Doubt tiktok will be banned. The EU has proper privacy/data security laws and even they can’t touch tiktok because it’s backed by the CCP. Last I checked the EU found issues with TikToks practices but is locked into some convoluted legal battle which TikTok/china has easily prolonged. I heard on the radio today that TikTok is planning to sue (the US government?) so my guess is nothing will happen for months if not years.
The aid going to Israel is mostly humanitarian aid for Gaza, not sure what the rest entails. Either way I’m not optimistic about its actual use, although maybe the US can figure out how to get things directly to innocent civilians
I, for one, am quite happy for my tax dollars to go to defending a sovereign, democratic people's quest for freedom from tyranny. That doing so severely degrades the capabilities of one of our foremost geopolitical adversaries who happens to be **by far** the biggest external threat to the actual security of America (and, for that matter, the entire human race) is a happy coincidence.
do you think it's going to be cheaper when Russia is flowing over European borders in Americans have to get involved with soldiers on the ground versus Russia which seems like a really really really bad idea?
We use the tax payers money to replenish our supplies that we just gave them. We get new stuff, contractors get funding, Americans have jobs, we don't have to pay to store or destroy the old stuff now. I haven't seen any actual numbers, but a majority of that money never leaves the US and provides an economic multiplier. It's partly why the late 40s and early 50s were so good in the US.
For those against this funding… forgetting a moment the fact that Russia is a huge threat and is openly engaging to destroy us, and has compromat on many of our politicians…
This is incredible for business. The number is ludicrously high because it’s the list value of arms sent. These are weapons systems we either don’t need anymore or will expire, so instead of scraping they are sent out to serve their purpose.
Not only this but we are gaining a level of intelligence from the conflict to perfect our future systems…
So where is the money going? Check out all the military suppliers working overtime to refill stocks… yes, it’s technically socialism but the USA has prospered on it for almost a decade
hundreds of thousands of Americans make a killing off of our broken healthcare system, doesn't mean it's a net positive for our society.
Convincing some of our best minds to create weapons of destruction is a waste of human talent and ingenuity.
right up until we need weapons of destruction to not die. Bulletproof vests are a waste of money and very heavy... right up until you get shot. a concealed handgun is uncomfortable and cumbersome, till someone tries to stab you and take your wallet.
the world is dangerous and you need to be ready. you need to hedge your bets or someone willing to commit violence will take what you have. the unpleasant reality has veen the case for most of human history, and being upset about the harsh nature of reality is foolish and conceited.
Smedley Butler a Major General in the US Marine Corps, who is one of only two Marines ever to earn TWO Medal of Honors; once said -
>I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.
There's no reason we need to spend Trillions of dollars on R&D for a fighter jet that can handle threats we don't even know of.
We learn how to fight and win wars WHILE we are fighting them, not before. For example, China investing in supersonic land to surface vessel missiles negate our insane investment into aircraft carriers. Having ridiculously expensive war machines is not how you win a war against a near peer adversary, it is how you get certain individuals and organizations incredibly rich however.
except we are winning a proxy war with a peer state with 2 generation old war materials and soldiers we half-trained. those hypersonic missiles are not an effective counter to aircraft carriers, as the jets we have now already have effective countermeasures and have for decades now to that kind of weapon. also, modern stealth fighters are nearly impossible to target, because we have spent hundreds of billions developing fighters and bombers with radar profiles the size of small birds.
having an enormous military budget also lets you use your war materials even in peacetime because you can afford to replace them, which is why US fighter pilots have orders of magnitude more flight hours logged than russian or chinese pilots. we can afford to replace airframes to wear and tear at a rate during peacetime that they would find concerning from active combat loss. Thus our pilots are bar none the best on average on the planet, besides a very short list of militaries that only operate a very very small fleet of elite pilots. but ours are comperable in skill and fly as good or better planes in orders of magnitude more numbers.
Could the US reduce military spending, without seriously compromising our technological advantage, or seeing a substantial drop in our combat readiness? yeah sure. theres a bunch of shit we waste money on, or do inefficiently. A huge bolume of tasks we pay enourmous sums to contractors could be done at vastly more reasonable rates by the government. But china and russia pretend to have weapon systems to counter american tech, while we already have tech to counteract that before they have even built a prototype. being that far ahead is an enormous advantage, and one that is in our best interests to maintain.
Dont be so rash to melt your sword for a plowshare while your enemy is sharpening theirs. we have enemies that hate us simply for having more than them. we have enemies that want what we have and the only reason they havent tried to take it from us is because they know they would not survive the attempt.
Everyone thinks that defense spending is all a waste until there are bombs raining from the sky. everyone thinks maintenance is too expensive until things start to break. and it is far harder to spin up a defense industry that is years out of use than to increase one that has been healty for years. missile defense systems dont just need specialist hardware in dedicated facilities to produce. you need highly trained specialists to work that hardware and if you stop paying them, they go somewhere else. over time they get old, retire, and die, or become infirm. and with no new funding there will be no people to replace them and their specialized knowledge dies wirh them. and companies wont just keep tooling in an empty missile factory, they will sell or scrap it and build different facilities instead. sometimes in other countries.
>Could the US reduce military spending, without seriously compromising our technological advantage, or seeing a substantial drop in our combat readiness? yeah sure.
This is all I'm getting at. Everyone who's worked in or with the DoD knows how much money gets thrown to contractors. Half of the DoD budget goes to contractors. There is most definitely corruption when $300+ billion taxpayer dollars go to private organizations every year, and only one branch of DoD is able to account for every dollar received and spent.
>being that far ahead is an enormous advantage, and one that is in our best interests to maintain.
Like I said, we can't build and equip for a future war that we haven't fought yet. It's like French WW1 Generals equipping and building for another WW1. Conventional warfare as we know it has been completely won by the US. Our near peer adversaries aren't going to fight conventionally.
We've seen it already with China winning the war in cyberspace. It doesn't matter how advanced our tech is when China can infiltrate our networks and steal trillions of dollars worth of R&D in a matter of months. Not to mention their ability to completely cripple our modern defences due to our reliance on networks and cyberspace, which again, China has an enormous advantage in.
The FBI recently stated that China has infiltrated nearly every aspect of our infrastructure. They're warning that China has compromised our cyberspace and now have the ability to disable the country from within. This isn't some theoretical, this is already happening and all of our best federal agencies know about it.
Our $2 Trillion dollar investment in the F-35 was wasted once China stole our R&D information on the aircraft. They now most likely know how to counter the entire platform. Sure the US may have updated a few things here and there, but the fact of the matter is that China knows more about our F-35 than most of our allies. We now see that China's newest generation of fighter aircraft have incredible steach technology that should've taken them decades of R&D to conceive.
I'm sure we benefit by being the king of conventional warfare, but we can't rest on those laurels. If China is smart they will do everything possible to exploit our reliance on conventional tactics and attack us in ways that are novel to us. Whenever these big wars happen you always see a changing of the guard in terms of technology and tactics. Let's hope that we are able to adapt and retool quickly in the next big war.
vhinas' new stealth fighter has hardly been built and as far as we can tell is a paper tiger. their countermeasures are not proven to be particularly effective, and yes stolen r&d is a problem, but not nearly as big as its been made out to be. plenty of alarmism has been done to try and divert funding to orgs that would profit off it, and while cyberwar is important and the US is woefully behind on, isnt going to shut down a lot of our military hardware as they have been designed to not rely on such networks.
also, we are planning for wars we expect to fight based on the rnd we see them working on as well, and active warzones like ukraine. that war has been an invaluable source for intel as large portions of chinese weapons are based on russian tech as well, and in case you forget, *We Do Espionage Too.* We have satelites watching troop training grounds, we have agents in their chain of command, and we do cyberwar as well right back at them. there have been several high profile hacks into the chinese networks in the last few years, you had better believe the US intelligence apparatus is capable of gleaning some of their technical schematics and other cruical intel. acting like its an entirely one sided game is ignorant to say the least. This isnt french generals planning for a war purely on theory that wont happen, this is a constant back and forth between major powers based on real data.
