shintao Posted August 23, 2016 Share Posted August 23, 2016 Trump’s approach to American allies, specifically the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) alliance, is the biggest reason why. Traditionally, American parties have seen its alliance commitments, NATO in particular, as ironclad guarantees — the core part of America’s global strategy. Trump doesn’t agree. He thinks that alliances are only useful as tools for extracting money. The US is the strongest power in the world, Trump reasons — why protect tiny NATO allies like Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania if they don’t pay up? At the very least, Trump has said, they should spend more on their own defense if they want to expect American protection. If Trump put his ideas into practice and actually renounced commitments that didn’t do what he wanted, it would destroy NATO. The alliance depends entirely on an ironclad guarantee on behalf of all allies to defend any one of them — that is literally what it does. If the US won’t do that, then NATO is effectively dead letter. This is music to Putin’s ears. He sees the NATO alliance (correctly!) as a major bulwark against Russian expansionism in eastern Europe, and would be thrilled if it fractured. That would make it far easier to install friendly dictators in small nearby countries, like Estonia, or even annex them entirely. A Trump victory, then, seems like it might allow Putin to fulfill his fundamental foreign policy goal — reviving Russia’s Soviet-era influence over its region — to a degree previously thought impossible. Trump seems totally oblivious the fact that he would be throwing US allies under the bus — and, in fact, to Putin’s hostility toward the United States entirely. For example, he has effusively praised Russia’s bombing campaign in Syria: "What’s wrong with Russia bombing the hell out of ISIS and these other crazies so we don’t have to spend a million dollars a bomb?" Never mind that Russian bombs have targeted the relatively moderate opposition more than ISIS, and that the point is to prop up Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad rather than defeat ISIS. Trump, alone among American political figures, sees Russia as more of a partner than an adversary — mostly because he doesn’t seem to care about the independence of eastern Europe or Syria’s freedom from dictatorship. All Trump cares about, instead, is getting more money for the United States, as he’s said: "my whole life I’ve been greedy, greedy, greedy … But now I want to be greedy for the United States. I want to grab all that money." His theories for how to do that — like spending less on alliances and other foreign commitments — line up exactly with a series of Russian foreign policy objectives. Moreover, Trump seems to admire Putin personally. "I will tell you that, in terms of leadership, he's getting an 'A' and our president is not doing so well," Trump said in a September interview. He even, weirdly, invented a story about the two of them becoming best buds in the green room before a 60 Minutes episode. "I got to know him very well because we were both on 60 Minutes, we were stablemates, we did well that night," Trump said in a November GOP debate. This never happened: The two men were interviewed by different journalists on different continents. But it must comfort Putin to know that Trump’s ideas align with Russia’s interest, and Trump himself is deeply impressed by Putin as a leader. "That Russia is pulling for Trump is at this point beyond any dispute," New York magazine’s Jonathan Chait writes. "Putin’s Russia has been proven or credibly alleged to have boosted friendly candidates in France, Germany, Austria, and, most successfully, in the election of a pro-Russian government in Ukraine. Something like this seems to be happening in the American presidential election now." Chait’s "beyond any dispute" is kind of an overstatement. Figuring out what Putin’s exact thoughts on the American election are — well, it’s literal Kremlinology. It’s important to be cautious about what we actually know, as alleging Russian interference in an American election is pretty serious. But it would make a certain kind of sense. There’s never been a major party candidate in the modern era more friendly to a Russian dictator’s interests. Trump and his top advisers have taken a lot of money from Russian interestsThe speculation on Russia’s motivations has gone well beyond merely alignment. In its most outlandish form, the theory is that Trump is an actual Russian agent — that he is willfully doing the Kremlin’s bidding in exchange for favors for his Russian business interests. "If elected, would Donald Trump be Vladimir Putin’s man in the White House? This should be a ludicrous, outrageous question … But we’re talking about a ludicrous, outrageous candidate," Paul Krugman writes. The title of Krugman’s column? "The Siberian Candidate." MORE http://www.vox.com/2016/7/27/12271042/donald-trump-russia-putin-hack-explained Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
native Posted August 23, 2016 Share Posted August 23, 2016 Fuck NATO All they do is bomb the shit out of countries Its not even constitutional to be in NATO Why are you so called democrats so fucking bloodthirsty? You want ww3? NATO has been encircling Russia for years with thier missiles Remember the Georgia incident The Russians aren't going to allow this aggression much longer You people are freaks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eclectic skeptic Posted August 23, 2016 Share Posted August 23, 2016 Fuck NATO All they do is bomb the shit out of countries Its not even constitutional to be in NATO Did NATO exist when our forefathers wrote the Constitution? Could you be any more stupid? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
native Posted August 23, 2016 Share Posted August 23, 2016 Did NATO exist when our forefathers wrote the Constitution? Could you be any more stupid? you stupid jackassWhere does it say in the Constitution that tax payer money can go to a global entity? Tax money is supposed to stay in country Period Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
eclectic skeptic Posted August 23, 2016 Share Posted August 23, 2016 you stupid jackass Where does it say in the Constitution that tax payer money can go to a global entity? Tax money is supposed to stay in country Period Look at the idiot doubling down on his ridiculous notion that NATO has something to do with the Constitution. Be a man, sonny, and admit your bonehead comment. News alert: not everything is written in the Constitution. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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