Latvia wants permanent U.S. troops, foreign minister tells Blinken

Re:Latvia wants permanent U.S. troops, foreign minister tell... by noelsusman on Monday March 07, 2022 @11:10AM (#30589482)

Ukraine didn't have modern weapons in 2014, but they do now.

Regardless, I don't think anyone has ever thought the post-Soviet Russian military could take on NATO in conventional warfare, but that doesn't matter because they have nukes.

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Re:Latvia wants permanent U.S. troops, foreign minister tell... by tablespoon on Monday March 07, 2022 @11:43AM (#30590003)

> Ukraine didn't have modern weapons in 2014, but they do now.

And the Ukrainians don't even have a full complement of modern weapons. IIRC, they're mainly getting sent infantry heavy-weapons at the very last minute. Even the US was pretty stingy with things like Javelins until very recently, out of fear of "provoking" the Putin.

Since the Baltics are in NATO, I doubt they'll have as many issues with getting more/better weapons. Hopefully they'll also take some lessons from Ukraine (e.g. really, really beef up their reserve forces and military training for their civilian population).

Also, since they're actually in NATO, they can hopefully count on better support from their allies than what the Ukrainians have gotten.

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