The US has basically said that. It doesn't matter though, because at the end of the day, dramatic foreign policy shifts and realignments only make the U.S. even less attractive as an ally and a partner.
Decades of relationships are being strained in the attempt of mending ties with a state that never really did much to advance America's interests in the modern era. And it could all be completely undone in four years. The whip lash of back and forth, radical shifts in policy, are as damaging as the acts that directly alienate America's global partners.
That's already expected. Right now, preparations are made for nuclear (re-)armament of europe. Germany in particular is working towards that at this moment [EDIT: politically. not in the "actively preparing weapons"-phase.].
Also, france has a first-strike policy.
So even without US troops, europe will be fine.
A sizable part of the population has wanted the US out of especially germany for a looong time now, so those movements have become pretty popular again. I haven't heard "ami go home" in a long time, but right now it's common.
> Right now, preparations are made for nuclear (re-)armament of europe. Germany in particular is working towards that at this moment.
Can you provide a source for this? It would be big if true, in particular the Germany claim. I've not heard it and couldn't find things with a quick google search.
Germany is currently already doing nuclear weapons sharing with the US, i.e. they have access to US nuclear weapons though of course with some restrictions.
What you wrote sounds like Germany would be working towards having new nuclear weapons to be produced in Europe without US involvement and shared without US restrictions.
The political work for it is being done right now. However, I reread my comment and realized, it could be interpreted as "actively working at the weapons" instead of the political framework. My apologies in that case.
Thanks, that's helpful! To break it down for others: Germany is considering making a similar deal for sharing with France as it currently has with the US. So it wouldn't really be a (re)armament, more an increase in resilience by not just relying on US for sharing but adding France.
I think that's quite an important difference from your original wording.
I don't know, I think lately there's a massive flaw in first-strike and MAD policies. Does it ever really make sense to destroy the world and yourself because an ally(Baltic states for example) or even your own state is being invaded? It's certainly not going to improve your situation even if the alternative is invasion by a foreign power.
A powerful conventional army capable of proportional response is the only realistic deterrent.
The purpose of MAD is to never have to launch a nuke.
The entire point of the doctrine is that any sane person in charge of a country('s military) would never risk getting their own country nuked just to attack another country, so having nukes on your side means that no one else will attack you.
This...does somewhat break down when we end up with people in charge of nuclear countries who are not sane.
France (and the UK) having an independent nuclear deterrent is because they (/we) didn't want to risk someone like Trump when the USSR was still around:
> Will this really happen? Or will the US prevent Europe from doing that by saying “then defend from Russia all by yourself?”
If push came to shove, the only ally Ukraine needs to equal Russia (as it is today) is Poland.
They'd rather not have to as it would be expensive, but Poland could match 100% of current outside assistance for Ukraine[0] for a smaller fraction of their GDP than Ukraine itself is currently spending on the war[1].
The USA and Russia agreeing with each other to carve up Ukraine would be a much harder battle.
Well, it would be harder unless DOGE actually does make good on the claim of $2T cuts, because the only way of reaching $2T without touching the "mandatory" budget (mandatory = social security etc.) is to delete the entire armed forces and the CIA (and basically everything else) and just under half the interest payments on the loans, which in turn means they'd have no power to carve anything up.
[0] $380bn over the first 2 years according to Wikipedia, so lets say $190bn/year
[1] Ukraine plans to spend ~$53.7 billion in 2025, about 26% GDP
Poland's GDP is $915, 26% of that would be $237.9 billion / year.
This is already the expectation from our leaders. It is the belief of a good % of EU leaders that, if Russia were to push into Poland and the Baltic states, and Article 5 was invoked, the US would not respond. Or at least not without some Versailles Treaty-level extortion, as they're trying to do with Ukraine.
Which ironically means the US also loses it's leverage. They're already threatening to functionally (if not actually) withdraw from NATO and economically split off via tariffs. The next step is actual invasion, which while sorta-kinda has been talked about with Greenland, probably won't happen.
I can see Trump putting hostile troops in Greenland. Tiny population despite the size, and I think Trump (at least) does not believe Europe would respond seriously.
I don't even know how Europe would respond to that, and I live in Berlin.
Canada… not so much. For all the talk, he'd be absolutely screwed if he tried. If you think Fentanyl is a problem now, wait until it's supplied for free by drones sent by Canadian civilians paying for it out of pocket because they've never heard of the Geneva Convention or the Chemical Weapons Convention.
(Harder done than said, of course; if it was that easy to mess with populations, western Russia would be high as a kite right now).
Europe will respond with drastic economic sanctions that will act quickly. Tariffs are slow to make a difference, but EU have prepared what they call an economic “bazooka”, that will very quickly hit US economy if force is used against a member state.
Trump can still make things worse, e.g. explicitly saying "If Putin invaded Estonia, US would stay out of it" or things like this. He hasn't said that (I hope) so there's still some strategic ambiguity - i.e. it's not clear for Putin if Trump is just uttering empty words re letting Europe go or whether he would in the end do defend.
Oh, we're already looking at the likelihood of Trump arming Russia and joining the war on the side of Putin. But for some people, although probably a minority, that just increases the resolve. They simply will never be part of something like this: https://bsky.app/profile/doctoroxford.bsky.social/post/3liqw...