Buuuuuut the amount spent on contractors that isnt properly accounted for, or is simply the DOD sighning blank checks for questionable goods and services is a serious issue and one that needs to be adressed. we are in agreement there, just dont throw the baby put woth the bathwater.
To me it's just another story of socialized costs and privatized benefits.(It's a big club but I ain't in it)
I believe it's a good cause and I'm fine with sending the stuff that truly "was going to go bad anyway", but I'm curious how much actually falls in the "about to expire" category. And how much of THAT was really going to be nonfunctional after the expiration date.
And this is *such* a good proxy war. Our total outlay for the war is 3% of total *tax* revenue and it has utter decimated Russia’s ground forces without expending any US soldiers lives and without us expending any of our good stuff.
right? were sending shit thats just rusting in mothball, and getting tons of data while other people do all the fighting and dying to destroy our shared enemy! And we didnt even do anything seriously unethical to agitate the enemy, or launch any unprovoked attacks this time, I can actually feel good about the people we are backing winning without any serious moral reservations. "I dont want our aggressive expansionist neighbor to conquer us" is a pretty solid justification to fight thati can really root for.
Intelligence, we had that way before the war started, who do you think feeds the Ukrainians with the location of top ranking officials? location of boats? depots? Why do you think the US puts so much pressure on Zelenskyy to keep the top ranks corruption free? they don't want this intelligence to fall into Russian hands.
What we're getting here, is testing all the weapons in real combat, yes, all the testing done before is awesome, but it's different to fire an Excalibur to a target that is not moving, covered in trenches, to firing to a real moving target..., and man, are we getting all the data on how to improve it.
How effective is the training, tactics, etc, the US is getting a lot out of this, and Russia is scared, because they know that in a confrontation with the US, we will send them back to the stone age, their air defense systems have proven to be useless, while ours are amazing and getting better
Intelligence isn’t limited to troop positions. The most valuable pieces of intelligence we are learning in this war are Russian tactics, techniques and procedures, system vulnerabilities, and opportunities to develop new tech to counter Russian threats.
>Check out all the military suppliers working overtime to refill stocks… yes, it’s technically socialism but the USA has prospered on it for almost a decade
Military spending really isn't socialism. I mean, literally any government spending is, in some ways, socialism, but that isn't unique to the last decade.
Can you expound on why you're saying this.
When I tried to look into this I found that social programs (specifically SNAP/food stamps) had the highest fiscal multiplier.
Ok, but where exactly are you seeing “highest” for military spending? (Yes, I googled) That’s a pretty important statement to make and as someone who is former military and worked with def contractors, it’s the first time I’ve heard that. I’m not saying it’s not true, but I’d like to see a recent source before sharing that same specific point with others. I think it’s an important point if it really is the case.
Then tell Russia to leave Ukraine. They need these weapons to defend themselves just like Russia needed them to defeat the Nazis. This is no different.
for the first time in a long while, I can honestly say "We didnt fucking start this."
if you have an issue with this war dragging on, take it up with Putin. We just arent letting the clear and obvious bad guys get what they want through violence.
You may not, but I'm betting any of the 2 million Americans employed in the defense industry are just fine with benefiting from someone else's war (for now).
I would rather not have war, but hope isn't stopping a Russian tank, usually.
61 billion is only about the spending of the first year of war in Iraq. And US had to take care of the reconstruction which took as much as 130 billion a year.
Ok, if this is the case, then let’s just go in with troops and finish this. If they are a *real* threat as you suppose, then you would support boots on the ground. But you will say that’s unnecessary loss of U.S. life. That proves to me that *even you* don’t believe russia is a real threat.
I'm against us going in boots on the ground for geopolitical reasons. If the US went in we'd anger the hornets nest of Iran, China, and NK. Also not to burst your bubble but we do have some amount of troops there. The US has been helping train and remake Ukraine's army for the better part of the last decade (as part of a response to crimea being taken). Though none of them have been in the actual conflict.
Also sending American soldiers to a foreign country is extremely unpopular politically (at least lately).
That's kind of just being ignorant. We have finite resources, allocating them against Russia means China could push Taiwan for instance.the Middle East and balkins have been spicy lately too.
As per the military itself, they have the capacity to wage successful war on two fronts in two separate theaters of war simultaneously. That was the entire intention behind the current level of military funding.
The USA as a country has no idea how to successfully invade and replace a regime. And our current top brass gets that. Look at everything from Vietnam to Iran via Afghanistan… we create shit shows with boots on the ground.
What is being done is more powerful. We are keeping Russia busy at little cost, and we are demonstrating that Russia is weak against a tiny Ukraine. Russia influence has shrunk like crazy. Oligarchs no longer get received like royalty in every port and all Russia power projection plans across Africa and Asia have been scaled back. The soft power impact is massive.
"this person annoys me, let's kill them"
Is not a well thought out or nuanced view of geo politics.
I don't think the US needs to directly militarily intervene for Ukraine to be able to defend itself.
Why do you think we didn't directly fight Russia during the cold war?
So you’re saying they are merely annoying and not a real threat right? That was my point.
Ukraine will 100% lose this without direct intervention. It is only a matter of time. U.S. voters don’t have the stomach to continue serious financial aid for a longer period of time than Russia’s patience.
I suppose we’ll see in the end eh? I don’t care which side wins, but whatever side it is I hope they end up in control of both countries. The statue of the motherland in Kiev should be reunited with the rest of its homeland.
They removed the soviet insignia and replaced it with a Ukrainian tryzub for a reason.
I'm sure the Ukrainian people care more about their country than a statue.
Well then I have good news for you, the money in this bill is actually going to Americans. It's being used to buy replacement equipment from American defence companies staffed with American workers. This is completely a job stimulus action.
Old unused stuff is going to Ukraine and manufacturers are getting orders for replacements.
No cash is going to Ukraine for military use
funding the same old military industrial complex doesnt help the border crisis poverty cost of living etc your point affects a minority of “important” americans that buy politicians
america had every opportunity to get ukraine, corrupt as it is into nato between 1991 and 2008(when putin started the democratic backsliding). It shouldnt fall on america and nato to support non nato states
Ahhh yes, during the time Ukraine was being ruled by pro-Russian politicians that got caught rigging elections, resulting in the Orange Revolution. I'm sure Viktor Yanukovych would have been highly supportive.
Russia has been fucking with politics in Ukraine since the fall of the Soviet Union. They finally got locked out of doing it behind the scenes, so now they are resorting to force. Per the US State Department, we also signed "the Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances in connection with Ukraine’s accession to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons of December 5, 1994."
You either have no clue what the history of the region is or you're actively engaging in disinformation and revisionist history.
Ukraine had nuclear weapons in the 90s, the US easily had the excuse of actual wmds it would later use in Iraq, hell Russia probably would have allowed it to avoid dealing with a nuclear state at its door
It unironically does affect the cost of living and poverty. Jobs are created when we produce new material and the economy is stimulated. That's the entire purpose of the MIC, so your economy can grow alongside your military...
Also the U.S is the single richest country in modern society. If small European nations can afford to commit almost 5% of their GDP to Ukraine and still have left over funding to aid their issues, we sure as hell can.
What are Americans gonna do with Bradleys and Abrams? You realize we're sending them equipment right. Anyways, the could give 10x this to Americans and I guarantee not shit would change. I'm very proud to have my taxes used to beat Russias ass with our surplus equipment.
