I don't think its necessarily wrong to say the EU is about economics, I just think he's wildly mistaken on the timeframe that the EU looks at. The very fact that Ireland has moved from a net recipient to a net contributor is exactly what backs up the mid to long term view of the EU. Every candidate state have been an immediate net negative in terms of funding, but in the long run when you support their economies the entire EU benefits.
I don't think it's going to be either or - not all future warfare is going to be fought with advanced weapons. The current conflict has shown the need for basic infantry weapons and artillery, and especially anti-air weapons. Fancy guided weapons are expensive, and "cheaper" weapons and ammunition are going to be needed as well. So it's absolutely essential that European armies have basic arms/munition production available - someone is going to manufacture them. And it's not going to be Russia or China (or USA) any more, Europe needs their own production - which seems to be what Germany among others want to do. Unless Europe wants to be completely dependent on USA in the future as well.
In any case NATO has 31 different armies - they don't all fight the same way or with the same equipment.
Closest seems to be backfilling. Switzerland is selling two dozen tanks. They can't go to Ukraine, but there's nothing stopping a country with Leopards from sending their ones to Ukraine and backfilling with the Swiss ones.
That's because Russia has a "dumb" armed forces, any conflict NATO could be involved in and their air power and precision would flatten Russia or anyone else in the first few days, land, sea or air.
The current conflict only necessitates huge amounts of artillery and basic weapons because it's not a high-tech war. NATO is not going to need the level of lower level equipment that Ukraine does.
Lets hope that bill goes through the US senate so that Russian assets can end up paying for the damage they have caused.
I noticed that as well before and subsequently heard a good reason for why you see this a lot. Apparently the higher ups in the army flogged a lot of the kit online as a backhander to themselves. The most popular items sold were those in the most common sizes. That left sizes that were extremely large or extremely small which is why you see so many of those on the Russian (and especially the LNR/DPR) soldiers in Ukraine.
Plenty of bot farms in India.
Mick Wally taking on Piers
Wow even Piers gets it
If you look like the biggest arsehole in an exchange with Piers Morgan then you'd really want to examine where your life has gone wrong.
Given the legal restraints on Switzerland which are not easily overcome, its better than nothing.
What does a "high-tech" war delivered by NATO look like exactly?
We're seeing as good as live footage of this war thanks to social media, we get to see all the flaws of both sides. I've yet to see NATO at war with a force this size and under the same scrutiny, so I wouldn't be quick to jump to a wipe out conclusion.
I don't think bolstering conventional weaponry is a bad idea considering the backfill that is needed anyway and the fact that it even poses a slight risk not doing so. If NATO does ever engage in direct conflict with Russia it will increase the chances of involvment from others.
I think no matter how smart a side can be in a war like that, this grinding warfare will always be the end result. Eggshells that have to be walked on will stop either side from delivering the blows that count until there is no other choice.
There truly are an infinite number of Universes - never thought I'd end up being in one where I agree with Piers Morgan.
All war is stupid, yes.
Ordinary Ukrainians are dying for no good reason, yes.
Conclusion: Russia should leave Ukraine.
As I don't follow the tWitterings of Mick Wallace, I have to wonder if he's ever said out loud what he appears to really think, which is that he agrees with, and supports, Russia's decision to invade Ukraine? He seems to get so close on everything I see posted here, 'US-NATO agenda' being a classic.
So coming back to the original point, the EU isnt just mindlessly dithering about whether to spend money on artillery shells or on more luxury items as the propaganda would have it. They are dithering on the issue of whether to build up large scale production lines of the less important weapons or whether to focus on the high tech stuff. Like air defense as you mention. Clearly, rational choices to prefer the high tech stuff are being made.
And while NATO isnt a single army, they a) use standardised equipment and practise interoperability and b) all seem to have come to the same conclusion that manufacturing millions of shells to blast Russia (or whoever) in a future war is not a pressing requirement, even while accepting that it is what Ukraine wants
I can assure you that the noise is a whole lot worse when they start landing near you.... especially if its mere meter's away. The noise is shocking in fact. And another shock to the system is when Blackhawks are shooting nearby. Customed by movies like "Blackhawk Down" and the noise's they made in that film, the real noise level comes as quite a shock.
To the outside viewer probably like the same kind of war. NATO is to my knowledge, big on common communication protocols, so that eg. if a squadron of F-35s is operating ahead of a squadron of Eurofighters picks up targets on their radars etc. they can feed that data to the 'data swarm' and the command structure will know and the Eurofighters will know where those targets are located. The military doctrine is for high interoperability of battlefield situational information, at least as far as I understand it. Of course NATO didn't form out of a single military so it was natural for eg. german french and american platforms to speak different languages in a sense, be engineered differently under different progeny, but when they were looking at the Joint Strike Fighter Program in the late late 80s/early 90s part of that review was to homogenize those systems (not just for the F35 but all of NATO) because in effect, communication between forces was firewalled between the technological distinctions between them, impeding the speed and effectiveness of battlefield communication. It's unclear how much operational intelligence, direct or otherwise, NATO is providing the the Ukrainian command structure. But they do seem to keep pantsing the Russians.
I would be looking into who paid for some vineyards or what ever they were. 🤐
Just had a thought.
Ukraine used to have nukes.
Then they gave them back to russia, (budapest agreement) on basis they were not attacked by russia.
Clearly russia broke this.
What if?
Ukraine "found" 3 or 4 nukes that were not returned at the time of this?
This would be a game changer
That wouldn't be a situation I'd want to find out about in a mexican standoff.
next "question"
That's usually something the person who was asked the question gets to say and why so defensive in the first place, it's like you're taking what I said as a personal attack?
The question asked was what a "high-tech" war with NATO looks like, what the Russians claim wasn't brought up by anyone but you and all you're doing is derailing things with your obsessive take.
It was a fair question and point made, stop looking for your own little battles.
No doubt they're the most advanced in every aspect but I still think it premature to write off the need for conventional capacity building. That is gambling and hoping for the best case scenario.
No it wouldn't change a thing,
Even if they found a few nukes just laying around, try threatening Russia with several nukes first they would have to show they are willing and able to use them but on the other side of the coin Russia has thousands of nukes who's going to win that particular game ,
Context is important here. This entire conversation started over a hypothetical war between Russia and NATO, with NATO engaging directly. You're referring to the real war between Ukraine and Russia, where NATO members are supporting indirectly.
There was no inventing here... it was just a response to a poster and the entire point was the hypothetical.
Lancets are obliterating Ukrainian equipment at the moment.
War has changed, €20,000 Drones destroying millions of equipment.
Have you any proof of 210k Russians dead?
I watch both the Ukrainian and Russian Telegram channels.
Both sides are making heavy use of suicide drones to good effect. Anything that's within a few km of the frontline is spotted and destroyed. There are plenty of incidents of even t72 tanks being completely destroyed by such attacks.
I get the feeling that this war will be won or lost be whoever has the resources to overwhelm the others in this sort of attack.
Have you any proof that there aren't more than 210k Russian's dead?
Good interview here with Arsenal player on Ukraine
A fresh geopolitical video from yesterday
![Photo of [Deleted User]](https://we.vanillicon.com/v2/e050b53be62f0ae2404c620976170938.svg)
