What Happens if America Pulls Out of Europe?

[unhappycamper]

http://watchingamerica.com/News/202070/what-happens-if-america-pulls-out-of-europe/



What does Europe do if the United States one day says, "It was nice meeting you, thank you and goodbye?"

What Happens if America Pulls Out of Europe?
die Welt, Germany
By Michael Stürmer
Translated By Ron Argentati
2 April 2013
Edited by Lau­rence Bouvard

The U.S. military has to economize and will reduce troop levels in Europe. The question of what the ramifications of losing the United States as resident protector would be for Europe isn't an especially welcome topic in Berlin and Brussels.

What does Europe do if the United States one day says, “It was nice meeting you, thank you and goodbye?” Of course it wouldn't happen exactly that way, but what would happen if it does?

The question was asked at the latest parliamentary meeting between the U.S. Congress and the German Bundestag in Berlin, although it must have been an unpleasant one for all the Germans regardless of their political party affiliation. It had an air of impending emergency about it. The German answer was instructive because the Germans had absolutely no clue as to what would happen.

The presence of 300,000 U.S. soldiers back in the good old days of the Cold War — not to mention innumerable family members scattered between Ramstein in the Palatinate and Bad Hersfeld in the Fulda Gap — those days are long since gone. As Bob Dylan sang, “the times they are a-changin'.” Today the Americans have but two combat brigades on the European continent plus Air Force units and Navy units in nearby waters. The tendency is toward even less.

[Victor_c3]

1. Great illustration

Thanks to us, much of the world receives a subsidized defense. I read an article in the bimonthly magazine "Foreign Affairs" a few months back stating that Germany and Japan only spend 1.8% and 1% of their GDP respectively on their defense/war budgets. Meanwhile, the US spends about 4.8% of its GDP on defense.

Could you imagine the funding that could be shifted to other areas of importance if we could cut our defense spending to 1.8% or 1% of our GDP? Perhaps I'm expressing a new libertarian streak here, but I fully believe that our money and priorities would be better spent on ourselves then on protecting other nations.