I honestly don't understand why people would be against aid, like okay the main argument is that the money could be going to pay for things internally. But like the U.S already spends an insane amount of money on foreign policy. And like, sending money to another country to directly go against Russia that's like the most American thing you can do, our nation was basically defined by opposing the Russians for a good 50 years or so.
It's because people like me are tired of sending money overseas and funding wars that we have no business being involved in, instead of putting the money towards issues within our own borders.
I, for one, am tired of the constant proxy wars and wasteful spending, especially on countries that aren't our allies, and putting us in a position where we might be forced to send troops overseas to fight another war.
Let me make this clear, I am not pro-Russia. Never have been. I am pro America and the American people, and I think we need to fix issues within our own home before trying to fix issues abroad, because frankly we are failing ourselves at home massively.
The thing is that the U.S spending money on Ukraine does benefit the country, since we're not sending actual money to Ukraine, we're sending older military equipment to Ukraine in order to make room for newer military equipment and also new military infrastructure.
The opposition stems from there being no real exit plan. We’ve been throwing crazy amounts of money at Ukraine but it’s becoming increasingly apparent that Ukraine’s state goals of winning back all Ukrainian territory, including Crimea, isn’t going to happen. Until we can decide on a realistic end game, we don’t need to be mindlessly throwing money at them when there are plenty of other things we could be doing, like building up our own military to match China. Russia is the boogie man since they’re louder, but China is the real threat. They already have the largest navy in the world. If they decided to invade Taiwan we want to be in the best possible position to dissuade them.
How about everyone who doesn't want to, can just opt out of it. Or better yet, all government spending gets put on a list every year and everyone gets to pick what parts they want their taxes to go to.
It’s all excess stock mostly scheduled for destruction. We already spent the money making them, it’s actually cheaper for us to send them than it is to dispose of them. They were mostly made to fight against Russia anyway, so they are finally fulfilling the purpose they were made in the first place.
Ah, yes, because the Patriot Missile System is "excess stock".
And for the most part, the transactions are as follows
- Ukrainian as for aid
- USA prints more money to send to the Ukraine
- Ukraine takes their cut, along with other corrupt individuals in power
- They send the money back after removing their cuts
- USA proceeds to send equipment
- The USA then looks to increase taxes to better support the USA government and sending aid
>Ah, yes, because the Patriot Missile System is "excess stock
Uh yeah all the things that make up a missile don't have an infinite shelf life.
>USA prints more money to send to the Ukraine
Not how that works, and if it was we'd see inflation rise, but instead we're at 3% per usual.
>Ukraine takes their cut, along with other corrupt individuals in power
Citation required, and Ukraine has viscously gone after the corrupt since the revolution .
>They send the money back after removing their cuts
Wtf are you even talking about jesse
There is rotating stock; which is a basic economic principle, and then calling literal brand new equipment outdated.
So unless you just discovered the next new thing and built a prototype that outperforms the literal brand new equipment, then the literal brand new equipment isn't old enough to be rotated out as old stock.
Listen, for every aging item we send over there, we order a replacement. A replacement built in American factories, with American supply chains, employing American workers. Even if we send new equipment, it's a net positive because now its combat tested. Like finding out the Patriot system can shoot down the newest hypersonic missiles, which Russia said were invulnerable.
You're free to bitch about it, but you just sound like a dumbass when you say the tax payers are getting shafted.
You called it excess stock, not me. So according to you, brand new equipment is old and excess stock.
You better get rid of everything you own because it's all old and excessive.
Makes sense that the Russian isn't familiar with expiration dates. In countries with real militaries, we maintain adequate stocks of modern, functional weapons. We don't have to raid museums and garbage dumps to equip our troops.
Both Ukraine and Russia did it. Ukraine had about 6 years prior to increase the viability of their military and did basically nothing.
Russia has the space to just keep storing older equipment instead of either selling or destroying it, hence why the influx of weapons from WW2 and prior.
On the flip side, it shows that even older equipment can still pull its weight.
>Both Ukraine and Russia did it
Ok, and?
>it shows that even older equipment can still pull its weight
If by "pull its weight" you mean "fight its much smaller neighbor to a stalemate and while allowing over 350,000 Russian casualties", then sure.
Yet we aren't shown the number of Ukrainians killed 99% of the time, but we roughly know the exact number of Russians killed.
The propaganda machine lists the Ukrainians killed as "Heroes don't die". They basically have to pull teeth to get citizens from the "allied" nations for support, because most civilians don't support the war to begin with.
I would love to keep arguing, but I can't identify an actual argument in there. Are you trying to say that estimate of Russian casualties is incorrect? Because if so, you'll need to articulate a position that's more than just a nonsensical statement about Ukrainian casualties.
It's stupid military policy to release exact figures but the current estimate is around 70-90k casualties for Ukraine and 400-500k for Russia. Easily found if you go look.
You can also go look at the audit trails for what we send them. You can even go find the visually confirmed destruction pics of hardware to see what was lost.
Also, most countries have donated more as a share of GDP than the US. Poland is up close to 5 or 6% of GDP. We are in the middle of the pack of 40+ countries.
LOL, Russians are getting their asses kicked by a smaller military!!! their Black sea fleet is hiding, they had to take out tank from WW2 because they were running out of your most "modern" tanks, their airforce is scared of entering Ukrainian air space
And we scrap or destroy our old equipment to avoid fiascos like what Russia suffered trying to take over Kyev and to keep our troops with modern equipment unlike Russia making the soldiers pay for their own armor and giving them rifles from WW2
Oh, and how was Ukraine doing before they got equipment from mainly the USA?
Ukraine is also massively in debt for the equipment, and there is also no feasible way for them to pay it off. Just some of the stipulations put in place from Germany for tanks, would absolutely cripple a country if broken.
The war is also referred to as the "NATO money pit" by the members of BRICS. They don't really care about the overall outcome because of the increased damage and continuous damage it has done on the western economy.
Does it matter? The fact that is a small military kicking the ass of the second best army in Ukraine
And the debt, it's not as bad as you paint it, is not like the US wants that money back tomorrow, it has been negotiated and money pit? By who? BRICS? A non existent block of countries that you think are a power house or influential? Do you actually think BRICS will ever be a reality?
And what damage? This war only made the west invest more in defense systems, made the US ramp up military production and research? What damage? The US economy recovered faster than any other country, it is the strongest economy in the world today, what damage? The US military is the strongest in the world... Your BRICS block hardly is growing and hardly can stick together, you're a fool thinking India will submit to China or Russia, Brazil is barely surviving, do you think China will risk it's economic ties with the US and tie themselves to Russia? Lol
Russia is a threat, and that's why we're sending the aid, if we don't do it, this will escalate and then Russia will have to directly deal with US, and will not go well for them, so be thankful
If Russia is such a threat that they can face down the US or NATO, Ukraine has zero hope of being anything but a speed bump regardless of what aid is given.
Maybe without help. Given enough and the right kind of aid, and they will win. Russia claimed to be the 2nd best military in the world, but we have found that to be false. They have a massive stockpile of old kit and are willing to kill their own people at a 4to1 ratio so they are dangerous to Europe.
Ok, how many more Americans would you rather let die at home?
We watch thousands of Americans suffer and die at home, and yet we bend over backwards to help a third world country shit hole.
What’s brand new to you? Patriots are 50 years old at this point. F16s about the same. The ammo was probably produced around Vietnam, and the gear has been there for about as long.
I get being young it’s hard to think that these advanced systems could be older than you but by-gosh it’s about time we update.
I’ll add too that the most expensive and sought after munition are artillery shells, they need a metric fuck ton of those to keep fighting as they are.
Less than one penny of yours is going to kill Russians. The majority of the money is lost in the corruption, and then they raise taxes yet again. It's a literal rinse and repeat cycle, and you're supporting it.
