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| Humvees are stored inside the Frigaard Cave in central Norway. The cave is one of six caves that are part of the Marine Corps Prepositioning Program-Norway, which supports the equipping of Marine Expeditionary Brigade consisting of 15,000 Marines and with supplies for up to 30 days. Photo by Lance Cpl. Marcin Platek |
Europe doesn't need us there.
We don't have the money to waste there. Time to pull gear and close up shop. That goes for all bases on European territory...from Norway all the way to Diego Garcia. If we're not wanted (and we're not) then bring our troops home.
i agree with pulling out most forces out of europe, except some airfields used to resupply forces in afghanistan but Diego Garcia? its one of the most important bomber bases strategically in the indian ocean, striking distance to middle east and south asia, thats where we need forces.
ReplyDeleteuh. NO.
ReplyDeleteeveryone complains that Europe doesn't fund its forces but some of that can be laid at our feet. we pull everything out. to include the forces at Diego Garcia.
the Brits have been getting cozy with India so if they want to rent space to them instead of us then cool. we just shut down all our space tracking and other gear. bull doze the runway that we buiilt and ship everything out.
i'm tired of subsidizing a people that don't want to help themselves. this of course doesn't apply to all the British people but to a large enough group to cause me to want to deep six their participation in any US programs.
out of the F-35 program...fuck BAE...let boeing build there part .... fuck mindenhall airbase in the UK...fuck it all....and that goes for the rest of europe.
its way past time to pull out.
DGAR is THE most strategically important base in the Indian Ocean - period. It costs little to operate and is situated right in the middle of the IO. The US can do what it wants, when it wants from DGAR. And UNLIKE the Norway Prepo site it is an operational base with tada Maritime Prepositioning Ships in its lagoon which are in Full Operating Status. I managed as many at 17 ships there, and they ALL went to war in DS/S when called. That meant about 250,000 TONS of needed cargo including enough to support a MEF.
DeleteThe DOD is subsidizing no one to be there unless you call pay nominal rent to the UK a subsidy? On DGAR you are really WRONG.
There is only one economy in the world that rivals that of the US, and that is Europe. Europe is in economic trouble at the moment, but that only makes US thinkers more nervous - remember what happened in Europe during the Depression? A unified Europe, brought closer together by economic necessity would easily be the biggest check to US power in the world. China and India are rising but they will be too busy dealing with their own abject poverty, rebellious ethnic groups, and assertive neighbors to look far beyond their regions, but a unified Europe could, especially if they act in a liberal interventionist manner, perhaps spurred by ideals or perhaps spurred in order to stem the flow of immigrants (which was the real reason why France was badgering for NATO intervention in Libya).
ReplyDeleteIt has been in the US's best interest to prevent this. Why did America side with Nasser's Egypt against Britain, France, and Israel during the Suez Crisis? Why did America actively rush European decolonization? Because while what America feared the most was Communism, American economic and strategic interests also did not like European influence around the globe.
Perhaps this logic is a bunch of 19th century realpolitik that is outdated. In fact, I tend to agree with that analysis - I personally feel as if Europeans simply don't give enough of a damn about military intervention across the globe. But my point is that the US has been happy to foot the bill for European defense in the past - not only to safeguard against Soviets but to make sure the Europeans don't feel as if they need to build up their own militaries. US presence in Europe will gradually decrease and our focus will shift towards Asia, but the key word there is gradual. Gradual, it will be.
well...even if a unified Europe resulted in a check in US power how would that necessarily be a bad thing? we're already in indirect competition with them, all that would do is to formalize the concept and lets not be fooled...the EU is all about being an economic and eventually a military juggernaut.
ReplyDeleteoh and if i was being completely honest, the Chinese don't worry me a bit. they have at best only copied western goods...at worst they've stolen them. Vietnam, Japan, S. Korea, Indonesia and a bunch of other countries i haven't named are more intellectually threatening than China will ever be.
India is kept in check by Pakistan and lets be honest...if India ever became a threat then we'd just back Pakistan and let them bleed them out a while before we hit them hard. but to be honest they have the same problem that China has. except they're worse at the copying part.
What does expeditionary mean if we have forward based ships? If we're going to have overseas holdings then I contend that it should be with an eye toward Asia and Asia alone. that means divesting ourselves of all these little nonsensical brush wars on concentrating on US interests....not European worries.
ReplyDeletetake Africa for instance. thats really a European worry but we're leading the charge. Diego Garcia? a hold over from the colonial British days. we don't need it and the Brits can cozy up to india over it.
what was it that our forefathers said? avoid foreign entaglements?! yeah. we should. that means leaving Europe and that means getting out of Africa and Diego Garcia.
we invented the Chinese menace so we have responsibilities to put that monster back in its cage but once thats done then leave other people to their own devices.
Diego Garcia is for all intents and purposes a US military facility. The pre positioned equipment serves US national interests. As does the home ported sub tender, the aircraft detachments, etc. It's one of three places outside the US we have B-2 shelters.
ReplyDeleteIndia for a number of reasons used to want us out but recently we've enjoyed better relations and we're starting to do more joint exercises with them and utilizing Diego Garcia.
