Arguments over who’s going to pay for the creation of the “rapid reaction” force in Eastern Europe, something NATO agreed to create back in September, has left the alliance spinning its wheels on actually getting the force going.
It was supposed to be a 5,000 ground troop force with air and naval support positioned along the Baltic Sea as some sort of hedge against a Russian invasion, something no one serious expects anyhow.
But while officials were eager to approve the plan as a chance to spend a lot of money on beefing up NATO’s military presence in the east, the officials are much less eager to commit any of their own money to the plan.
With so many European NATO nations trimming their military budgets in recent years, there’s not just tons of equipment and fighters left over to throw at the “spearhead” force from any of them, and most are just waiting for someone else to do it.
Diplomats are now saying that the force, which was supposed to be put together quickly, will be lucky to be fully operational before 2016. Fewer than 100 of the 5,000 troops have been committed yet.
But it sounded really good when they announced it! They (Eastern Europe/Baltics) just figured that Uncle Sugar would pick up the complete tab – both financial and physical to protect them while they poke the Bear.
I'd love to know where Mr Ditz is getting this information. I can find no trace of it anywhere on the internet. Googling simply brings up this article. If Putin did send his rickety conscript army into the Baltic republics, I don't see how a rapid reaction force would do any good. The response would, in the first instance, have to be air attacks all along Russia's frontiers, in particular along the highly vulnerable Arctic and Pacific coasts. The rapid reaction force serves merely to reassure the population that the US is not leaving them in the lurch and that reassurance needs to be given so as to convince the Middle East that the US won't leave Israel in the lurch.
"I'd love to know where Mr Ditz is getting this information. I can find no trace of it anywhere on the internet. Googling simply brings up this article."
Why tell a lie that anyone else with Internet access can falsify in 30 seconds or less?
Reuters, November 27th: "NATO's planned new fast-reaction force, centerpiece of its response to Russia's annexation of Crimea, is proving harder to set up than expected because of shortages of vital equipment and arguments over funding, diplomats say."
http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/11/27/us-ukra…
Why would Putin invade the Baltics?
Because Putin is the devil himself. He's Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot reincarnated and hates everything that's decent. Fox Noise, MSNBC and CNN said so.