Russia not a threat? Im sure ukraine disagrees, as with other border nations.

Russia is not able to, with some of the highest military spending on the planet, properly invade a weak country right on their borders. Again, we’re talking about the poorest country in Europe. Whereas if we look at the American invasion of Iraq - within a month the Iraqi government had collapsed. Now, let’s see what other countries Russia could presumably invade.

The only real options are

• the baltic states which are already in NATO. So no need for NATO to spread there.

• poland - who has a military budget more than 3x Ukraine’s along with a more modern air force and air defense system. Not to mention they are also in NATO. Even if Poland wasn’t in NATO, Russia would stand no chance.

• finland - this is probably Russia’s best bet - they were spending about 20% less on their military as Ukraine in 2020. however Ukraine and Finland have drastically different geographies. Ukraine is mostly open plains so Russia historically wants to control Ukraine as it’s an easy way to invade Russia (both Napoleon and (edit: i refreshed my memory on French invasion and was incorrect. They went through Belarus) Hitler exploited this in order to invade Russia). However Finland is dense forest and the winters are harsh. The USSR even tried to invade Finland right around WW2 and failed miserably. And back then Finland was a poor backwater relative to what it is today.

So, Finland I think is justified in wanting to join NATO but realistically it’s not necessary. Should Finland get invaded, they would end up getting support from the US and Europe just like Ukraine is getting now. In 1939 they didn’t get that support and they still held back the Russians. Now with them being much richer relatively and Russia being weaker - it just isn’t realistic

Do you see what I’m saying? Russia isn’t a real threat. The only card they hold is nuclear weapons, and that’s a last resort option because they know it would very likely signal the end of the regime.

While im sure there is new technology to be had the majority of it is all old stuff. From 1960’s to 2000’s

Yes, both Ukraine and Russia are bringing out relics in this fight. Russia is burning through old Soviet tanks from the 1950s. But modern air defense systems, cruise missiles, drones, and modern satellites have never been used in this capacity. This is great for the US. They are able to use their satellites and communicate real time information to the Ukrainians. They learn what’s best to pay attention to, what are the limits of their tech.

All parties have learned just how useful drones can be. They’ve been used in many ways. As recon, as ways to attack people in trenches by simply dropping grenades on them, as suicide drones, etc. US military engineers are taking this massive treasure trove of data and reinvesting their work and money into places that have been shown to be most effective.

Not to mention all the behind the scenes cyber warfare / intelligence gathering that is going on. I’m telling you - a lot of people in the MIC are very happy about this war. And of course our defense contractors are getting tens of billions of dollars which can conceivably become hundreds of billions before this war is finally through.

People do have genuine feelings and reactions

Obviously people have genuine feelings. But governments don’t have feelings. They practice realpolitik and that involves lots of educated smart people making cold calculated decisions. Feelings mean nothing to deciding whether to go to war or even when talking about internal policies. There’s that famous quote said to Yanis, that minister from Greece. “Elections cannot be allowed to change economic policy” by the German finance minister in a Eurogroup meeting.

Im assuming you are american

I was born in South America. Although I concede there is very little risk of nations invading each other in South America just like in the USA.

The US doesn’t actually need external reasons to justify defense spending.

Yes it actually does. Congress can’t just pass a bill randomly and send $100 billion to Raytheon and Lockheed Martin. It needs a big seemingly groundbreaking reason. Which is partly why this war has been so hyped up and Russian is depicted as a major threat to Europe when realistically they are so weak they can’t even properly conquer the poorest country in Europe right next to their borders.

I say partly because it actually is a fairly important war being the largest war in Europe since WW2. But absolutely, just like Cheney & co took advantage of 9/11 to funnel money into war, our modern day politicians are doing the same thing. It’s not a conspiracy theory. Or at least, in 20 years from now people will talk about it as if it’s obvious.

I mean, yeah, the conspiracy theory is bullshit. Just pointing out that if Trump wins, turning off the tap of support to Ukraine is very much a possibility.