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Europe under extreme duress

Lawman said:
They can increase funding all they want… call me when they bring back the conscription that was used throughout the Cold War to meet the manning requirements.

I want to see Germany get serious about the fact even if it had tanks that worked they have no bodies to drive them.
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Looks like a few months ago Germany passed their version of Selective Service.

www.bbc.com

German cabinet backs voluntary military service, opening door to conscription - BBC News

The defence minister wants to increase soldiers in service from 182,000 to 260,000 by the early 2030s.
www.bbc.com www.bbc.com
 
Lawman said:
They can increase funding all they want… call me when they bring back the conscription that was used throughout the Cold War to meet the manning requirements.

I want to see Germany get serious about the fact even if it had tanks that worked they have no bodies to drive them.
Click to expand...

https://twitter.com/x/status/1897687463759315032

But on the serious side, both Germany and Japan did take a less militaristic approach towards life after WWII for…reasons. Changing a culture takes time.
 
CommodoreMid said:
https://twitter.com/x/status/1897687463759315032

But on the serious side, both Germany and Japan did take a less militaristic approach towards life after WWII for…reasons. Changing a culture takes time.
Click to expand...
Yeah my money would very much be on the Poles at the current state of everything.

Be nice if the economic power of the EU could actually field the forces it’s responsible for. The Bundeswehr used to maintain an entire Corps of ground fighting force throughout the Cold War plus reserves to draw from, to include fielding what was until the M1A2, the single best armored formations in NATO. Right now… they’d be lucky to get parity over the Danish.

This is why I’m mad…. Currently 1/3 of the Active Army is on a constant cycle of deployments to meet the manning requirement in Atlantic Resolve/Assure & Deter and meanwhile people drawing on political divisions are claiming Europe is prepared to “go it alone.” They don’t have the bodies to maintain constant ownership of the northern mission in the Baltics without us having to step in from time to time and provide some pretty specific capabilities all the time, they (traditional Western Europe) definitely aren’t taking the wolf next door for the seriousness they should while the Latvians and Poles are throwing the kitchen sink at the problem. We are deluding ourselves because it’s comfortable.

Europe needs to get its S in a sock and realize that if things go sideways in Eucom and IndoPacom at the same time, we won’t be there the way they’ve grown comfortable with and they need to step up now if deterrence is going to be a real thing. Crimea was over a decade ago. They’ve had 1/3 of the time they’ve lived in the “end of history” era to unfuck themselves. They should be looking at the most dangerous prediction situation and responding to that but they aren’t and promises are just that.
 
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It was very telling watching how fast European NATO air forces got tapped out during the Libya campaign. How much has their capacity improved since then?
 
sevenhelmet said:
It was very telling watching how fast European NATO air forces got tapped out during the Libya campaign. How much has their capacity improved since then?
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Lol.

I can only speak for surface weapons, but I’d go with about fuck all.

Post-2022 (Ukraine), NATO started to wake up to the problem. Unfortunately, that only meant we realized that turning the taps of weapons production back on wasn’t actually a lever we had available to pull. But even within those available limits, and the big talk about jacking up spending, I didn’t see NATO do anything more than incremental increases. Nothing bold or dramatic.

We’re getting there, but I guarantee anybody in a position to pay attention to weapons capacity is demanding more and faster. One thing I will credit to the new Administration, they are pushing for the necessary bold and actually meaningful increases.
 
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