Nato Is Dead Long Live Nato (1 Viewer)

[Tangmo]

NATO new SecGen Mark Rutte the former Dutch conservative PM said in April the US remains committed to its troop presence in Europe and to continue providing its US 4-star Supreme Allied Commander of Operations into the foreseeable future.

Rutte says Europe recognizes the USA so called "Pivot To The Pacific" initiated by SecState Hillary Clinton during the Obama presidency that focuses on China. The Obama national defense team over its 8 years committed the US to having 60% of its military forces in the Pacific in a gradual shift that now is all but complete. For instance the Pivot has placed 5 USN aircraft carrier strike groups in the Pacific that had only one such group forward deployed to Japan when Obama became president. These carrier groups now have standoff offensive missiles that place the carriers out of the range of CCP antiship and air offensive missiles.

US has no plans for sudden withdrawal from Europe, NATO chief says | Amu TV

“There are no plans for them to all of a sudden draw down their presence here in Europe,” Rutte said.

amu.tv

April 3, 2025

BRUSSELS — NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte said Thursday that the United States has no intention of rapidly scaling back its military presence in Europe, despite ongoing calls for European allies to take on greater responsibility for their own defense. “There are no plans for them to all of a sudden draw down their presence here in Europe,” Mr. Rutte said ahead of a meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Brussels. The remarks come amid continued debate over burden-sharing within the alliance and growing pressure from Washington for NATO members to increase defense spending. “We do everything in the alliance in the spirit of no surprises, of working together, of being strong allies,” Mr. Rutte added. “We are laser-focused on the main threat, which is Russia, and the upcoming issues around China, North Korea, and Iran.”

He acknowledged that the United States has long sought to shift more of its strategic focus to the Indo-Pacific region. That pivot, Mr. Rutte noted, has been accompanied by persistent calls for Europe to boost its own defense capabilities. “For many years, the Americans have told us… they want to pivot more towards Asia,” he said. “They have also told Europeans: you have to spend more. This [increased spending] really started to happen after Trump came into office. Since then, we are spending more on this side of the Atlantic — $700 billion in aggregate since 2016 and 2017.” Mr. Rutte, who recently assumed the role of NATO chief, emphasized that any shift in U.S. posture would be undertaken in coordination with allies and would not undermine the alliance’s core mission of collective defense.

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The times they're-a-changin yet Putin and Russia keep spinning their wheels.

 

[Tangmo]

USA military things are a-popping constantly in the Pacific and away from Europe and that have been under the news radar due to the massive domestic chaos in the USA now that there is Trump 2.0 MagaMania.

During these past teen years the US Marines have purged their Beloved Corps of tanks and other heavy equipment in favor of light, lethal fast attack forces throughout the Pacific to include ambush tactics on the land, air and sea.

In April the Marines deployed their nasty NMESIS antiship missile in the Philippines which sent Beijing into a howl heard throughout the region. Since Obama US Marines have rotated into Australia to include, for the first time in 80 years, Infantry forces from Japan deployed outside the country -- to Darwin with USMC and Aussie forces for interoperability combat training.

The US Army Pacific has 100,000 troops under its 4-star command to maintain and to secure land bases to include for its antiship and antiair defense forces.

Four B-2 USAF Spirit bombers have been added to Guam which is undergoing a massive upgrade in its antimissile defenses. Last year two B1-B bombers participated in an exercise at Guam that included F-35s. The US has just deployed four B-2 Spirit bombers to Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean which base it shares with its owner the UK RAF.

Hegseth meanwhile just tags along with it while being always on the lookout for his DEI Syndrome.

 

[cAPSLOCK]

Hmm... These are interesting times.

The US "hegemony" has spread weapons of warfare to bases all across the globe which is really our one and only major export at this time. Other US exports have such high tarrifs they can't sell well.

Oh end stage Triffin dilemma... such is the way of superpowers I guess.

In fact... the US has more bases on the globe than any other country. I am curious... if we combine ALL the other countries... would THAT have any chance to outnumber the amount bases with missiles manufactured by Lockheed, Boeing, Avibras, MDBA etc.??? And whomever they are.. if WE sold them the high tech boomsticks... how do we count them?

Interesting question... maybe worth answering. I am to tired to though.

Then there are all the missiles we have sold to our "allies" In Israel, and Ukraine... This becomes hard for the black and white tribes... Russia bad!! Or wait... Israel Bad!!! Or wait.. Iran bad!! or is it North Korea? Damn I can't keep up.

And NATO.

What would happen if we stepped back? If we STOPPED selling weapons and started to take care of our poor instead... Yeah... I know... Me and dumb old John Lennon. Dreamers.

I guess ask Mark Rutte and Ms. von der Leyen. They seem ready to step up to fill the vacuum indeed.

Boom.

 

[Tangmo]

Hmm... These are interesting times.

The US "hegemony" has spread weapons of warfare to bases all across the globe which is really our one and only major export at this time. Other US exports have such high tarrifs they can't sell well.

