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| Home Front: Politix |
| Wrecking NATO |
| 2018-07-11 |
| [American Thinker] The Washington Post headline blared, "Trump is bent on wrecking NATO. Prepare for catastrophe." The Post fears that President Trump's diplomacy will benefit Vladimir Putin to the detriment of American and European interests. European Council president Donald Tusk sniped, "Dear America, appreciate your allies. After all, you don't have that many." The NATO countries are, indeed, among America's closest allies, but some of them appear more interested in oil, natural gas, and trade with Iran than in the Fulda Gap. Some of our "closest allies" have been working overtime to undermine America. If Mr. Trump is irritated with them, there is a reason. Iran is preparing to take $300 million in cash out of German banks to get ahead of impending U.S. banking sanctions. While American intelligence officials are concerned that the money will finance terrorism, the German government says it has "no evidence" to that effect. According to the German newspaper Bild, "Iran ... says that they need the money 'to pass it on to Iranian individuals who, when travelling abroad, are dependent on euros in cash due to their lack of access to accepted credit cards.'" The German government appears to think that one million Iranian tourists might need $300 each ‐ or perhaps 300 tourists might need $1 million each. The plan to send dollars to Tehran is in line with European negotiations, led by Germany and France, to help Iran mitigate the economic fallout of the American withdrawal from the JCPOA ‐ the Iran deal. The E.U. has also begun to update its "blocking statute," the rule that will prevent European companies from complying with impending Iran sanctions. Germany is willing to run a multi-billion-euro trade deficit with Iran to keep the doors open, even as a 2018 German intelligence report confirms that Iran is currently seeking nuclear technology in there. It is unclear why America's "closest allies" want to help the regime that sponsors Hamas and Hezb'allah, created a mercenary army of tens of thousands of Shiites to uproot the mostly Sunni population of Syria, sentences a women who doffed her head scarf to 20 years in prison (she will serve at least two years, likely more), bans homosexuality and hangs gay people from cranes in public ‐ and is, in fact, behind only China in the number of executions it conducts annually ‐ and imprisons foreign nationals. And that's before mentioning that Iran cheated on the JCPOA by hiding the military nature of its program and violated U.N. Security Council resolutions on ballistic missile development and the import and export of weapons. |
| Posted by:Besoeker |
| #17 The UN building would make a nice condo conversion I was thinking a multi-storied pig farm... but the pigs would never put up with the stench. |
| Posted by: CrazyFool 2018-07-11 19:34 |
| #16 Re #8's pic: Golly, those Norsemen sure got around! |
| Posted by: Shinenter Splat1698 2018-07-11 16:33 |
| #15 The problem is those nice shiny things are already broken. All that stuff is rusting when delivered and breaks almost immediately. A huge racket. |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2018-07-11 15:59 |
| #14 Well NATO, it would be a shame if some of these nice shiny things got broken now wouldn't it? The problem is those nice shiny things are already broken. |
| Posted by: Frozen Al 2018-07-11 15:43 |
| #13 The UN is a place for third world dictators to send their most serious rivals to get them out of the country. It's a safety valve for people we should not care about the safety of... |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2018-07-11 12:58 |
| #12 If the EU wants to be a Pan-European Nation State then why the pretense of asking the USA's opinion in this so-called alliance? Ah, Other People's Money? Ah, Fight To The Last Colonial? Where have we heard these before...? |
| Posted by: magpie 2018-07-11 11:03 |
| #11 A concept well past its shelf life. The UN building would make a nice condo conversion and parking would improve. Might even be able to get a lunch reservation at some of the nicer places to eat with the UN gone. |
| Posted by: Sock Puppet of Doom 2018-07-11 11:02 |
| #10 All those aircraft and U-boats are out of service due to lack of spare parts. Spare parts which Germany could easily purchase, but declines to do so. Hell, why should they when they have an idiot to pay for their defense? |
| Posted by: Herb McCoy 2018-07-11 10:37 |
| #8 By the way. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2018-07-11 10:14 |
| #7 When the wall came down, the purpose of NATO ended. They just can't kick the drug of military welfare and the pols in Washington signal their virtue with American taxpayers money and the 'deplorables' lives*. * death through training and traffic accidents seem to get buried along with the service members over there. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2018-07-11 10:13 |
| #6 It's time for anachronistic institutions like NATO and the UN to be dissolved. Maybe Congress too. |
| Posted by: Skidmark 2018-07-11 10:05 |
| #5 Charge them protection money. Well NATO, it would be a shame if some of these nice shiny things got broken now wouldn't it? |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2018-07-11 10:02 |
| #4 Make everything a contractor arrangement. Cash. Up. Front. Nothing personal, it's just business. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2018-07-11 09:30 |
| #3 Make everything a contractor arrangement. Cash. Up. Front. |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2018-07-11 09:28 |
| #2 G T F O |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2018-07-11 09:25 |
| #1 They need us. We don't need them. Our people are hurting. If we have to pay to have allies, then fuck them. |
| Posted by: Herb McCoy 2018-07-11 09:18 |
