NATO is not a business deal. That's a very dangerous game to play when Russia is waiting for an opening to stomp the baltic countries. It's not worth risking the integrity of NATO over 2% of the GDP of 3 broke-ass (but strategically important) countries.
> That's a very dangerous game to play when Russia is waiting for an opening to stomp the baltic countries.
politics has always been a dangerous game. This didn't just start this election cycle.
> It's not worth risking the integrity of NATO over 2% of the GDP of 3 broke-ass (but strategically important) countries.
NATO has no integrity if member countries do not follow the terms of the agreement. How can we expect them to support us if needed against Russia in the future if they aren't doing it now? Just because the US has a strong enough military to stand against russia alone doesn't mean that it would not be better if all the NATO countries helped out. I mean, thats the whole point of the treaty: stronger together, united against a common enemy.
I live in Croatia. As of last month, there was an attempted coup in Montenegro (our neighbors to the south). In Serbia (our neighbors to the east), the president is currently in hiding because of a series of assassination attempts, as well as the discovery of a large weapons cache indicative of a coup attempt. Both sets of conspirators were Russian-trained operatives, fresh from fighting in Ukraine for Mother Russia. Some were caught. Most fled back to Russia.
Meanwhile, in Bosnia (our next-door neighbors, sharing the overwhelming majority of our eastern border), the president of Republika Srpska (which controls half of Bosnia) has been in talks with Putin directly for months. The content of those discussions is undisclosed, but just this month he called a referendum on statehood -- a direct violation of the Dayton Agreement and a prelude to yet another Balkan War.
If you think Russia hasn't already begun invading Europe, you've really not been paying attention. With Ukraine looking likely to fall, I'd tremble if I lived in a Baltic state. Hell, I'm trembling over here and -- to give you an idea of how close to Western Europe the threat is coming -- I can see Italy on a clear day.
