NATO chief: Libya exposes Europe's dependence on US power. So Europe cannot carry on without the US

Seems like the truth is that the Europe in Libya cannot carry on with the dependence of the US even though it's not US-led. What do you guys think about this?

www.middle-east-online.com...

The NATO mission in Libya has laid bare Europe's ever growing dependence on US military might to carry out operations, NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said in an interview. Rasmussen warned that shrinking defence budgets across the continent could make it harder for Europeans to respond to future crises and lead to their decline on the global stage. "I think the Libyan operations is an example that there is a potential for strengthening what you might call a European pillar within NATO," the Danish former prime minister said. Although Europeans and Canada provide the majority of combat jets in the operation, he said, they lack the key intelligence and surveillance aircraft that only Washington possesses. "For the first time in the history of NATO, we see a NATO operation not led by the Americans but led by the Europeans," Rasmussen said at this office on Wednesday. "But it's a fact we could not carry out this operation without the unique and critical assets provided by the United States," he said. "So we are still dependent on America." The United States withdrew into a backup role after handing control of air strikes in Libya to NATO on March 31, but it provides refuelling planes as well as spy aircraft vital to the operation. While US aircraft still carry out some bombings, the bulk of the raids are in the hands of Britain, France, Canada, Norway, Belgium, Denmark and Italy. Norway, however, is pulling out in August. The United States has repeatedly voiced frustration over the dwindling defence spending in Europe, with Defence Secretary Leon Panetta, like his predecessor Robert Gates, saying this gap was evident in the Libya mission. At the same time, ambitions to build a European Union defence project have stalled, with the chief of the French armed forces, Admiral Edouard Guillaud, saying it was put in "hibernation".

Echoing the US concerns, Rasmussen lamented the lack of defence spending in Europe, saying that despite times of austerity governments should find ways to strengthen the military. "I would say that in the current circumstances the strongest obstacle to this vision of strenghtening a European pillar of NATO is the lack of political will in Europe to invest a sufficient amount of money in defence," he said. At the end of the Cold War, NATO's European allies represented one third of overall military spending but their share has fallen to 20 percent, he noted. The United States accounts now for three quarters. "If that development continues, you will see a Europe lacking the critical capabilities to carry out crisis management operations like the one in Libya, because we don’t have critical airlift, because we don't have intelligence, reconnaissance assets," Rasmussen warned. "And that will lead to a European decline on the international scene."

Turning to NATO's major ground operation in Afghanistan, Rasmussen said the outcome of the conflict, as well as the one in Libya, may not be as clear cut as in past wars. "I think we have to realise that modern warfare is quite different from World War II, as an example," he said. "In today's world you will very often end up with a more blurred outcome, partly because in today's world I think there is a political and public demand for a more, let's say, cautious approach," Rasmussen said. "We know that civilian casualties is a very controversial issue. And in today's world a lot of media focus on such incidents," he said, stressing that NATO does its utmost to avoid civilian deaths with precision strikes. "That may also explain why it takes more time despite more modern technologies, it takes more time and the final outcome might be more blurred because people want to see a political solution at the end of the day. That is the facts we are confronted with."

Of course they're reliant on the pentagon. Of course we're paying for the majority of the funding for the libyan humanitarian mission. The powers that be, those elitist who tell our governments what to do are trying to run us into the ground. WE have to be apart of every military conflict that has a chance of making someone else some money. The point is to shoot round after round into some middle eastern country until we go broke (happening as we speak) and/or we start world war 3 (some would say its already begun). And of course they get what they want because congress is too busy and too proper to get pissed that there powers have been handed over to barry... i mean barack.

Here’s what Franz Josef Strauss, Germany’s ex-minister president of Bavaria wrote about Europe and the US in his book ‘The Grand Design’ back in 1966:

"Germany does not want atom patronage, but atom partnership."

Why? Page 104: “…it [was] much easier for Germany to make a comeback as a member of an international family, as a member of a European Federation, than as a German Reich, a single national state. … our European attitude was the only escape hatch we had, the only approach to make a comeback possible."

Page 56: “I should like once again to stress that in such a European scheme Germany would not have any national control over nuclear weapons. It is however important for the Germans not to feel that their desire for security is being discriminated against by the previous introduction of some international agreement on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons. This fear would be removed by the introduction of an independent European nuclear potential even in an embryonic form."

"The ultimate aim remains the complete transfer of the power to order the use of nuclear weapons from a national to a federal authority."

Strauss mentions his desire for ‘victory over physical and spiritual misery in this world’ on page 57, and elaborates on what he calls a ‘common strategic headquarters and a common nuclear strategy… the means of delivery for nuclear weapons with warheads under American custody…'

Wake up people. Germany wants a comeback and has been hiding behind and inside the European colossus. You think that today they would not use that trick to get others to do their shooting?

Check what happened in Kunduz in Afghanistan, went a German officer provided misleading information to the Americans with the result that an Afghan tanker was blasted with the loss of innocent Afghan lives.

Check what is happening in Saudi Arabia right now, and how the Germans and the Saudis are in cohoots together against Iran – their weapons deals, and how Karl Theodor zu Guttenberg travelled to Pakistan when he was still Germany's Minister of Defense (whoops – he had to cancel that at the last minute and travelled to an arms fair in India instead – did he talk to the Pakistanis there?) and next thing you know, Debkafile reports on the Saudis having access to nuclear missiles just across the border. Coincidence? This all happened earlier this year. Google ahead and see if I am wrong.

Germany is using Europe as a cloak to get their hands on UK, US and French nuclear weaponry via NATO. Germany must be watched, because they want to have a third attempt to rule the world. Not by marching leather boots this time, but by subterfuge and dirty tricks under cover, using crises and mayhem to divide and conquer.

Link: en.wikipedia.org...

Good for Germany. No reason that modern day Germany shouldn't have the ability to become a real power with some say in the community. At least the Germans have some sense when compared to other superpowers.

Originally posted by Paulioetc15
Seems like the truth is that the Europe in Libya cannot carry on with the dependence of the US even though it's not US-led. What do you guys think about this?

I say we should stay the hell out of it. It's mainly a French & Italian disaster.
Let all those Euro-thumping - Anti-US - America bashing Socialists have at it!
We have our hands full elsewhere.

well at least the "Rebels"
got there own central bank...and oil trading company....

and the Us dollar is saved yet again from having anyone trade oil for gold.

Originally posted by SLAYER69

Originally posted by Paulioetc15
Seems like the truth is that the Europe in Libya cannot carry on with the dependence of the US even though it's not US-led. What do you guys think about this?

I say we should stay the hell out of it. It's mainly a French & Italian disaster.
Let all those Euro-thumping - Anti-US - America bashing Socialists have at it!
We have our hands full elsewhere.

edit on 15-7-2011 by SLAYER69 because: (no reason given)

Yes i agree, they hate us when they cannot live without us. bunch of weirdo idiots.