[albeva]

While true, it is often ignored that combined EU does possess a huge, highly advanced and well trained military force.

So more than that I'd hope EU can then put its squabbling aside and respong in unison to any military provocation as well.

[mantas]

How many aircraft careers does EU have? Especially after Brexit...

[angrygoat]

Seven: France (4) Italy (2) Spain (1)

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_carriers_in_s...

[riku_iki]

they listed helicopter carriers there (e.g. Mistral for France).

[BrazzVuvuzela]

That count is a bit deceptive, France has a single aircraft carrier with fixed-wing aircraft, the Charles de Gaulle. The other three are Mistral-class amphibious assault ships with helicopters.

[jessaustin]

The recent conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh proved that the future is here, and no large asset is safe from drones. Even if carriers could deny airspace to cheap tiny airborne loitering munitions (they can't), they have no hope against the submarine variety.

[qnsi]

4, which is more than China has.

[Iolaum]

I 'd say that the EU armies look better in paper than they would in practice.

One example is that several EU armies running out of precision bombs relatively early into the Libyan intervention [1].

[1]: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/nato-runs-short-on-some...

[Aeolun]

And land armies without tanks! Last I heard the Netherlands had sold off all of theirs :/

[punnerud]

Europe combined have more people and spend way more on military than US. On GDP Europe is lower, but they also have more than 2x the amount of people: https://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/compare/European-U...

[martin8412]

Spending more doesn't mean much if you don't spend it on something worthwhile. Not to mention that the European countries don't count money spent on healthcare, education, etc for veterans as part of the military budget.

The US is definitely overspending for no real benefit, except lining the pockets of defense contractors(and by that, politicians pockets)

[fifilura]

And anyone who has played a couple of games of Risk knows how much that is worth...

[BrazzVuvuzela]

Advanced weapons and good training, but lacking in the force projection in the Pacific department, relative to America anyway.

[GekkePrutser]

On the other hand, we don't really have any business being there. So why would we. We're not the world police.

In the EU we view the "Department of Defense" as a tool for actual defense. Not for invading the middle east for corporate benefit. We've been dragged into this several times by the US in the last decades and it's always been a huge failure and has sometimes led to worse threats (ISIS for example which was much more of a threat to us than Saddam Hussein was)

A land war against China is not winnable anyway. I do think we should help Taiwan if it comes to it. But this should just come down to strategic deterrents. There's no point sending armies. By the time they get there it's too late anyway.

Our main threat right now is mainly Russia. And mainly so because they view us as enemies. But having entire tank brigades like in the cold war won't do us any good. This is not how the next war will be fought.

[BrazzVuvuzela]

To be clear, I'm not faulting the EU for it. The EU should be concerned more with their own security, particularly if America gets tied up with China and is consequently less capable of helping to defend the EU against Russia.