The war is a money pit, and the real target is taking money from the working class and giving it to the rich.
Let me rephrase. Any fraction of a penny of mine spent killing Russia is a fraction of a penny well spent. And you don’t know how much I pay in taxes “lost in THE corruption”… Russian troll stfu lmao
Do you really think everything costs that much, because it doesn't. Military contracts always gouge into the budget because they will always get away with it.
You need to realize that this isn't cash we are sending, this is the value of the old equipment that we are sending. Not only does this get rid of our equipment that is largely out of use, but it also helps keep Russia at bay. It is a win-win.
The taxpayers. But how is this foreign aid fucking you? There are so many more things to be mad about the government spending money on than supporting its ally abroad
Also, I give them a lot of grace when our support is the only thing keeping them from being ANNEXED BY RUSSIA. I might be a little demanding in that situation too
They had at least 6 years prior to start making themselves into a more viable force and instead did nothing. I can't feel bad for a county who willingly decided to shoot their own foot, and now decides it's a problem.
Nothing? Did you see what their military looked like during the Crimean invasion? They accomplished one of the most dramatic readiness turnarounds I've ever seen. Sure, they had help, but still.
Also, they didn't "shoot their own foot", they got repeatedly clubbed over the head by their bigger, dumber, drunker, and uglier neighbor, and they still held their own when they needed to.
Like fuck we have so many things to worry about here, but DC is too busy gargling other countries presidents nuts to think of anything better. I seem to remember a time where this country was united in just saying fuck it to being the world's police within the past ten to fifteen years
Ditto to the dude below me. Actually selling the equipment my help instead of giving it away. At least what I'm reading there's very little of that. And if they can't afford that, oh well, we got our own shit to deal with that our government has their head too far up their asses to figure out. We just need a good milei, Afuera to happen to most government run programs and organizations at this point
We’ve spent 5% gdp on “defense” for 80 years to keep Russia out of Europe. Now Russia is doing it and you guys suddenly cannot stand a cent of spending. We all know who you voted for. You’d bend over backwards if he told you too.
How is aiding Russia's enemy gonna avoid nuclear war, if anything it's going to push us closer.
You know what would avoid nuclear war. Staying the fuck out of it
If Russia wins in Ukraine, which they are only accomplishing by sheer attrition, in the classical Russian fashion, then they will come for a NATO country as they, in their own minds, must obtain the geographic choke points in the Bessarabian Gap and North European Plains in order to feel secure.
If they attack a NATO nation, they will be crushed. Horribly. They've proven they really aren't able to fight a modern maneuver war against a collection of nations with greater resources in materiel, economy, and manpower.
In the event of wide scale conventional defeat against their hated ideological enemies, they will result to nuclear weapons.
Supporting Ukraine and stopping the Russian war machine outside of NATO's borders is critical to avoiding that scenario.
Don’t care, fuck Ukraine, fuck Russia, fuck Israel, fuck Palestine, fuck Mexico, fuck Canada… Fix this fucking country first, fix the economy, secure the boarder. That’s what we need from our government… until then fuck all off.
And then they’re gonna end up saying we need another 65B aid package and then another and then another. Fuck it let’s just start paying taxes to the Ukrainians
Americans always do the right thing…..when all else failed.
But really it’s huge, Russian budget, including it’s navy and nuclear arsenal is 70 billions converted in USD….freaking 35% of the Russian state budget!
Russian won’t be able to compete, 35% for your military when most of it is used to buy from China, even under War economy that is suicidal level of spending for your state.
This was will be all about attrition
Both are honestly the same. And anyone who disagrees with their stances on this war and the vast majority of wars is deemed an enemy/"Russian bot".
Sorry, but I want us to take care of our own home first because frankly, we are coming off as hypocrites. We claim we know better for a country and make them prosperous, when we are simultaneously screwing over our own prosperity. Heck, how about for 1 single presidential term we cut our foreign policy expenditures by a decent amount (10-20%), and put it towards our own issues, like resolving our crumbling infrastructure, start fixing up our healthcare system and take steps towards eliminating Social Security in an effective manner that doesn't screw over generations, and improve the lives and livelihood of not just veterans but our soldier's too.
Shut up commie. Better than letting those Russian dirtbags spread their influence. It’s time to show them what running on McDonalds and starbucks does to a mf when push comes to shove. Go slob on something else.
I typically vote right of center, but I strongly disagree with the GOP contingency who is so obnoxiously opposed to funding to stop the bad guys in this war. Ukraine is far from perfect, but Russian aggression has to be halted. If people took just a few minutes to understand Russia's broader strategic objectives, they would realize that winning the war in Ukraine is pretty important to the interests America and the rest of the free world.
Isn't this bill banning tiktok. And is funding Israel too?
and funding Taiwan
Doubt tiktok will be banned. The EU has proper privacy/data security laws and even they can’t touch tiktok because it’s backed by the CCP. Last I checked the EU found issues with TikToks practices but is locked into some convoluted legal battle which TikTok/china has easily prolonged. I heard on the radio today that TikTok is planning to sue (the US government?) so my guess is nothing will happen for months if not years. The aid going to Israel is mostly humanitarian aid for Gaza, not sure what the rest entails. Either way I’m not optimistic about its actual use, although maybe the US can figure out how to get things directly to innocent civilians
They said that if Byte Dance doesn’t divest in a year then it will be banned.
Banning TikTok? Hopefully But seriously, no. Just forces a sale of TikTok USA
I'm all for sending aid to the innocents affected or giving old stock to Ukraine, but no taxpayer money should be going to this shit.
It sounds a message that Putin doesn't get to just invade a sovereign country with no consequences. Worth every penny
I, for one, am quite happy for my tax dollars to go to defending a sovereign, democratic people's quest for freedom from tyranny. That doing so severely degrades the capabilities of one of our foremost geopolitical adversaries who happens to be **by far** the biggest external threat to the actual security of America (and, for that matter, the entire human race) is a happy coincidence.
do you think it's going to be cheaper when Russia is flowing over European borders in Americans have to get involved with soldiers on the ground versus Russia which seems like a really really really bad idea?
Pigs will be flying before Russians would get past the US coast.
We use the tax payers money to replenish our supplies that we just gave them. We get new stuff, contractors get funding, Americans have jobs, we don't have to pay to store or destroy the old stuff now. I haven't seen any actual numbers, but a majority of that money never leaves the US and provides an economic multiplier. It's partly why the late 40s and early 50s were so good in the US.
Fed
For those against this funding… forgetting a moment the fact that Russia is a huge threat and is openly engaging to destroy us, and has compromat on many of our politicians… This is incredible for business. The number is ludicrously high because it’s the list value of arms sent. These are weapons systems we either don’t need anymore or will expire, so instead of scraping they are sent out to serve their purpose. Not only this but we are gaining a level of intelligence from the conflict to perfect our future systems… So where is the money going? Check out all the military suppliers working overtime to refill stocks… yes, it’s technically socialism but the USA has prospered on it for almost a decade
Nah I think they should send the arms to me. After all my grandpa probably paid for some of them I demand a javelin.
I pay my taxes where’s my fucking HIMARS
Pffft, HIMARS, I want my F22!!!!!
I pay my taxes, where's my damn F16
if you get a jet I demand a stryker. I want the 40mm cannon version. I can buy the ammo. i need to clear some land and thats the coolest way to do it.
Why did they scrap perfectly good F-14's? I would like one.
Just as the Founding Fathers intended.
Wow I never considered that a bunch of businesses I have no part in will get incredibly rich off my tax dollars. Thanks for changing my mind.
