News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on Latvia wants permanent U.S. troops, foreign minister tells Blinken. Parent comment

Re:Latvia wants permanent U.S. troops, foreign minister tell... by glogla on Monday March 07, 2022 @10:56AM (#30589287)
In War NATO makes sense as command structure. But I can imagine "EU Army" structure for things like equipment procurement, trainings and so on for the economies of scale and better alignment.

It makes little sense for small EU countries to do that by themselves, when the whole of Slovakia will have like 6 fighter planes and 20 IFVs. At the same time, procurement is pretty political, since many countries are deep in weapons trade, so maybe it wouldn't work.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Latvia wants permanent U.S. troops, foreign minister tell... by jupp0r on Monday March 07, 2022 @10:59AM (#30589324)
It would also be a path for abysmally inefficient defense departments like Germany's to make sweeping changes while still keeping face.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Latvia wants permanent U.S. troops, foreign minister tell... by adwn on Monday March 07, 2022 @11:13AM (#30589523)
Maybe we could get rid of the Gorch Fock [1] while we're at it. A sailing ship in the 21st century, causing repair costs well in excess of 100 million EUR, and killing sailors in training. JFC. A lot of people had to pay a lot of taxes to finance that shitty exercise in futility.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_training_ship_Gorch_Foc...

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Latvia wants permanent U.S. troops, foreign minister tell... by waffleiron on Monday March 07, 2022 @12:04PM (#30590301)
I am not in the navy but I assume there is a good reason tall ships are used for training as quite a few countries do, just a few examples:

Portugal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NRP_Sagres_(1937)

US Coast Guard: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USCGC_Eagle_(WIX-327)

Italy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_training_ship_Amerigo_...

Russia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STS_Mir

Peru: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BAP_Uni%C3%B3n

See:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Training_ship

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Latvia wants permanent U.S. troops, foreign minister tell... by jupp0r on Monday March 07, 2022 @12:11PM (#30590384)
The USCGC Eagle was actually built in Nazi Germany and seized by the US after world war II.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Latvia wants permanent U.S. troops, foreign minister tell... by waffleiron on Monday March 07, 2022 @12:15PM (#30590446)
I really like how the steel hull looks on these boats, specifically the Eagle and the Peruvian boat. It's seems so out of place, my mind just expects to see a wooden hull.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Latvia wants permanent U.S. troops, foreign minister tell... by Semaphor on Monday March 07, 2022 @10:59AM (#30589333)
Just make sure us Germans don’t run procurement, or we’ll start outspending the USA for less equipment.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Latvia wants permanent U.S. troops, foreign minister tell... by makomk on Monday March 07, 2022 @11:13AM (#30589532)
The last politician in charge of German defence procurement failed upwards and is currently the (unelected) President of the European Commission thanks to some clever political wrangling, so odds probably aren't great on that front...
[ Parent | on HN ]