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"The Common defence"? Of who? From what?

With the demise of the Soviet threat, I'm rather intrigued at what significant threats you think Europe now faces to its security.

by IdiotSavant on Thu Aug 18th, 2005 at 08:11:13 AM EST
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I was referring to the Cold War era.  
by corncam on Thu Aug 18th, 2005 at 09:21:27 AM EST
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Which is over. Spending more money on tanks and guns now certainly won't do anyone any good.

Idiot/Savant
No Right Turn - New Zealand's liberal blog

by IdiotSavant on Thu Aug 18th, 2005 at 09:59:00 AM EST
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Indeed.

The only field where I'd favor more military spending is humanitarian interventions. But, apart from transport planes and a unified Euroforce (which are coming), what this would need most is not more spending and more weapons, but more training (to avoid civilian casualties, and to not rish long-term negative economic, social and political consequences with short-term force protection decisions) and much deeper policy pre-planning, and of course strong checks and balances to prevent the abuse of this power for other goals (economic, geopolitical, dominance). Possibly best done under a UN umbrella, the EU delegating power.

Only, by today, I am growing increasing doubts that this is realistically possible. That is, would politicians ever agree to something like this, or would be able to do sufficient policy pre-planning.

*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.

by DoDo on Fri Aug 19th, 2005 at 07:03:09 AM EST
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