We don't have a better base in terms of political reliability. We're not there to support other nations or alliances interests but solely our own. Diego Garcia is more akin to Guam than pre positioning sites in Norway.
Lane youre right. Add this the Maritime Prepositioning Ships at DGAR carry cargo to support a MEU. The cargo is onboard NOT ashore as in Norway In addition there are other prepo ships there.
DeleteAlso there is a large airfield, fleet refueling point and lagoon large enough for many ships to anchor in.
No one is going to find a place like that aroudn the IO. One does just PARK an ammo ship anywhere for years on end.
Why not simply have those huge, high speed ships stationed here in the states and deploy them as needed?
DeleteI've never seen a conflict where we were at war instantaneously and didn't have time to move ships to the area. some of those RO/RO ships are as fast as amphibs and can simply deploy with the gators.
Sol you're still talking 3 to 4 weeks steaming time vs 4 days. The maritime pre positioned ships serve a very useful purpose. Now that said we certainly could use more 30knot CONUS based transports. We only have 8 of those and we don't even spend enough to keep them properly maintained.
DeleteThat said it takes 4 days just to activate them and then you need to move the units equipment to the port and load it. The 31 pre positioned MPS and other ships are already loaded and ready to go on 24 hours notice. The ships are mostly at Diego Garcia and Guam.
then why not have those preloaded ships based in the US with the same 24 hour steam time table?
Deleteeveryone wants to talk expeditionary but no one actually wants to do it. there is no reason why those ships have to be stationed over seas. the troops and supplies will be coming from the states and the ships can too.
SOL what high speed ships (can carry thousands of tons of cargo)?
DeleteLane in point of fact the APF had a mission rqmt to deliver their loads within 5 days. And yes your timeline is about right. BUT the MPSron in Atlantic/Med is going away due to rqmts changes. AND I suspect so while Norway prepo?
this link may help (chk date?):
http://www.bic.usmc.mil/Concept.aspx
Sol, the limiting factor in the above was getting the USMC Fly-in Echelon to their respective discharge ports. MPS were timed to arrive when the terminal and shore party were ready to accept.
There have been numerous studies done on afloat prepositioning - all of which show that preloaded ships with operational (under DH & AC) tactical equipment shorten the time required to deliver their cargo to the required POD.
YES there are reasons why ships loaded with AMMO cannot be parked in US ports at all much less for long periods of time. Not to menition the targeting issues. Prepo ships are NOT stationary but move around regularly to prevent targeting. BTW sustaining troops fly to theater nowadays.
Solomon, europe spends roughly a third of what america spends on defense, france & britain alone, have the third & fourth highest spending on the planet, that europe doesn't spend enough is false. We should spend it differently maybe.
ReplyDeletethat the u.s. isn't wanted in europe is utter rubbish.
Solomon, ron paul is an isolasionist, who'd let syria, etc etc have the nuke, he'd pull out most of america's forces from abroad, cut military spending, generally do things you'd hate.
Rebublicans, got your country into the mess it is in right now!!! when clinton left office he left it with the country in surpluss, when goerge bush left office he left it with a trillion dollar deficit, leaving the u.s.a. in much bigger trouble than osama bin laden, could ever cost you, oh yeah he wasw killed by the next guy, obama.
Dont get me wrong i dont particularly like obama but he's better than any "bushe clone".
look how well the "con-dems" are doing in britain, we've just fallen back into recession, just mind you, but still.
From britains perspective america is pulling out of recession quite well, compared to us!!!
gotta start using the reply button so my comments dont get caught in the wash....
Deleteanyway Darren.
from looking at things from this side of the atlantic it appears that Europe doesn't want us on that continent. additionally even defense blogs have a bit of America bashing to them that i find distasteful. you might be right about the UK and France being numbers 3 and 4 in defense spending but i wonder exactly how much of that has to do with pay and how much it has to do with actual gear?
putting it another way, does China get more bang out of its defense dollar because they're much more frugal when it comes to paying their soldiers? i would bet that they do. additionally if you haven't been keeping up with events, the Pacific nations are on an arms buying spree. every nation on the Pacific Rim is getting ready for world war 3...even Singapore with a population less than half of the UK's is spending like gang busters.
i give none of the political parties high marks...the democrats and republicans have both conspired to bring a mighty nation to its knees through free trade, outsourcing and a flawed economic policy that borders on a religion....no practicality just a 'belief' that it works. but we're not talking about what might have beens we're talking about the here and now and Obama just plain screwed the pooch.
repeating myself but he took two years to play with health care while the economy muddled along. and don't believe the tripe that comes out of the treasurery dept. we're still hurting its just that most of the american public is too stupid to notice.
Hay Solomon, i just love a good debate, American bashing is a fun pasttime, not seriously aimed at anyone in perticular, unless your a 30 stone redneck, who thinks mcdonalds is a healthy way too eat!!!