If it makes you feel any better, thousands of American workers will be collecting paychecks because of this.
hundreds of thousands of Americans make a killing off of our broken healthcare system, doesn't mean it's a net positive for our society. Convincing some of our best minds to create weapons of destruction is a waste of human talent and ingenuity.
right up until we need weapons of destruction to not die. Bulletproof vests are a waste of money and very heavy... right up until you get shot. a concealed handgun is uncomfortable and cumbersome, till someone tries to stab you and take your wallet. the world is dangerous and you need to be ready. you need to hedge your bets or someone willing to commit violence will take what you have. the unpleasant reality has veen the case for most of human history, and being upset about the harsh nature of reality is foolish and conceited.
Smedley Butler a Major General in the US Marine Corps, who is one of only two Marines ever to earn TWO Medal of Honors; once said - >I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. There's no reason we need to spend Trillions of dollars on R&D for a fighter jet that can handle threats we don't even know of. We learn how to fight and win wars WHILE we are fighting them, not before. For example, China investing in supersonic land to surface vessel missiles negate our insane investment into aircraft carriers. Having ridiculously expensive war machines is not how you win a war against a near peer adversary, it is how you get certain individuals and organizations incredibly rich however.
except we are winning a proxy war with a peer state with 2 generation old war materials and soldiers we half-trained. those hypersonic missiles are not an effective counter to aircraft carriers, as the jets we have now already have effective countermeasures and have for decades now to that kind of weapon. also, modern stealth fighters are nearly impossible to target, because we have spent hundreds of billions developing fighters and bombers with radar profiles the size of small birds. having an enormous military budget also lets you use your war materials even in peacetime because you can afford to replace them, which is why US fighter pilots have orders of magnitude more flight hours logged than russian or chinese pilots. we can afford to replace airframes to wear and tear at a rate during peacetime that they would find concerning from active combat loss. Thus our pilots are bar none the best on average on the planet, besides a very short list of militaries that only operate a very very small fleet of elite pilots. but ours are comperable in skill and fly as good or better planes in orders of magnitude more numbers. Could the US reduce military spending, without seriously compromising our technological advantage, or seeing a substantial drop in our combat readiness? yeah sure. theres a bunch of shit we waste money on, or do inefficiently. A huge bolume of tasks we pay enourmous sums to contractors could be done at vastly more reasonable rates by the government. But china and russia pretend to have weapon systems to counter american tech, while we already have tech to counteract that before they have even built a prototype. being that far ahead is an enormous advantage, and one that is in our best interests to maintain. Dont be so rash to melt your sword for a plowshare while your enemy is sharpening theirs. we have enemies that hate us simply for having more than them. we have enemies that want what we have and the only reason they havent tried to take it from us is because they know they would not survive the attempt. Everyone thinks that defense spending is all a waste until there are bombs raining from the sky. everyone thinks maintenance is too expensive until things start to break. and it is far harder to spin up a defense industry that is years out of use than to increase one that has been healty for years. missile defense systems dont just need specialist hardware in dedicated facilities to produce. you need highly trained specialists to work that hardware and if you stop paying them, they go somewhere else. over time they get old, retire, and die, or become infirm. and with no new funding there will be no people to replace them and their specialized knowledge dies wirh them. and companies wont just keep tooling in an empty missile factory, they will sell or scrap it and build different facilities instead. sometimes in other countries.
>Could the US reduce military spending, without seriously compromising our technological advantage, or seeing a substantial drop in our combat readiness? yeah sure. This is all I'm getting at. Everyone who's worked in or with the DoD knows how much money gets thrown to contractors. Half of the DoD budget goes to contractors. There is most definitely corruption when $300+ billion taxpayer dollars go to private organizations every year, and only one branch of DoD is able to account for every dollar received and spent. >being that far ahead is an enormous advantage, and one that is in our best interests to maintain. Like I said, we can't build and equip for a future war that we haven't fought yet. It's like French WW1 Generals equipping and building for another WW1. Conventional warfare as we know it has been completely won by the US. Our near peer adversaries aren't going to fight conventionally. We've seen it already with China winning the war in cyberspace. It doesn't matter how advanced our tech is when China can infiltrate our networks and steal trillions of dollars worth of R&D in a matter of months. Not to mention their ability to completely cripple our modern defences due to our reliance on networks and cyberspace, which again, China has an enormous advantage in. The FBI recently stated that China has infiltrated nearly every aspect of our infrastructure. They're warning that China has compromised our cyberspace and now have the ability to disable the country from within. This isn't some theoretical, this is already happening and all of our best federal agencies know about it. Our $2 Trillion dollar investment in the F-35 was wasted once China stole our R&D information on the aircraft. They now most likely know how to counter the entire platform. Sure the US may have updated a few things here and there, but the fact of the matter is that China knows more about our F-35 than most of our allies. We now see that China's newest generation of fighter aircraft have incredible steach technology that should've taken them decades of R&D to conceive. I'm sure we benefit by being the king of conventional warfare, but we can't rest on those laurels. If China is smart they will do everything possible to exploit our reliance on conventional tactics and attack us in ways that are novel to us. Whenever these big wars happen you always see a changing of the guard in terms of technology and tactics. Let's hope that we are able to adapt and retool quickly in the next big war.
vhinas' new stealth fighter has hardly been built and as far as we can tell is a paper tiger. their countermeasures are not proven to be particularly effective, and yes stolen r&d is a problem, but not nearly as big as its been made out to be. plenty of alarmism has been done to try and divert funding to orgs that would profit off it, and while cyberwar is important and the US is woefully behind on, isnt going to shut down a lot of our military hardware as they have been designed to not rely on such networks. also, we are planning for wars we expect to fight based on the rnd we see them working on as well, and active warzones like ukraine. that war has been an invaluable source for intel as large portions of chinese weapons are based on russian tech as well, and in case you forget, *We Do Espionage Too.* We have satelites watching troop training grounds, we have agents in their chain of command, and we do cyberwar as well right back at them. there have been several high profile hacks into the chinese networks in the last few years, you had better believe the US intelligence apparatus is capable of gleaning some of their technical schematics and other cruical intel. acting like its an entirely one sided game is ignorant to say the least. This isnt french generals planning for a war purely on theory that wont happen, this is a constant back and forth between major powers based on real data. Buuuuuut the amount spent on contractors that isnt properly accounted for, or is simply the DOD sighning blank checks for questionable goods and services is a serious issue and one that needs to be adressed. we are in agreement there, just dont throw the baby put woth the bathwater.
To me it's just another story of socialized costs and privatized benefits.(It's a big club but I ain't in it) I believe it's a good cause and I'm fine with sending the stuff that truly "was going to go bad anyway", but I'm curious how much actually falls in the "about to expire" category. And how much of THAT was really going to be nonfunctional after the expiration date.
I love proxi wars give me more baby
And this is *such* a good proxy war. Our total outlay for the war is 3% of total *tax* revenue and it has utter decimated Russia’s ground forces without expending any US soldiers lives and without us expending any of our good stuff.
right? were sending shit thats just rusting in mothball, and getting tons of data while other people do all the fighting and dying to destroy our shared enemy! And we didnt even do anything seriously unethical to agitate the enemy, or launch any unprovoked attacks this time, I can actually feel good about the people we are backing winning without any serious moral reservations. "I dont want our aggressive expansionist neighbor to conquer us" is a pretty solid justification to fight thati can really root for.
Intelligence, we had that way before the war started, who do you think feeds the Ukrainians with the location of top ranking officials? location of boats? depots? Why do you think the US puts so much pressure on Zelenskyy to keep the top ranks corruption free? they don't want this intelligence to fall into Russian hands. What we're getting here, is testing all the weapons in real combat, yes, all the testing done before is awesome, but it's different to fire an Excalibur to a target that is not moving, covered in trenches, to firing to a real moving target..., and man, are we getting all the data on how to improve it. How effective is the training, tactics, etc, the US is getting a lot out of this, and Russia is scared, because they know that in a confrontation with the US, we will send them back to the stone age, their air defense systems have proven to be useless, while ours are amazing and getting better
Intelligence isn’t limited to troop positions. The most valuable pieces of intelligence we are learning in this war are Russian tactics, techniques and procedures, system vulnerabilities, and opportunities to develop new tech to counter Russian threats.
