Hi, Shrewd!        Login  
Shrewd'm.com 
A merry & shrewd investing community
Best Of PoliticsBest OfAll BoardsThe Shrewd’m WeeklyLearn to InvestHow to Become Shrewd
Search
Shrewd'm.com Merry shrewd investors
Search
Best Of PoliticsBest OfAll BoardsThe Shrewd’m WeeklyLearn to InvestHow to Become Shrewd


The week's question
In March 2025, in the thread "Re: OT, out", Umm asked the members: "Do you think it is because America is made up of magical soil that makes businesses based in America magically profitable?" This week it is put to everyone again. The button below opens the small thread re-asking it - read what others have said so far, then give your own answer as an ordinary reply.
Answer this questionContinue to Shrewd'mThis note won't appear again
Halls of Shrewd'm / US Policy
Unthreaded | Threaded | Whole Thread (60) |
Author: Dope1 ⎊  😊 😞
Number: of 86289 
Subject: Re: More EU views on the trade deal
Date: 07/29/25 1:46 PM
Post New | Post Reply | Report Post | Recommend It!
No. of Recommendations: 3
There's a major free-rider problem - Poland probably doesn't want Spain to be able to get the benefit of their military expenditures, which block continental invasions from the east). There's also collective action problem - the Great European Plain is the "roadway" for land forces to get into Europe from the east, and so you need all of the countries that sit on that plain to be heavily militarized in order to provide an effective defense. There's significant reasons why Europe would want to maintain tight integration of national defense institutions and policies.

And this is their exact problem today- in many respects the entire EU is free riding off the US (and has been for decades now). Within the continent the Spainards (the furthest from Russia with limited world war exposure in their history) have little desire to fund a national defense whereas on the other side you have a Poland (sits on Putin's border and has a long history of being run over from both the east and the west) with the polar opposite view.

The Pax Americana arose because Europe was under the massively powerful umbrella of the U.S. military....but it also existed in part because European armed forces were generally weak and subject mostly to NATO oversight. Getting Europe to vastly increase its own defense operations isn't an entirely unmitigated good, because you increase the chances of going back to the Bad Old Days of wars within Europe.

And this brings us around to the trade deal. Avoidance of that is fine in concept, but only if the Europeans have some skin in the game. Since the reunification of Germany, they largely haven't. NATO navies are at all-time lows. The Germans can field maybe ~80 combat ready aircraft and that's probably a very generous estimate:

Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski likes to relate a humorous moment from a NATO event that occurred during the 2013-2019 tenure of Dr. Ursula von der Leyen as head of Germany’s MoD. One of his German colleagues took him aside and pointed across the room to the CDU politician and told him:

“Do you see that woman over there,” asked his German colleague. “That’s our defense minister. She has more children than the Luftwaffe currently have serviceable aircraft.”

(from 19fortyfive.com - The numbers prove germanys military is rotting away)

If the Europeans don't want to fund their own defense in traditional ways, they can buy our hardware instead. I'm good with that.
Post New | Post Reply | Report Post | Recommend It!
Print the post
Members reply directly to Dope1 here — and replies get answered. Reading is free; so is joining the conversation. Join Shrewd'm »
This community has written 86,214 posts about US Policy. The article-length ones it recommended most:
It's going to get worse · 33 recs · 2025
G’day Donny · 30 recs · 2026
Old Related Story · 28 recs · 2026
HCR is a national treasure · 27 recs · 2025
Fascism in America · 27 recs · 2025
Unthreaded | Threaded | Whole Thread (60) |


Announcements
US Policy FAQ
Contact Shrewd'm
Contact the developer of these message boards.

Best Of Politics | Best Of | Favourites & Replies | All Boards | Followed Shrewds | Open Questions | Moving a community