DeleteI dīˈgres, after the second world war, with britain on it's knees, flat broke, The nhs was created, out of poverty came a briliant institution. one that gives everyone an equal footing, loved by the majority. If your going to do something, dont chizle around the edges of a problem, use a sledgehammer. The richest country on the planet should be able to give everyone universial healthcare, Health is a fundamental right more important than free speech, The right to bear arms & USMC, dig dig.
old age pensioners shouldn't havee to work in till there graves because their medical benifits & pensions, dont cover the drugs they have to pay for, A hard working family, with health benifits shouldn't have too declare bankruptchy because the mum has a heart attack, looses her job thru ill health, then her health insurance. You shouldn't have to worry when you have an accident, about how much an ambulance trip will cost you if you call 911... the injustice of your health systyem, is beyond reason.. you may have the best health system, but it's only really available if your rich, or served your country. 20 or 30 million americans can attest too that!!
I'd agree that, each party can be bad but democrats, atleast try to think of the people, while lining their own pockets, republicans are just busy, lining their own pockets!!!
global trade, is about world stability, china, is more involved, today than 20 or 30 years ago, therefore you have more means too influence.
Lets be clear, would you have been better off wit a third term for bush over the last 4 years, I dont think so!!!!!!
world stability? how is the world more stable now? how is the standard of living increased because of these unfair trade practices?
Deleteif isolationism is the way to a fairer world then so be it. i am tired of the america bashing. lets let the US look inward and take care of our own problems and let the rest of the world do the same. we don't need them and they don't need us.
if i ruled the world the first thing i would do is to take every drop of oil produced in the US and keep it here. same goes for natural gas and coal. then i'd make deals with canada and mexico and guess what. we wouldn't need to worry about those jack asses in the middle east.
that would be a european problem along with africa. i am so sick of the US bending over backwards to help this ungrateful planet and then have pacifist jackasses act like they can do better.
i just want to give them a chance to show me and the world how they would.
lets not forget, alot of the middle east instability, lies at america's feet, to a lesar extent u.k. aswell.
Delete1951, iran nationalises their oil industry, u.s. & u.k. impose an embargo,
1953 thru the failure of an embargo, General Fazlollah Zahedi is proclaimed as prime minister and the Shah returns, via a coup engineered by the British and American intelligence services. Like many autocratic madmen things turn harsh quickly for anyone who oposes him
1978 September - The Shah's brutual policies alienate the clergy and his authoritarian rule leads to riots, strikes and mass demonstrations. Martial law is imposed, many die.
1979 1 February - The Islamic fundamentalist, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, returns to Iran following 14 years of exile in Iraq and France for opposing the regime. The same year, The Islamic Republic of Iran is created.
1980 22 September - Start of Iran-Iraq war which lasts for eight years, The u.s. supplies arms to both sides.
It's easy to say leave them selfs to them selves, but america hasn't been able to do that for 6 decades or more, maybe if we hadn't fucked them over back in the 50's, then again in the 80's, they wouldn't hate us so much, oh and america shot down an iranian passenger jet with 290 passengers onboard, they have a few reasons to hate us
so your answer to the problem isn't to take a hands off approach but to continue to play king maker?
Deleteinteresting.
Hardly, I'm just saying history has alot to do with it, Would you like iran to have a nuke with a missle capable of reaching the u.s. I'm sure you'd be boming the shit out of them before that ever happend, i'm saying maybe If we'd taken a hands off approach 6 decades ago, we wouldn't be in this mess, now.
Deletefirst the rocket tech that they have can only reach Europe not the US....so i could care less about them getting nukes. Israel has an adequate anti-missile system and Europe hasn't seen fit to develop one independently.
Deletesecond, we can't unring the bell so all we can do is move forward. i say we take a hands off approach in moving forward.
ok, i get your point about un ringing the bell, but how long do you think it'll take for them too build a multi stage icbm to hit america, in your isolasionist stance? what will happen then?
Deleteto be honest, i think your right, to keep a hands off approach, all i was saying, america doesn't have a good track record of doing so. Iran doesn't pose a threat, even with a missle or 20 that can hit e.u. or u.s.a. they'd be fucked back a hundred times over
if they get a missile that can strike the US then the US will bomb them back to the stone ages independently from US bases. not allied territory but from US bases.
Deleteyou have to start somewhere, sometime so why not now?
"you have to start somewhere, sometime so why not now?"
DeleteTrue
your partially right, about the china thing, not because their frugall, but because they buy cheaper things, and our politicians fuck everything up by changing their minds all the time -- f-35b, no f-35c, oh fuck it lets just buy the f-35b
ReplyDeleteSoloman, just remember that Brits and Yanks have bled the same blood in the same places for a long long time.
ReplyDeleteRemember your strikes on Libya in the 80's. Where were they launched from?
Remember the war on terror. Who was your first and largest ally?
Remember Korea, World War 2 etc etc.
There is a long history between our countries.
Dont throw that all away
the history is there but to be honest American get a much warmer reception from Poland, Romania, even Italy and Spain.
Deleteit seems like the European big 3...Germany, France and the UK are headed in a different direction from the US.
just the way I see it.
Maybe thats because Italy, Spain, Romania and Poland are emerging countries in Europe or just flat broke.
DeleteEach has their own agenda for sidling up to the US, dont kid yourself its because they are just friendly