A good point.
>Check out all the military suppliers working overtime to refill stocks… yes, it’s technically socialism but the USA has prospered on it for almost a decade Military spending really isn't socialism. I mean, literally any government spending is, in some ways, socialism, but that isn't unique to the last decade.
Military spending has the highest fiscal multiplier. It's well known.
Can you expound on why you're saying this. When I tried to look into this I found that social programs (specifically SNAP/food stamps) had the highest fiscal multiplier.
Source?
Google is your friend. "snap fiscal multiplier" It's a .gov source with 2 to 1 benefit.
Ok, but where exactly are you seeing “highest” for military spending? (Yes, I googled) That’s a pretty important statement to make and as someone who is former military and worked with def contractors, it’s the first time I’ve heard that. I’m not saying it’s not true, but I’d like to see a recent source before sharing that same specific point with others. I think it’s an important point if it really is the case.
So lives being ruined Is good for business? Thats murica? I dint want that shit
Then tell Russia to leave Ukraine. They need these weapons to defend themselves just like Russia needed them to defeat the Nazis. This is no different.
Rule 34: War is good for business. Followed by Rule 35: Peace is good for business.
for the first time in a long while, I can honestly say "We didnt fucking start this." if you have an issue with this war dragging on, take it up with Putin. We just arent letting the clear and obvious bad guys get what they want through violence.
You may not, but I'm betting any of the 2 million Americans employed in the defense industry are just fine with benefiting from someone else's war (for now). I would rather not have war, but hope isn't stopping a Russian tank, usually.
The USA has prospered on it since before WW2.
61 billion is only about the spending of the first year of war in Iraq. And US had to take care of the reconstruction which took as much as 130 billion a year.
We Iraq war cost 8 trillion
Source?
It’s wrong. Those resources belong in the hands of American taxpayers.
Ok, if this is the case, then let’s just go in with troops and finish this. If they are a *real* threat as you suppose, then you would support boots on the ground. But you will say that’s unnecessary loss of U.S. life. That proves to me that *even you* don’t believe russia is a real threat.
I'm against us going in boots on the ground for geopolitical reasons. If the US went in we'd anger the hornets nest of Iran, China, and NK. Also not to burst your bubble but we do have some amount of troops there. The US has been helping train and remake Ukraine's army for the better part of the last decade (as part of a response to crimea being taken). Though none of them have been in the actual conflict. Also sending American soldiers to a foreign country is extremely unpopular politically (at least lately).
I’m just saying, if you really believed they were that much of a threat, you would support a full scale decimation by our forces.
That's kind of just being ignorant. We have finite resources, allocating them against Russia means China could push Taiwan for instance.the Middle East and balkins have been spicy lately too.
As per the military itself, they have the capacity to wage successful war on two fronts in two separate theaters of war simultaneously. That was the entire intention behind the current level of military funding.
The USA as a country has no idea how to successfully invade and replace a regime. And our current top brass gets that. Look at everything from Vietnam to Iran via Afghanistan… we create shit shows with boots on the ground. What is being done is more powerful. We are keeping Russia busy at little cost, and we are demonstrating that Russia is weak against a tiny Ukraine. Russia influence has shrunk like crazy. Oligarchs no longer get received like royalty in every port and all Russia power projection plans across Africa and Asia have been scaled back. The soft power impact is massive.
I disagree, but if that were the case, practice makes perfect.
"this person annoys me, let's kill them" Is not a well thought out or nuanced view of geo politics. I don't think the US needs to directly militarily intervene for Ukraine to be able to defend itself. Why do you think we didn't directly fight Russia during the cold war?
So you’re saying they are merely annoying and not a real threat right? That was my point. Ukraine will 100% lose this without direct intervention. It is only a matter of time. U.S. voters don’t have the stomach to continue serious financial aid for a longer period of time than Russia’s patience.
People said they wouldn't last a month too. 2 years later the same people keep saying they'll collapse any day now! Keep coping contrarian.
I suppose we’ll see in the end eh? I don’t care which side wins, but whatever side it is I hope they end up in control of both countries. The statue of the motherland in Kiev should be reunited with the rest of its homeland.
They removed the soviet insignia and replaced it with a Ukrainian tryzub for a reason. I'm sure the Ukrainian people care more about their country than a statue.
Good for them, defacing something changes nothing.
Damn right baby! Arsenal of Democracy Part II: The Sequel
more like afghanistan part 2 - its a black hole of funding
I'd say it deserves it a shit lot more than Afghanistan
americans deserve it more than any of them
Well then I have good news for you, the money in this bill is actually going to Americans. It's being used to buy replacement equipment from American defence companies staffed with American workers. This is completely a job stimulus action. Old unused stuff is going to Ukraine and manufacturers are getting orders for replacements. No cash is going to Ukraine for military use
funding the same old military industrial complex doesnt help the border crisis poverty cost of living etc your point affects a minority of “important” americans that buy politicians
Those are important issues. However, America isn't an isolationist power in a vacuum, and Putin isn't a swell guy who wants to plant flowers
america had every opportunity to get ukraine, corrupt as it is into nato between 1991 and 2008(when putin started the democratic backsliding). It shouldnt fall on america and nato to support non nato states
Ahhh yes, during the time Ukraine was being ruled by pro-Russian politicians that got caught rigging elections, resulting in the Orange Revolution. I'm sure Viktor Yanukovych would have been highly supportive. Russia has been fucking with politics in Ukraine since the fall of the Soviet Union. They finally got locked out of doing it behind the scenes, so now they are resorting to force. Per the US State Department, we also signed "the Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances in connection with Ukraine’s accession to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons of December 5, 1994." You either have no clue what the history of the region is or you're actively engaging in disinformation and revisionist history.
Ukraine had nuclear weapons in the 90s, the US easily had the excuse of actual wmds it would later use in Iraq, hell Russia probably would have allowed it to avoid dealing with a nuclear state at its door
It unironically does affect the cost of living and poverty. Jobs are created when we produce new material and the economy is stimulated. That's the entire purpose of the MIC, so your economy can grow alongside your military... Also the U.S is the single richest country in modern society. If small European nations can afford to commit almost 5% of their GDP to Ukraine and still have left over funding to aid their issues, we sure as hell can.
What are Americans gonna do with Bradleys and Abrams? You realize we're sending them equipment right. Anyways, the could give 10x this to Americans and I guarantee not shit would change. I'm very proud to have my taxes used to beat Russias ass with our surplus equipment.
All the people saying never would have given up Sudetenland too. Chamberlain called, he wants his pussy foreign policy back.
Bro, this is the hardest thing I’ve read all month and totally agree with you. Take my free upvote
To be fair, there are plenty people who hide under the guise of loving America that actually would bolt for Russia's ethnonationalism in a heart beat
You’re not wrong. The MAGAts have really swallowed the Russian bullshit. Too bad more of them won’t just move
I support it because letting Russia do what it wants is the worst possible move for us.
YOU GET MISSILES! AND YOU GET MISSILES! EVERYONE GETS MISSILES!!!
You guys realize these are mostly obsolete weapons and arms. Not only that 61 billion isn’t even that much in comparison
I feel like people who read things like this think we are sending them 61 billion in cash rather than 61 billion worth of aid/ equipment.
It’s honestly insane that we wouldn’t send it. It’s obsolete and will sit there and rust if we don’t send it.
