Occupation of Iraq -- Where Is Europe?

[Pekka]

DanS, Good thing I noticed then, eh?

Well personally I think 2.5% is not too much to ask for. Or 4%. We can't still make it . But some countries could... and granted, many European countries have talked a lot about peacekeeping, and are not living up to those promises.

But then again, I don't care about peacekeeping, it's a waste of time .

[GePap]

Hey DanS: we send 3.5% of our GDP on the military. Don;t we have enough forces to peacekeep in Iraq?

Hersh is correct: the Average European has little inclination to spend lost of money on defense to peacekeep. Newsflash, NEITHER DOES THE US! The very fact that the US wants other states to participate in Iraq is to cut our expenditures and so that we don't have to keep 50% of our army and logistic units in there for years. BUt since the US decided to go into Iraq before creating the political groundwork to get European support (becuase the Iraqi threat was so imminent ), we are stuck with it, and those that 'were willing'.

If it had been up t the US public we would not have gotten into the balaksn at all, and we certaonly won;t get involved anywehre outside the ME or NE Asia any time soon.

[Spiffor]

I may be wrong, but I thought European countries provided the bulk of peacekeeping forces in Kosovo and Afghanistan, and that France was always the leading peacekeeping force in Africa (with little peacekeeping done however).
It is normal since European militaries are richer in numbers when it comes to ground units, the heart of peacekeeping forces.

The fact that Europeans don't want to pay for your mess in Iraq doesn't mean they oppose peacekeeping as a whole. Don't forget that no European public opinion ever supported the Iraqi war except in Britain. The refusal to go there isn't surprising.

Besides, the objective of Aznar, when he was actively undermining the clumsy efforts of Chirac to build a European bloc, was precisely to continue like Spain has done before : very little military spending, and living under the US' umbrella. I suppose this objective was shared by quite a few members of the axis of vassals.

However, Oerdin is right that the EU (as the organisation) is extremely bad when it comes to military business. This comes from the fact that the 3 most important countries in Europe (UK, France, Germany) sure want to become militarily / politically / diplomatically important again, while the other States want to continue concentrating on their economy. That's why the EU-guy for diplomacy is completely powerless (and that'll continue with the Constitution), and that's why all Europe-wide military projects are ripped of their meaning.

There have been quite a few military initiatives in the EU, mostly involving France + Britain or France + Germany, but they have been extremely timid so far. The deep strategic disagreements between UK and France hinder these projects from being really ambitious.

[Pekka]

Spiffor, sure, but there are people who have spoke for 'the whole Europe', that we are always there for peacekeeping. We are, but the real effort is not very impressive.

[Cruddy]

Originally posted by Spiffor
...The deep strategic disagreements between UK and France hinder these projects from being really ambitious.

Bearing in mind what happened on the last co-operative effort at "peacekeeping", this isn't surprising.

Also, an EU wide defence force means no more NATO - and a lot of countries are deeply suspicious over anything that changes the status quo, which has been largely a success.

The whole POINT of colloboration on projects like Eurofighter is to;-

a) Keep the defence jobs in Europe
b) Deny the money to Boeing.

As all the planes are tooled up with US made missiles anyway, I can't see dependance on the US being a factor.

[DanS]

Hey DanS: we send 3.5% of our GDP on the military. Don;t we have enough forces to peacekeep in Iraq?

We spend 4%. And yes, we have enough forces to occupy Iraq. My instant beef is that the neocons were unrealistic in their assumptions about how gung-ho the Europeans are on peacekeeping, which gave our troops false hopes about what they would be doing the next couple of years (sorry, we know you're a $275,000 per annum pair of boots on the ground, but here's a rifle--go stand in front of a bank in the middle of Fallujah in 120 degree heat).

Newsflash, NEITHER DOES THE US!

Precisely. We assumed that others would pick up the slack. It's very convenient to ignore something that is unpleasant.

Now take the instant case of Iraq and project our military forward 20 years. That's what I'm talking about. Europe is nowhere to be seen.

[Pekka]

DanS, I go. Give me the rifle!

edit: Again I got it wrong, this is about peacekeeping. Keep your rifle .

[DanS]

Pekka: You're all occupation, no peacekeeping. Here's a rifle. Go occupy their asses.

[Pekka]

The real story behind all this is, that we don't want to wear those sissy blue hats and helmets. We are too tough. We are so tough, that we can just drink tea and critisize everyone else. If we start fighting again, it's WWIII and IV at the same time. Look, you only need Germany, not the whole Europe .

I know, bad joke. sorry..

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Ecthelion

Where is Europe?

Don't you realize when people are being sarcastic?

[Paul Hanson]

I'm sure he does.

[GePap]

DanS:

The Neocons are in no mood for peaceekkeping either, and neither is anyone in the US military. Soldiers in the Us like to fight wars and win wars. All that mess afterwards..we really don;t care much forit, or for doing that job, and I highly doubt that anyone in the US, particulrly washington, will all of a sudden develop the taste for peacekeeping anytime within the next 20 years.

On Europe: what would Europe be peacekeeping for? This is the key question. Wil they peacekeep to "spread American values", which si the neo-con objective? Why should they? They have thier own set of values. As Spiffor said, effective European peacekeeping is likely to come from only the 6 big EU states (Germany, France, UK, Italy, spain, Poland). Germany has contitutional issues and cultural ones, Italy and Spain don't have the wil either. That leaves Poland (not wealthy enough) , the UK and France. France wants to have the Europeans pushing thier agenda forcefully, while tyhe Uk wants to have a "western agenda", but they are not likely to get support for that in the US, and while Italy and Spain might temporarilly back such a move (look for Aznar to be gone soon enough), as I said before, those two won;t contribute much, leaving the UK alone, unless they back the French notion, and then you would be more likely to see more European defense innitiatives, but ones that Washington would disapprove of.

[DanS]

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[DanS]

Also, I want to make clear that I think our troops are doing an important job occupying Iraq. But it seems sort of pointless having the commander of the 4th ID try to explain how his multi-billion dollar battle net and targetting systems are helping him so much against the second-rate sabateurs and snipers.

Our military, from the top (prez) to the bottom (private) doesn't want to do these things, so everyone does everything possible to try not to create the capability. Well, here we are.

[BeBMan]

Well, I don´t understand this discussion. As Spiffor said, Europeans were able to bring their troops to Afghanistan. You have a point when you say they hadn´t enough transport capacity on their own, but what matters is the result - the troops are there. So I see no reason why it should be different in case of Iraq (if we wanted to there - and if the US wanted us).