Oh end stage Triffin dilemma... such is the way of superpowers I guess.

In fact... the US has more bases on the globe than any other country. I am curious... if we combine ALL the other countries... would THAT have any chance to outnumber the amount bases with missiles manufactured by Lockheed, Boeing, Avibras, MDBA etc.??? And whomever they are.. if WE sold them the high tech boomsticks... how do we count them?

Interesting question... maybe worth answering. I am to tired to though.

Then there are all the missiles we have sold to our "allies" In Israel, and Ukraine... This becomes hard for the black and white tribes... Russia bad!! Or wait... Israel Bad!!! Or wait.. Iran bad!! or is it North Korea? Damn I can't keep up.

And NATO.

What would happen if we stepped back? If we STOPPED selling weapons and started to take care of our poor instead... Yeah... I know... Me and dumb old John Lennon. Dreamers.

I guess ask Mark Rutte and Ms. von der Leyen. They seem ready to step up to fill the vacuum indeed.

Boom.

No more Pax Americana means regional scale wars all over the globe.

Your posts don't mind or don't know.

I do mind because I do know.

 

[cAPSLOCK]

No more Pax Americana means regional scale wars all over the globe.

Your posts don't mind or don't know.

I do mind because I do know.

Tell the children in Palestine about Pax Americana. But are there any left now? Who made the missiles that killed them.

Or tell the children, and boys, and middle aged men, or OLD MEN in the Ukraine about Pax Americana. Who made the guns and patriot missiles and drones they manned before they died?

Tell the millions of dead and starving people whose lives have been lost or ruined in spite of, or because of the peaceful American hegemony.

Here's the thing. I believe our PEOPLE (I am a US citizen... and proud to be) want peace. We want the best for our country and the world.

NATO is nothing more than a giant money laundering mafia that rules the world.

It may not have started out that way... but that is what it is today.

We can do better.

 

[Tangmo]

Tell the children in Palestine about Pax Americana. But are there any left now? Who made the missiles that killed them. Or tell the children, and boys, and middle aged men, or OLD MEN in the Ukraine about Pax Americana. Who made the guns and patriot missiles and drones they manned before they died? Tell the millions of dead and starving people whose lives have been lost or ruined in spite of, or because of the peaceful American hegemony. Here's the thing. I believe our PEOPLE (I am a US citizen... and proud to be) want peace. We want the best for our country and the world.
NATO is nothing more than a giant money laundering mafia that rules the world.

It may not have started out that way... but that is what it is today.

We can do better.

Your focus is wrong.

Your focus is exclusively against the United States in the United States.

Your post is tripe -- "We want the best" -- and banal. You need to get out and about in the world.

 

[cAPSLOCK]

I have been all around the world.

You are not taking the time to criticize what I said... but rather me.

That is the weakest argument.

 

[Tangmo]

I have been all around the world.

You are not taking the time to criticize what I said... but rather me.

That is the weakest argument.

Your posts are lazy and sweeping generalities. This is my criticism of what you say. And what your posts don't say.

Your posts ignore the CCP DictatorTyrants in Beijing, the indicted war criminal Putin and the nuclear ayatollas in Iran plus Kim Jong Un in North Korea and so on and so on.

If the USA and NATO had not won the Cold War against Soviet Russia we'd be speaking Russian which since 2015 PutinMagasTrump keep getting closer to doing to us all the time.

Your posts don't say you support NATO and its prosperous and peaceful democracies that have kept the world away from world war for 80 years. What your posts do say includes such tripe as "We want the best" and other glib virtue signaling. Your posts are complaints and grievance to which I don't bite.

 

[cAPSLOCK]

The world has been at war for 80 years.

 

[Tangmo]

WORLD WAR is what I said.

I said "kept the world away from world war for 80 years."

Your post is far afield to think I'm saying no war(s) in the world for 80 years.

Just face it plse thx, your posts are lost in these matters.

 

[Tangmo]

France remains firmly as the only European-NATO country to maintain a Pacific Naval Fleet.

The France aircraft carrier strike group DeGaulle spends six months of each year with the French Pacific Naval Fleet. Frigates from the French Pacific Fleet have also joined the USN in FONOPS which are freedom of navigation exercises such as sailing the length of the Taiwan Strait while Beijing howls bloody murder against it.

The UK has committed its two new aircraft carrier strike groups to the western Pacific and has done multinational exercises with each of 'em. Germany, Netherlands and Canada provide Naval ships for FONOPs while Australia for years provides regular Air Force recon and intel flights over the South China Sea.

India and Japan are members of The Quad of joint Naval exercises that also involve Australia and the USA. The Quad is about to expand to include South Korea.