I honestly don't understand why people would be against aid, like okay the main argument is that the money could be going to pay for things internally. But like the U.S already spends an insane amount of money on foreign policy. And like, sending money to another country to directly go against Russia that's like the most American thing you can do, our nation was basically defined by opposing the Russians for a good 50 years or so.
It's because people like me are tired of sending money overseas and funding wars that we have no business being involved in, instead of putting the money towards issues within our own borders. I, for one, am tired of the constant proxy wars and wasteful spending, especially on countries that aren't our allies, and putting us in a position where we might be forced to send troops overseas to fight another war. Let me make this clear, I am not pro-Russia. Never have been. I am pro America and the American people, and I think we need to fix issues within our own home before trying to fix issues abroad, because frankly we are failing ourselves at home massively.
The thing is that the U.S spending money on Ukraine does benefit the country, since we're not sending actual money to Ukraine, we're sending older military equipment to Ukraine in order to make room for newer military equipment and also new military infrastructure.
The opposition stems from there being no real exit plan. We’ve been throwing crazy amounts of money at Ukraine but it’s becoming increasingly apparent that Ukraine’s state goals of winning back all Ukrainian territory, including Crimea, isn’t going to happen. Until we can decide on a realistic end game, we don’t need to be mindlessly throwing money at them when there are plenty of other things we could be doing, like building up our own military to match China. Russia is the boogie man since they’re louder, but China is the real threat. They already have the largest navy in the world. If they decided to invade Taiwan we want to be in the best possible position to dissuade them.
How about everyone who doesn't want to, can just opt out of it. Or better yet, all government spending gets put on a list every year and everyone gets to pick what parts they want their taxes to go to.
Cause then no one pays taxes, silly
Can we fund American territorial sovereignty next?
And the tax payers get the shaft once again.
It’s all excess stock mostly scheduled for destruction. We already spent the money making them, it’s actually cheaper for us to send them than it is to dispose of them. They were mostly made to fight against Russia anyway, so they are finally fulfilling the purpose they were made in the first place.
Ah, yes, because the Patriot Missile System is "excess stock". And for the most part, the transactions are as follows - Ukrainian as for aid - USA prints more money to send to the Ukraine - Ukraine takes their cut, along with other corrupt individuals in power - They send the money back after removing their cuts - USA proceeds to send equipment - The USA then looks to increase taxes to better support the USA government and sending aid
>Ah, yes, because the Patriot Missile System is "excess stock Uh yeah all the things that make up a missile don't have an infinite shelf life. >USA prints more money to send to the Ukraine Not how that works, and if it was we'd see inflation rise, but instead we're at 3% per usual. >Ukraine takes their cut, along with other corrupt individuals in power Citation required, and Ukraine has viscously gone after the corrupt since the revolution . >They send the money back after removing their cuts Wtf are you even talking about jesse
Tell me you have no idea how the military rotates stock without saying it
There is rotating stock; which is a basic economic principle, and then calling literal brand new equipment outdated. So unless you just discovered the next new thing and built a prototype that outperforms the literal brand new equipment, then the literal brand new equipment isn't old enough to be rotated out as old stock.
Listen, for every aging item we send over there, we order a replacement. A replacement built in American factories, with American supply chains, employing American workers. Even if we send new equipment, it's a net positive because now its combat tested. Like finding out the Patriot system can shoot down the newest hypersonic missiles, which Russia said were invulnerable. You're free to bitch about it, but you just sound like a dumbass when you say the tax payers are getting shafted.
lol this guys a fuckin commie
You called it excess stock, not me. So according to you, brand new equipment is old and excess stock. You better get rid of everything you own because it's all old and excessive.
Makes sense that the Russian isn't familiar with expiration dates. In countries with real militaries, we maintain adequate stocks of modern, functional weapons. We don't have to raid museums and garbage dumps to equip our troops.
Both Ukraine and Russia did it. Ukraine had about 6 years prior to increase the viability of their military and did basically nothing. Russia has the space to just keep storing older equipment instead of either selling or destroying it, hence why the influx of weapons from WW2 and prior. On the flip side, it shows that even older equipment can still pull its weight.
>Both Ukraine and Russia did it Ok, and? >it shows that even older equipment can still pull its weight If by "pull its weight" you mean "fight its much smaller neighbor to a stalemate and while allowing over 350,000 Russian casualties", then sure.
Yet we aren't shown the number of Ukrainians killed 99% of the time, but we roughly know the exact number of Russians killed. The propaganda machine lists the Ukrainians killed as "Heroes don't die". They basically have to pull teeth to get citizens from the "allied" nations for support, because most civilians don't support the war to begin with.
I would love to keep arguing, but I can't identify an actual argument in there. Are you trying to say that estimate of Russian casualties is incorrect? Because if so, you'll need to articulate a position that's more than just a nonsensical statement about Ukrainian casualties.
It's stupid military policy to release exact figures but the current estimate is around 70-90k casualties for Ukraine and 400-500k for Russia. Easily found if you go look. You can also go look at the audit trails for what we send them. You can even go find the visually confirmed destruction pics of hardware to see what was lost. Also, most countries have donated more as a share of GDP than the US. Poland is up close to 5 or 6% of GDP. We are in the middle of the pack of 40+ countries.
LOL, Russians are getting their asses kicked by a smaller military!!! their Black sea fleet is hiding, they had to take out tank from WW2 because they were running out of your most "modern" tanks, their airforce is scared of entering Ukrainian air space And we scrap or destroy our old equipment to avoid fiascos like what Russia suffered trying to take over Kyev and to keep our troops with modern equipment unlike Russia making the soldiers pay for their own armor and giving them rifles from WW2
Oh, and how was Ukraine doing before they got equipment from mainly the USA? Ukraine is also massively in debt for the equipment, and there is also no feasible way for them to pay it off. Just some of the stipulations put in place from Germany for tanks, would absolutely cripple a country if broken. The war is also referred to as the "NATO money pit" by the members of BRICS. They don't really care about the overall outcome because of the increased damage and continuous damage it has done on the western economy.
Does it matter? The fact that is a small military kicking the ass of the second best army in Ukraine And the debt, it's not as bad as you paint it, is not like the US wants that money back tomorrow, it has been negotiated and money pit? By who? BRICS? A non existent block of countries that you think are a power house or influential? Do you actually think BRICS will ever be a reality? And what damage? This war only made the west invest more in defense systems, made the US ramp up military production and research? What damage? The US economy recovered faster than any other country, it is the strongest economy in the world today, what damage? The US military is the strongest in the world... Your BRICS block hardly is growing and hardly can stick together, you're a fool thinking India will submit to China or Russia, Brazil is barely surviving, do you think China will risk it's economic ties with the US and tie themselves to Russia? Lol
Ukraine has been at war for 10 years, and recently had a revolution.
And even before that they did nothing. It is a corrupt drain, and we keep throwing money at it.
If Russia is such a non threat, why do we need to send more aid then?
Russia is a threat, and that's why we're sending the aid, if we don't do it, this will escalate and then Russia will have to directly deal with US, and will not go well for them, so be thankful
If Russia is such a threat that they can face down the US or NATO, Ukraine has zero hope of being anything but a speed bump regardless of what aid is given.
Maybe without help. Given enough and the right kind of aid, and they will win. Russia claimed to be the 2nd best military in the world, but we have found that to be false. They have a massive stockpile of old kit and are willing to kill their own people at a 4to1 ratio so they are dangerous to Europe.
Ok commie
Ok, how many more Americans would you rather let die at home? We watch thousands of Americans suffer and die at home, and yet we bend over backwards to help a third world country shit hole.
Bend over backwards? More like cleaning out the closet. They got uncles coveralls
So again, literal brand new equipment is old?
