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| Europe |
| NATO's Trillion Dollar Budget Can't Buy Enough Firepower to Save The Baltics From Russia |
| 2021-05-13 |
| [The National Interest] Here's What You Need To Remember: Russian forces would likely conduct a well-dispersed, fast-moving advance into the Baltic States, which would mean NATO tactical nuclear weapons wouldn’t hit concentrated troop formations, but would instead land on the civilian populations the alliance is supposed to be defending. Even if NATO resorts to tactical nuclear weapons, it still can’t save the Baltic States from a Russian invasion. One reason? The Warsaw Pact—the Eastern European satellites of the Soviet empire—can’t be held hostage anymore. That’s the conclusion of a wargame by the RAND Corporation. In RAND’s view, NATO’s nukes are not a deterrent to Russia because Europe would have far more to lose from a tactical nuclear exchange than Russia. "The biggest takeaway from the wargame exercise is that NATO lacks escalation dominance, and Russia has the benefit of it," the study found. "In contemplating war in the Baltic states, once nuclear attacks commence, NATO would have much stronger military incentives to terminate nuclear operations, if not all of its operations, than Russia would." Indeed, the NATO players grappled with the utility of using nukes in the first place. "In our wargame exercise, NATO commanders knew that they would be rapidly overwhelmed by the Russian forces and considered early first use of NSNW [non-strategic nuclear weapons] to prevent that outcome," noted the report. "But, the commanders wondered, what would NATO target?" How about train capabilities, roads, any way Ivan would resupply logistics to their now-isolated troops? Russian forces would likely conduct a well-dispersed, fast-moving advance into the Baltic States, which would mean NATO tactical nuclear weapons wouldn’t hit concentrated troop formations, but would instead land on the civilian populations the alliance is supposed to be defending. Or, they could attack Russian units forming up in Russia, which would risk a strategic nuclear exchange. The NATO players ultimately chose to send a signal to Russia by dropping five tactical nukes on a Russian mobile air defense missile battery just inside the Latvian border. |
| Posted by:Besoeker |
| #11 Funny how these topics never even came up while Trump was President. |
| Posted by: Tom 2021-05-13 15:31 |
| #10 Stop taunting the bear. The threat is CHINA... and inside the Deep State |
| Posted by: Omereling Peacock7108 2021-05-13 13:08 |
| #9 Three words: "Cuban Missile Crisis", and more: "Russians are paranoid" |
| Posted by: magpie 2021-05-13 12:12 |
| #8 And how do you execute this without quickly escalating to strategic nuclear exchange? Use your imagination:
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| Posted by: Bubba Lover of the Faeries8843 2021-05-13 12:08 |
| #7 And how do you execute this without quickly escalating to strategic nuclear exchange? Xi smiles. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2021-05-13 11:15 |
| #6 So basically the RAND corp's wargame advises the 'Defender's of the planet against Russia' to stick to their respective domains and desist from fcuking around. Just make sure your whole field C4I is not screwed by hackers 'only out for money' plugged into local intranets, long before the first missile has flown. Or that Estonia's economy is not ransomwared overnight just for entertaining this tomfoolery. |
| Posted by: Dron66046 2021-05-13 10:05 |
| #5 The whole point of adding them to NATO was to provide a jumping off point for an invasion. Stop drinking bong water. No one wants to invade Russia. |
| Posted by: Rob Crawford 2021-05-13 08:28 |
| #4 Why are we even defending Estonia? For what American vital interest was it necessary to bring Estonia into NATO? Our elites needlessly provoke Russia while they shill and whore for China: criminal behavior |
| Posted by: Thrush Craing8281 2021-05-13 08:18 |
| #3 The Baltic states are utterly indefensible. The whole point of adding them to NATO was to provide a jumping off point for an invasion. It's only 200 miles from the Estonian border to Moscow. |
| Posted by: Knuckles Slererong5344 2021-05-13 08:13 |
| #2 Unless we base a corp in the Baltics, Russia can take them over whenever they want. Russia knows that, the Baltic states know that and we know that. Estonia doesn't even have tanks. If we were serious about helping defend them, the US would donate 32 M1A2s. The tanks sure wouldn't be able to seize Moscow, but it would make invading Estonia damn painful. |
| Posted by: DarthVader 2021-05-13 08:10 |
| #1 Before engaging in bear-baiting make sure the bear is chained. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2021-05-13 03:34 |