OT:President Asks Europe:"What R You Prepared 2 Do?

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https://www.reuters.com/world/us-questions-european-governments-ukraine-security-2025-02-16/

The United States has sent European governments a set of questions about what they would need from the U.S. in order to provide Ukraine with security guarantees.

A U.S. State Department spokesperson said that Washington “has been clear that we expect European partners to take the lead in establishing a durable security framework and look forward to their proposals.”

Here are the questions sent by the U.S. according to a document seen by Reuters.

1) What do you view as a Europe-backed security guarantee or assurance that would serve as a sufficient deterrent to Russia while also ensuring this conflict ends with an enduring peace settlement?

2) Which European and/or third countries do you believe could or would participate in such an arrangement?

Are there any countries you believe would be indispensable?

Would your country be willing to deploy its troops to Ukraine as part of a peace settlement?

3) If third country military forces were to be deployed to Ukraine as part of a peace arrangement, what would you consider to be the necessary size of such a European-led force?

How and where would these forces be deployed and for how long?

4) What actions do U.S., allies and partners need to be prepared to take if Russia attacks these forces?

5) What, if any, U.S. support requirements would your government consider necessary for its participation in these security arrangements?

Specifically, which short-term and long-term resources do you think will be required from the U.S.?

6) What additional capabilities, equipment and maintenance sustainment options is your government prepared to provide to Ukraine to improve its negotiating hand and increase pressure on Russia?

What more is your government prepared to do to increase its sanctions on Russia, including more strictly enforcing sanctions and better targeting third countries enabling Russia globally?

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Vacuous

Just buy the weapons from us full freight.

Color me cynical.

God are most official documents boring.

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Amanpour interviewed some NATO and EU honchos last night. The officials were pretty tight-lipped about their plans, because they know Putin is listening. How would they know that their responses to these USian questions would not be funneled directly to Putin?

Steve

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What is Putin supposed to do about Central Europe?

The Europeans are gearing up a military industrial complex. For now some armaments will be bought from us or SK and Japan. Japan is also gearing up.

Easy guess. Now the headline.

https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/us-will-push-european-allies-buy-more-arms-ukraine-say-sources-2025-02-11/

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If they’re smart, they’ll assume that any information they provide would be funneled directly to Putin.

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Europe is a mess.

The countries keep fighting major wars between themselves and drag the world into it.

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I’m sure with the crew that’s in now, and not just the VP, but especially the SecDef and the DNI, I don’t know how they could assume otherwise.

Pete

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When was the last one? Recall?

Ukraine is not a major war.

Some war effort. Russia can not move its forces two miles down the road. Russia is still losing 1200 men per day.

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Not to mention TI himself, who has assured us Putin could be trusted (koff…koff) Meanwhile, TI gives up the major bargaining points before talks even start. But his press secretary assures us he is the best deal maker the world has ever seen. (gag)

Steve

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Comparatively speaking, Europe is more peaceful today than it’s ever been, going back millenia.

This stability is a result of the US maintaining stong alliances over the last 80 years, give or take. Now that we’re abandoning our values based foreign policy, things will get very messy.

This isn’t brain surgery.

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For starters.

Then came European determination to build unifying and broadening social and economic structures, starring the

  1. EU and its initial coal and steel community
  2. the Erasmus program making it economic, easy, and immensely educational for bright young Europeans to study together away from national parochialisms,
  3. parallel associations linking research facilites and etc., (CERN)

and much more. Meanwhile the USA is teetering ever closer to nasty civil conflict, a conflict being fueled by leaders who admire “strong man strong mind fruitful women nationalism”

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Thanks for expanding! I certainly don’t want to suggest that the US saved the day. It’s important to acknowledge how European countries’ efforts have sustained stability.

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Were not the “values” a function of the USian “us vs the Commies” one track thinking? With the US bailing, will western Europe start to fracture into “no to Putin, forever” vs appeasement camps?

Steve

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Meanwhile, the latest from TI:

“You should have never started it,” Trump said of Ukraine while criticizing President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who had expressed concern that his country was not included in talks between the U.S. and Russia on Tuesday in Saudi Arabia.

“I think I have the power to end this war, and I think it’s going very well. But today I heard, ‘Oh, well, we weren’t invited.’ Well, you’ve been there for three years,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort. “You should have never started it. You could have made a deal.”

Steve

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“Film at 11:00”. It’s easy to end a war, when you surrender.

Steve

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You guys live in fantasy land.

There is a small probability that the Ukraine war may go nuclear and annhilate major areas in the continent.

Here you are saying that it is peaceful.

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Um, Cold War? History is not just the study of the past, it informs our present and future. History is not fantasy.

I get it, lots of people like dudes who put out that big dictator energy. Things typically don’t work out well when they’re in charge.

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The biggest risk in general is Germany. When they have tough economic problems, they tend to start world wars. And maybe the USA isn’t changing its values, but rather deciding that it can’t pay for everyone’s defense anymore.

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Nope. We’re definitely trying to change our values, from a country that wants to be a world leader to a country that only looks out for itself.

What too many don’t realize is that giving up world leadership also means giving up our economic dominance. That will eventually turn us into a second tier country struggling to find relevance and dwelling in the past. Kind of like England.

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Do you think Germany is a bigger threat than Russia?

Sure, the whole of the USA hasn’t changed its values, just the transactional morally corrupt leaders and their unapologetic supporters. Many of them are overtly supporting the AfD in Germany. And we shouldn’t question their values…hilarious.

Also, the only time Article 5 has ever been invoked was on 9/12/2001, in defense of the US. Yet we whine and cry about having to defend everyone…ridiculous.

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