The Guardian: Nato is a threat to Europe and must be disbanded

[Dinner]

Originally posted by laurentius
We survived without ANY allies back in the 1939-1944,

*COUGH* NAZI GERMANY *COUGH*

[Kuciwalker]

Beat you to it by a long shot

[Dinner]

Originally posted by laurentius

Because not all NATO members are in the Union nor are all the EU counties in the NATO. Its an outside force, it simply doesnt serve our common interest. Also it has too much history to bear to win support of all Europeans.

Other then Russia which countries are anti NATO? Even the Russians are only anti NATO because they aren't likely to be invited to join.

[Pekka]

Oerdin, yeah but technically they just provided us weapons for the continuation war. So germany was just a little cosmic detail . But it is true that without their weapons we couldn't have fought pretty much at all, so that had a big effect. And also I think their presense in Lapland made the possible attempt of cutting the country in half once again (like in winter war) more of a dream than reality. SO that helped too. But in sense of just fighting, we managed ourselves thank you very much!

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
Beat you to it by a long shot

I must be getting slow in my old age.

[Dinner]

Pekka: Finnish troops helped during the Siege of Leningrad.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Pekka
Oerdin, yeah but technically they just provided us weapons for the continuation war. So germany was just a little cosmic detail . But it is true that without their weapons we couldn't have fought pretty much at all, so that had a big effect. And also I think their presense in Lapland made the possible attempt of cutting the country in half once again (like in winter war) more of a dream than reality. SO that helped too. But in sense of just fighting, we managed ourselves thank you very much!

Just like Britain "managed itself" before the US entered the war?

[Pekka]

Kuci, learn history or shut up. Just like US nuked China? uh?

Oerdin, we were keeping in our own perimiters. That's the old 'you tied up SU troops in your section'. Yeah we did. We were defending. They didn't have to attack. Blame us for defending ourselves?

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker

Just like Britain "managed itself" before the US entered the war?

Britain did pretty well before the US entered and I doubt Germany could have invaded even if the Soviets or Americans didn't join in the war. The German Air Force got mauled pretty bad during the battle of Britain and they were forced to call off the invasion, the British managed to push the vaunted Afrika Korp half way across north Africa, and they checked the German advance into Norway.

[MikeH]

Originally posted by Ned


Didn't Madonna just say that she wanted our troops out of Iraq because we were bombing the people of the Iraq? Here is what she said,

“I just don’t want American troops to be in Iraq, period,” the singer said on BBC Radio. “My feelings are ‘can we just all get out? . . . Global terror is everywhere. Global terror is down the street, around the block,’ she said. ‘Global terror is in California. There’s global terror everywhere and it’s absurd to think you can get it by going to one country and dropping tons of bombs on innocent people.”

Now that phraseology demonstates exactly what Kerry and others meant by dropping bombs on "the people of Vietnam." The Guardian article has the same intent, to suggest that the US is assaulting Iraqi cities indiscriminately, killing friend and foe alike.

As to the so-called "majority" of the people of Iraq being opposed to the US assaulting Iraqi cities indicrimnately and dropping bombs on innocent people, I would be shocked if they were not opposed. I, however, think you would get a different answer if you were to ask whether they supported the Iraqi government restoring Falluja to control of the Iraqi people so that the people of Falluja could vote in the upcoming election.

Did you actually read my post?

[Pekka]

Kuci just has his facts wrong and is missing the big picture all together.

[Ned]

I definitely think we, the US, should "streamline" our alliances to include only a very select few countries that would both like to have are help in case of attack, and are willing participants in US security as well. Europe may be chaffing at US dominance of NATO. We, in turn, have had it with so-called allies opposing and undermining US security.



BTW, shouldn't the whole concept of alliances be outmoded given the United Nations?

[Ned]

Originally posted by MikeH


Did you actually read my post?

Yes. The Guardian's "opinion" seems to be the same as Madonna's. Both are so far out there as anyone should instantly recognize the extreme bias in the statements. The problem comes from the fact that so many of the Hollywood and liberal crowd, here in the US, and the European public actually seem to believe this lunatic view of the world.

[laurentius]

Originally posted by Oerdin


Other then Russia which countries are anti NATO? Even the Russians are only anti NATO because they aren't likely to be invited to join.

People in most Nordic countries oppose NATO, millions and millions of German, French even british people hate NATO partly because of the Euro missile scandal. Half of Balkans hate NATO, especially the serbs. Nato just doesnt have a clean slate to start from. EU military in the other hand is much more justifiable to even the pacifists. Most Europeans believe in peace, we think its ok to reduce the military and oppose the militarization of EU. This is why a scenario where NATO is disbanded and is in Europe replaced with external border troops + rapid deploument force to be used in peacekeeping is prolly the most widely acceptable solution. I know it sounds federal and many people might opposed it because of that but it still is better IMHO than american troops living in little americas around Europe playing Cold War.

If I was to decide...I would say:

"Thank you very much Nato, but times have changed and now its time for goodbye. Again thank you for securing the freedom in Europe during the Cold War."

[Pekka]

Well, most people here in nordic countries oppose joining NATO. That's a different animal .

Also, Serbs trust Americans more than Euros.

But other than that, I don't try to disagree, just correcting some semantics.