• rottingleaf@lemmy.zip
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    8 months ago

    I think Europeans in general psychologically still feel themselves weak without NATO, unable to fill the needs of their own defense.

    I’ve been reading about 1st Indochina war yesterday, so - emotionally biased.

    • SuddenDownpour@sh.itjust.works
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      8 months ago

      EU’s population: 448 million

      EU GDP: 19 trillion dollars

      Russia’s population: 143 million

      Russia’s GDP: 1,78 trillion dollars

      Simplifying a bit here (I’m obviously taking Morocco and Belarus for granted, assuming that Turkey wouldn’t attack Greece, and so on), but it’s pretty much a “gotta get our shit together” situation, because there’s no reason why we should depend on the US for defense, or anything else.

      • paholg@lemm.ee
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        8 months ago

        I assume you meant trillion and not million for those gdp figures? Even then, they’re low.

      • rottingleaf@lemmy.zip
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        8 months ago

        That’s about architecture more than resources. “Gotta get our shit together” doesn’t negate the fact that shit isn’t together yet.

        It’s good to have resources, but such a situation is still weakness. Only I think NATO in some sense is a contributing factor, and EU frankly too, both not in the least because of all those veto and consensus rules.