yes. But, I believe it will persist despite this, and that the USA's national security is improved by being a member and having a framework to train and coordinate forces together, pre-position logistics, and develop defense strategies and the weapon systems and forces needed to ensure mutual defense.

aggiehawg said:

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🚨 BREAKING: NATO SecGen Mark Rutte STUNS THE WORLD, comes out in SUPPORT of President Trump flaming our allies for abandoning the US during Operation Epic Fury

This comes after Rutte met 47 at the White House

RUTTE: "Some of them [failed]!" 🔥

"[Iran] would lead to a North… pic.twitter.com/7pjlbm8nJQ

— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) April 8, 2026

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"[Iran] would lead to a North Korea moment, where if you take so long, it's beyond the point you can get it done if they get a nuke...that is a BIG risk for Europe!"

HE KNOWS, NATO needs America, and they MESSED UP.

Rutte is desperately trying to keep NATO together. It's up to Trump now whether they get PUNISHED.

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If they get to choose, so should we.

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Rutte's response here is actually not surprising at all and I assume this is what came out of he and Trump's meeting two days ago where Trump said he was going to talk to him about leaving.

Rutte knows how his bread gets buttered and he's already on record castigating Europe for even thinking they could go it alone without the US. Because he knows they don't have the money or dedication to do it. It would require them to shift away from cradle to grave welfare and Western European countries would revolt over that.

Poland joined us in Iraq 2