NATO-Europe-US Cooperation in the Indo-Pacific: Challenging Times Ahead

As the Indo-Pacific gradually becomes the world’s geopolitical and geoeconomic epicentre, states and regional organisations are progressively pivoting to it. Due to a combination of drivers – chiefly US pressure, economic opportunities, strategic interests and politico-normative priorities –...

www.iai.it

Europe’s interaction with the Indo-Pacific is gaining momentum, despite being relatively recent. The spillover effects of Indo-Pacific security issues have prompted a widespread recognition of the region’s significance, including the “big four” (France, the UK, Germany and Italy) with their broad alignment to the US, large material capabilities (and blue-water navies) and expeditionary experience.[5] This development holds much promise for Europe-NATO convergence in the region, also considering their substantial cooperation in the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean. The EU, too, has openly recognised the necessity of an Indo-Pacific pivot and is pursuing it with its own policy tools.[7] Lastly, other European countries – virtually all NATO members – are gradually refocusing on this region.


On the one hand, the current US posture is already spurring a greater European role in its immediate neighbourhood, which undoubtedly remains the main priority area. On the other, given that Europe’s interests are now inextricably intertwined with the Indo-Pacific, a stronger European activism in this region is altogether possible, mainly due to economic, strategic and political interests, in addition to renewed US burden-sharing pressures. Amidst the volatile 2020s, two final implications stand out. First, the Indo-Pacific’s sheer importance can no longer be ignored. While other regions acknowledged it long ago, Europe is making up for the time lost. Second, as the US adds to global uncertainties rather than addressing them, allies and partners must assume greater international roles. This should prompt greater Europe-Indo-Pacific-NATO cooperation in light of growing economic, political, and security interdependence.


Europe's interests in the western Pacific and South China Sea demand cooperation

 

[MAGAnificent]

NATO is alive and well. And about the only positive so far coming out of the Ukraine war is that perhaps the European NATO partners are learning why they need to step up their military spending to the agreed upon requirements. Perhaps they also have learned that dependence on Russian energy supplies was never a good thing.

 

[Rich2018]

NATO is alive and well. And about the only positive so far coming out of the Ukraine war is that perhaps the European NATO partners are learning why they need to step up their military spending to the agreed upon requirements. Perhaps they also have learned that dependence on Russian energy supplies was never a good thing.

It's just suffering a temporary crisis until president bone spurs leaves office,.

 

[MAGAnificent]

It's just suffering a temporary crisis until president bone spurs leaves office,.

The usual TDS from Rich

 

[Tangmo]

Indeed, Taiwan, SK, Japan, Indonesia among other big economy East and SE Asian states have always got their oil and gas from the ME and not from Russia.

Australia and New Zealand do the same -- rather than become energy dependent on Putin's Russia that is chums with NK and Kim Jong Un and the CCP besides.

This is despite that energy sources from the ME are always more expensive to ship into East Asia than getting gas from Russia right there would be.

The Russo-German Serpent Pipeline in the Baltic that was the sinister work of the BFF Putin-Merkel was always designed to control Europe geostrategically via Russian gas and German technology and political clout. Its huge selling point was the Putin-Merkel below market prices for gas in particular.

Since 2005 it was Putin's sinister design to shift the flow of Russian gas to Europe over to the 4 Nord Stream pipelines from the extensive and well kept overland pipelines in Ukraine. Putin was then to invade Ukraine while holding Europe's energy supply in his grubby hands -- and while Merkel convinced Europe stopping Putin in Ukraine was not worth a general continental war. With the USA isolated Putin would have his long sought, and so carefully planned and worked through scheme, to take Ukraine and exercise geostrategic energy blackmail control over all of Europe.

So the USA isn't the only country that at times takes sucker punches in economics, trade and in counterinsurgency warfare. Europe took a huge sucker punch from the Putin-Merkel Russo-German Axis of Geostrategic Energy blackmail that was averted when the new German government of Olaf Scholz reversed Merkel's okay to certify Nord Stream 2 -- which infuriated Putin to invade Ukraine two days later. Several months later Ukraine, with the US looking on, blew up the whole of the Russo-German Serpent in the Baltic.

The bottom line is that Europe is constructing double its current LNG receiving facilities to get the bulk of its gas from the USA -- at rich country market prices. Germany is dropping $1bn for two long stalled LNG terminals on its Baltic coast just several miles from the Russo-German and Putin-Merkel pile of junk at the bottom of the sea. Greek shipping magnates are ordering new oceanic tankers as if it were Christmas.

It's noteworthy too that East Asians for energy sources are smarter than a skinflint on the cheap European just about any time. Until the US Congress scrambled to sanction NS pipeline construction in three quick waves of sanctions laws, the Europeans were taking it lying down. The only reason the misers got up was to holler against the sanctions among allies which is yet another European faux pas. Indeed, Merkel circumvented the sanctions using German foundations to fund Russians themselves completing the pipeline. What's slippery that comes around goes around too -- with a bang in this one.

 

[Tangmo]

The usual TDS from Rich

Camp Follower.

 

[Rich2018]

The usual TDS from Rich

And unsurprisingly, a response to which you cannot articulate any counter argument
Just spew abuse as usual

"When the debate is lost, slander becomes the tool of the losers" - quote attributed to Socrates.