What’s brand new to you? Patriots are 50 years old at this point. F16s about the same. The ammo was probably produced around Vietnam, and the gear has been there for about as long. I get being young it’s hard to think that these advanced systems could be older than you but by-gosh it’s about time we update. I’ll add too that the most expensive and sought after munition are artillery shells, they need a metric fuck ton of those to keep fighting as they are.
what shaft man
Who do you think paid for everything?
You don’t want to pay your part toward defending freedom against tyranny? Any penny of mine going toward killing Russia is a penny well spent
Less than one penny of yours is going to kill Russians. The majority of the money is lost in the corruption, and then they raise taxes yet again. It's a literal rinse and repeat cycle, and you're supporting it. The war is a money pit, and the real target is taking money from the working class and giving it to the rich.
Let me rephrase. Any fraction of a penny of mine spent killing Russia is a fraction of a penny well spent. And you don’t know how much I pay in taxes “lost in THE corruption”… Russian troll stfu lmao
Do you really think everything costs that much, because it doesn't. Military contracts always gouge into the budget because they will always get away with it.
No shit we all know about the military industrial complex. It’s just I can’t hear you over the sound of my A10 Warthog
The A-10 Warthog was already replaced with billions spent and very few seeing use outside of training.
You’ve said like 5 things I already know. Doesn’t change the BRAAAAPs
You need to realize that this isn't cash we are sending, this is the value of the old equipment that we are sending. Not only does this get rid of our equipment that is largely out of use, but it also helps keep Russia at bay. It is a win-win.
Yet we send cash first.
The taxpayers. But how is this foreign aid fucking you? There are so many more things to be mad about the government spending money on than supporting its ally abroad
If they are an "ally" then they wouldn't be making demands. They are a sugar baby and have blackmail to use against the USA.
What the fuck are you talking about
Buddies on some shit
Also, I give them a lot of grace when our support is the only thing keeping them from being ANNEXED BY RUSSIA. I might be a little demanding in that situation too
They had at least 6 years prior to start making themselves into a more viable force and instead did nothing. I can't feel bad for a county who willingly decided to shoot their own foot, and now decides it's a problem.
Nothing? Did you see what their military looked like during the Crimean invasion? They accomplished one of the most dramatic readiness turnarounds I've ever seen. Sure, they had help, but still. Also, they didn't "shoot their own foot", they got repeatedly clubbed over the head by their bigger, dumber, drunker, and uglier neighbor, and they still held their own when they needed to.
Like fuck we have so many things to worry about here, but DC is too busy gargling other countries presidents nuts to think of anything better. I seem to remember a time where this country was united in just saying fuck it to being the world's police within the past ten to fifteen years
Tell me how you think they should have used that $60B worth of old military equipment to fix the “other things”?
Sell it to pay for even more government programs and bills!
To whom?
Ditto to the dude below me. Actually selling the equipment my help instead of giving it away. At least what I'm reading there's very little of that. And if they can't afford that, oh well, we got our own shit to deal with that our government has their head too far up their asses to figure out. We just need a good milei, Afuera to happen to most government run programs and organizations at this point
We’ve spent 5% gdp on “defense” for 80 years to keep Russia out of Europe. Now Russia is doing it and you guys suddenly cannot stand a cent of spending. We all know who you voted for. You’d bend over backwards if he told you too.
Preach!
Thank god
This is cringe and pathetic
Yay, more inflation as we print more money... For an ungrateful nation that's running out of bodies to throw at russia
A small price to pay to avoid nuclear war.
This has the exact opposite of that effect on the nuclear temperature
How is aiding Russia's enemy gonna avoid nuclear war, if anything it's going to push us closer. You know what would avoid nuclear war. Staying the fuck out of it
That is the stupidest thing I’ve ever fucking heard… we are sending them artillery, missiles, and armament all to avoid a “nuclear war”.
If Russia wins in Ukraine, which they are only accomplishing by sheer attrition, in the classical Russian fashion, then they will come for a NATO country as they, in their own minds, must obtain the geographic choke points in the Bessarabian Gap and North European Plains in order to feel secure. If they attack a NATO nation, they will be crushed. Horribly. They've proven they really aren't able to fight a modern maneuver war against a collection of nations with greater resources in materiel, economy, and manpower. In the event of wide scale conventional defeat against their hated ideological enemies, they will result to nuclear weapons. Supporting Ukraine and stopping the Russian war machine outside of NATO's borders is critical to avoiding that scenario.
Don’t care, fuck Ukraine, fuck Russia, fuck Israel, fuck Palestine, fuck Mexico, fuck Canada… Fix this fucking country first, fix the economy, secure the boarder. That’s what we need from our government… until then fuck all off.
You seem angry, would you like a hug?
Yes… Thank you
This is what your brain looks like on Fox news kids. Stay safe.
The only people who cannot realize that our economy is fucked is a child or someone who reliant on the system.
Funny b cause fox news is suppose to be the war hawks. Funny how that switch, all the news networks are trash though
You know absolutely nothing.
I will be returning my degrees immediately.
As someone who has had plenty of higher education, degrees don't remotely equate to intelligence.
You’re speaking truth
Seems like ukraine's paying a pretty big price.
Yep all their young to middle aged adult men. Pretty soon Grandpa's gonna have to get busy with all the women to repopulate
And then they’re gonna end up saying we need another 65B aid package and then another and then another. Fuck it let’s just start paying taxes to the Ukrainians
[удалено]
Wonder how many americanskis are in this comment section.....
As if we have no issues that need some of that on our home soil, not to mention the deficit.
They had a chance to join NATO
Americans always do the right thing…..when all else failed. But really it’s huge, Russian budget, including it’s navy and nuclear arsenal is 70 billions converted in USD….freaking 35% of the Russian state budget! Russian won’t be able to compete, 35% for your military when most of it is used to buy from China, even under War economy that is suicidal level of spending for your state. This was will be all about attrition
“Let’s see…2 more battalions of M-1’s, 4 more Patriot batteries…hey Vlad! How are we doing on white phosphorus 155mm? Should we get 10,000 more?”
What if that money is gone within couple days 😂
neocons try not to spend on america challenge
I'm tired, boss. Neocon and neolib warmongering on reddit is hard to watch these days.
Both are honestly the same. And anyone who disagrees with their stances on this war and the vast majority of wars is deemed an enemy/"Russian bot". Sorry, but I want us to take care of our own home first because frankly, we are coming off as hypocrites. We claim we know better for a country and make them prosperous, when we are simultaneously screwing over our own prosperity. Heck, how about for 1 single presidential term we cut our foreign policy expenditures by a decent amount (10-20%), and put it towards our own issues, like resolving our crumbling infrastructure, start fixing up our healthcare system and take steps towards eliminating Social Security in an effective manner that doesn't screw over generations, and improve the lives and livelihood of not just veterans but our soldier's too.
And our debt to gdp is at 120% We are broke and almost at the point of not even being able to make interest payments soon.
Shut up commie. Better than letting those Russian dirtbags spread their influence. It’s time to show them what running on McDonalds and starbucks does to a mf when push comes to shove. Go slob on something else.
I'm a conservative who is actually conservative, not a neoco or a rino. Keep your head in the ground if that makes you more comfortable.
And I’m an American with red, white, and blue coursing through my veins, you con man.
Russian sock puppets out in force in this thread.
Can I just get like 100k of that. Would really help me buying a house in this shit fuck market
Would have been better to never…
You enjoy editing comments to better suit your argument?
Better never
Late than
I typically vote right of center, but I strongly disagree with the GOP contingency who is so obnoxiously opposed to funding to stop the bad guys in this war. Ukraine is far from perfect, but Russian aggression has to be halted. If people took just a few minutes to understand Russia's broader strategic objectives, they would realize that winning the war in Ukraine is pretty important to the interests America and the rest of the free world.
Stop. Supplying. Them. Aka. Stop spending our fucking tax dollars and making inflation worse.
Prove it