Nato and Russia playing dangerous game with military build-up

Nato and Russia playing dangerous game with military build-up

Russia wants to detract from problems at home and position itself as a superpower, and Nato troop movements can only help

It has been billed as Nato’s biggest military build-up on Russia’s borders since the cold war. Britain is sending fighter jets next year to Romania. The US is dispatching troops, tanks and artillery to Poland. Germany, Canada, and other Nato countries also pledged forces at a meeting on Wednesday of defence chiefs in Brussels.

The move comes after Russia has been busy deploying hardware of its own. Earlier this month Moscow said it was stationing nuclear-capable missiles in Kaliningrad, Russia’s Baltic exclave. This week two Russian warships armed with cruise missiles slipped into the Baltic sea.

Meanwhile, the hulking Russian aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov has been belching its way through the English Channel en route to Syria. Spain said Moscow had withdrawn a request to refuel on Spain’s north African coast, amid western suspicions the Russian fleet will be used to flatten civilians in Aleppo.

Nato’s apparent goal here is to deter future acts of aggression on European territory by Vladimir Putin’s revanchist Russia. After a period in which Nato has seemed slow to react, and lacking in backbone, the alliance is now sending out a robust message. As the US defence secretary, Ash Carter, put it this week, these deployments are all about deterrence.

In particular, Nato wants to signal to Moscow that it is prepared to defend the embattled Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. In May, Britain will send an 800-strong battalion to Estonia, supported by the French and Danes. By next summer around 4,000 troops from Nato countries will face off against 330,000 Russian soldiers stationed on Moscow’s western border.

None of this means Europe is on the brink of an imminent east-west conflict. Or - as Donald Trump and some commentators have suggested apocalyptically - that the world is gearing up for a third world war. It isn’t. Speaking at a conference in Sochi on Thursday Putin agreed. He told a group of western experts that it was “stupid and unrealistic” to think Russia might attack anyone in Europe.

Despite the cold war atmospherics, then, there’s little prospect of Russian tanks rolling across the border into the Baltic states anytime soon.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/oct/27/military-build-up-along-russias-border-no-cause-for-alarm


There had better be a world left for me! I plan to travel it in a few years.

You guys ought to do something about Russia. They are getting away with stuff they never should be permitted to do.

Forget NATO...France, Germany and the UK should do.

Quill it's quite worrying. Russia seem....well, nuts...

eddie wrote:Quill it's quite worrying. Russia seem....well, nuts...

They are fresh off the days when they really were something. Now, they're psffft...

But Putin was the head of the KGB under the Soviets, so he's got problems forgetting. He's out to reinstate the old buffer state system, and he's starting with Ukraine. Next is Syria. Russians are like clockwork...they always have a plan going. And, they're not that creative.

A good spanking would do Mr. Putin well. That's why I say...the sooner you guys put him in his place, the sooner it will sort out.

oh look quill wants yet ANOTHER "proxy war"

Strange how America is backing the Saudi coalition against the rebels in Yemen... saying how it is important to support the official Yemen govt there... and same in Iraq... supporting the official govt there against the rebels... but in Syria they are saying support the rebels and against the official Syria govt...

Tommy Monk wrote:
Strange how America is backing the Saudi coalition against the rebels in Yemen... saying how it is important to support the official Yemen govt there... and same in Iraq... supporting the official govt there against the rebels... but in Syria they are saying support the rebels and against the official Syria govt...

Only Congress can declare war under the War Powers. Article I, Section 8, Clause 11 of the U.S. Constitution. The US can go into Iraq because, under GWB, and (again) the Republican Congress, they passed The Iraq Resolution, a joint resolution passed in October 2002. The Iraq war resolution is still in effect. The US can still go into Iraq, but they are constitutionally prevented from going into Syria. You guys just don't understand having a permanent, written Constitution.

The Republican Congress, House and Senate, has had a draft war bill involving Syria put on their desk by Barack Obama since 2013. The Republicans have refused to pass it. Republicans apparently are partly kowtowing to the anti-war sentiments, while at the same time having a heyday criticizing Dr. Obama, leaning on the fact that people (like you) do not understand constitutional powers and how they operate.

The most that Republicans will say about this is that they don't want to risk making a hero of Dr. Obama. Anyway, count us out...not saying I'm sorry. I'm tired of fighting wars half way round the world, where it's none of our business.

Original Quill wrote:

eddie wrote:Quill it's quite worrying. Russia seem....well, nuts...

They are fresh off the days when they really were something.  Now, they're psffft...

But Putin was the head of the KGB under the Soviets, so he's got problems forgetting.  He's out to reinstate the old buffer state system, and he's starting with Ukraine.  Next is Syria.  Russians are like clockwork...they always have a plan going.  And, they're not that creative.

A good spanking would do Mr. Putin well.  That's why I say...the sooner you guys put him in his place, the sooner it will sort out.

russia already effectively controls the eastern med with its air defence system which covers most of syria and over half way up turkey right out to cyprus and most of the way to israel. In a week or so they will have the northern fleet sitting off the coast of syria, admittedly the Kuznetsov is not a top notch carrier and an on its last deployment had to be followed by several tugs for when its engines broke down, but it is quite a force non the less.
cruise missiles which can be nuclear armed have been stationed which can now reach most of poland. They are just bringing online a new ICBM which a single one can obliterate an area the size of texas, and if specs are to be believed would be very hard to shoot down.
Of course MAD should ensure we dont end up in a nuclear confrontation, but as has already been shown when push comes to shove Obama backs down which is one of the reasons that russia has been so emboldened over the last decade. Of course clinton should she escape jail and become president seems to want a war and may be the one who sets off the nuclear Armageddon. Trump for all his faults seems to be the voice of reason here and wants to have, what before obama, was known as détente where america and russia tried to work together.
So yes War may happen, but is more likely with an unstable clinton in charge then with trump.

Original Quill wrote:

Tommy Monk wrote:
Strange how America is backing the Saudi coalition against the rebels in Yemen... saying how it is important to support the official Yemen govt there... and same in Iraq... supporting the official govt there against the rebels... but in Syria they are saying support the rebels and against the official Syria govt...

Only Congress can declare war under the War Powers. Article I, Section 8, Clause 11 of the U.S. Constitution.  The US can go into Iraq because, under GWB, and (again) the Republican Congress, they passed The Iraq Resolution, a joint resolution passed in October 2002.  The Iraq war resolution is still in effect.  The US can still go into Iraq, but they are constitutionally prevented from going into Syria.  You guys just don't understand having a permanent, written Constitution.

The Republican Congress, House and Senate, has had a draft war bill involving Syria put on their desk by Barack Obama since 2013.  The Republicans have refused to pass it.   Republicans apparently are partly kowtowing to the anti-war sentiments, while at the same time having a heyday criticizing Dr. Obama, leaning on the fact that people (like you) do not understand constitutional powers and how they operate.

The most that Republicans will say about this is that they don't want to risk making a hero of Dr. Obama.  Anyway, count us out...not saying I'm sorry.  I'm tired of fighting wars half way round the world, where it's none of our business.

then your laws have been broken because america are quite clearly in syria both in the air and on the ground. Does that mean the president should be impeached? you might not see it, but over here we see american troops supporting both the peshmerga and FSA in syria.