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A comment on Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict?. Parent comment

Re:Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict? by peepeepoopoo89 on Tuesday November 26, 2024 @06:10AM (#42244653)
NATO as it exists today is a welfare program where US taxpayers subsidize the defense budgets of European countries so they can afford lavish social benefits programs for their citizens while the US drowns in both personal and federal debt. You were never going to come help us, and the exploitative relationship between our countries is now over. Good luck.
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Re:Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict? by jlengrand on Tuesday November 26, 2024 @07:57AM (#42245294)
In volume, maybe, not in % though. https://i.abcnewsfe.com/a/8b366e9a-5353-4a83-9510-bad111a54d...

Which should still leave plenty for lavish social benefits programs, since other places can afford it.

Genuinely looking forward seeing the US folks get a better coverage soon.

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Re:Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict? by leviliebvin on Tuesday November 26, 2024 @06:20AM (#42244716)
This is a fascinating perspective. Because a lot of people would rather say that NATO is a US-led project intended to protect US hegemony.
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Re:Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict? by peepeepoopoo89 on Tuesday November 26, 2024 @06:28AM (#42244751)
NATO needs the US a lot more than the US needs NATO. It wasn't always this way, but today we really don't get anything out of being allied with a deindustrialized and demilitarized Europe that is currently doing its absolute best to provoke an irrational and unstable neighboring world power.
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Re:Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict? by guiraldelli on Tuesday November 26, 2024 @06:57AM (#42244925)
I might be mistaken, but as far as I remember, there were NATO troops (that were not US troops) in Afghanistan, for decades, not because any European country declared war to Afghanistan.

I am not expert in history, but I cannot recall Europeans using US troops in an active war since creation of NATO. The opposite can be said in this century, though.

I do not deny that having the back of US, that has possibly the biggest military in the world, is favourable for European countries.

But I am absolutely tired of this discourse that NATO only benefits the others, and that USA doesn't get any benefit from it.

It is beneficial for all parts, and that is the reason it is an alliance. And USA has used it for its benefit for quite long; thus, it is not unreasonable that allies might rely on its help.

Besides, it is beneficial for USA to keep Europe stable and in peace — most clearly, for macro-economic reasons.

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Re:Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict? by peepeepoopoo91 on Tuesday November 26, 2024 @07:09AM (#42244977)
Europe did practically nothing in Afghanistan and it was a big source of political controversy here in the US.

> Besides, it is beneficial for USA to keep Europe stable and in peace — most clearly, for macro-economic reasons.

Maybe in the 20th century, but today your politicians have deindustrialized your economy into irrelevance.

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Re:Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict? by guiraldelli on Tuesday November 26, 2024 @07:46AM (#42245229)
In the last ten years, USA more than doubled the imports from EU [1], mostly machinery and vehicles, as well as other manufactured (i.e., industrialised) products such as chemicals.

In average, there is 200 billion USD/year [2]unbalance between imports from and exports to EU.

Now, imagine a war breaking in Europe, and overnight medicine and machinery [3] lacking in USA.

And those are products that need know-how, it is not something that any government can solve soon. Besides the 800 billion USD suddenly removed from the economy.

For better or for worse, we are all interdependent. And no matter how much we want to believe we can simply show a middle finger to our allies when it is convenient for us, the reality is that the interdependence in the real world, not in the demagogic one of political nonsense discourses, is a fact.

[1]: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php...

[2]: https://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c0003.html

[3]: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php...

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Re:Ask HN: Aren't you afraid of a possible world conflict? by meiraleal on Wednesday November 27, 2024 @10:01AM (#42256610)
You are both right, that's why this "partnership" stands.
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