To be fair, the one thing Trump and the USA has achieved is a more united world, nations which previously were indifferent to each other have now common interests and closer ties. The USA has become the outlier.
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Not the first time that Trump has made a decision to benefit the president of Russia.
Of course, it makes no difference to the people of America. With a $1 trillion budget and about 2 million active & reserve staff in the US military, moving 5,000 from one location to another will have exactly zero impact on the lives, taxes or opinions of any single American.
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Did you see the video where Trump rudely pushed in front of our king to shake hands with bystanders? this is how ignorant and unrespectful he is, even to our royality and overseas invited heads of state
No wonder why the rest of the world has turned their backs on the USA
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Yes, in America it was all over the news immediately. Regardless of politics, common courtesy, manners, politeness all come first when you invite and entertain a guest in your home, any home, including the White House.
I recall Trump butting to the front at a previous NATO conference with other heads of state when photos were to be taken, and I was embarrassed even then. He is a 5th grader who needs to be at the center of attention always or he pouts or bullies.
To other countries, we applaud your points of criticism towards Trump, as he doesn’t pay any attention to his own people. The word embarrassing doesn’t begin to touch what we all feel towards this jerk.
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As I understand it this merely reduces the number of US Troops in Germany to the same as before the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Undoubtedly it will reduce the income of those around the base but that is about it.
US troops are still being rotated through Northern Australia in ever increasing numbers as are US pilots training out of RAAF Tindal (15km outside Katherine)
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My brother served in Brussels with NATO. Europe is large enough to stand together on its own. Europe / Asia / middle East. most all the world aren’t on my bucket list and England told the Common market to go get F’d a while ago. I sort of thought giving the kING OF eNGLAND A FREE LUNCH IS STUPID.
I know, I chuckled along with his arrogance. He joked about remodeling the Whitehouse too.
I drove past the Boeing Plant today; Europe doesn’t have Boeing workers working overtime. The parking lots were basically MT. So, you see Nada is NATO’s crap BS is just all it.
I remember when England felt it needed to blo the F out of Argentina back then. I think the Donald has made a huge mistake. Whatever. Time will not ring a good gong on it. Most likely he doesn’t give a crap. I sort of hopped the 50’s forum would be across continents, I will most likely leave it!
No need to leave.
It’s OK to agree to dis-agree.I think that’s what Charlie was saying. 
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I think the rest of us are safe until he builds his bunker.
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I just want to know how the Military can keep its heads clear below a sleezy teen dance hall above it.
This kind of sleaze is an insult on the taxpayer’s of the USA.
Hi Zac
I totally agree that some of NATO have been ripping off the USA Taxpayer.
Much as I detest Trump, this is the one thing that I admire him for.
It did need to be stopped.
As with all these things there is another side of the Coin.
The USA is the most powerful military in the World.
It only achievies this by having forward bases abroad, including Europe.
We have several here in the UK, 2 of which are vital to the USA Military and Security Services.
At one point in my life I was a liason contact with the USAF, here in the UK.
i, like many like the USA but not Trump.
We have some lovely USA posters on here I would be sorry to see you leave.
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In what way?
We can certainly agree that there have been NATO member states that have been underfunding their own military and, indeed, not paying their full share of the funding NATO requires. But are these two shortcomings in spend actually ripping off the US taxpayer?
The first is the defense spending as a share of their own GDP. Does one country, let us pick France (at about 2% of GDP), underspend on defense actually mean that the US is spending more? The year on year increase in spend by the US is not driven by NATO or by France’s underspend. That is only a decision by the US government. Would the US spend less on defense if France spend more? Nope - as witnessed this year. Where exactly is the rip off?
The second one is the budget for running NATO and funding its projects. That is about $5bn a year, of which the US will only pay a fraction (15% in fact). This is due to go down as other states contribute more - so the “rip off” here is in the order of 1-2% of $5bn… The entire US military budget is now $1 trillion. I simply cannot see why anyone would look at this excess payment by the US of perhaps $100m (a ten thousandth of the defense budget) and moan about being ripped off. The new ballroom is going to cost $400m.
the % share of GDP spend on defence is a nonsense target. It doesn’t strive for efficiency or effectiveness and is doubtless rife with inaccuracy and misreporting
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The % of GDP doesn’t take into account that NATO is only a fraction of what should be the US defence spend. After all NATO is only one part of US global military efforts, or have I misunderstood what NATO represents?
NATO is two things - a defense alliance (to attack one member state is to attack all of NATO), and a set of common standards (parts, components, communications) in order to allow easier interchange and reduce stocks.
NATO is not an army, has no weapons or equipment of its own. It does set out defence spend goals for member states. It does use the staff and equipment of member states when NATO runs an action (such as in former Yugoslavia in the 90’s).
The US presence around the world is not NATO, it is solely the US military. Same as UK’s air base in Cyprus is the UK military or the French base in Djibouti are not NATO.
So you agree that US boasting about it’s military spend is not representative of it’s NATO contribution?
I very much agree with that. The actual spend on NATO by the US is in order of $750 million a year. For a country that is happy to pee away billions (Pentagon says $25bn but Trump asked for another $200bn in military funding so it is a lot more than 25bn) in their war on Iran (thus far to zero effect) this is very little.
I’d go further, US moaning about NATO and the cost of “protecting Europe” is all rubbish. The in the years after WW2 the US placed hundreds of thousands of troops and hundreds of planes in Europe to stop USSR expansion - and did this to protect US interests. The arrangement was that any war would be fought in Europe, that Europe would be trashed in the process, the UK would be an unsinkable warship off the coast of Europe to continue the fight. This was not protecting Europe, this was Europe as a disposable buffer zone. It has always been US military bases, run by US DoD, line of command back to the US - with no local military involvement in decision making.
The dude just likes to spread his B/S, never says anything, just spews hate; he’s a pretty miserable fella. I feel sorry for him.
You can’t …we’d miss your posts and you’d miss ours. 
Debates are good, we can’t always agree but that’s what makes this thread so interesting.
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I wonder if the only winner from this conflict with Iran is China?
I suspect the US thought that China would be a loser with the Strait of Hormuz closed but it looks like the US is the bigger loser as they are far more dependent on oil and the increased price has hurt the average American badly. China is far less dependent on oil.
Not only that, the USA has proved to be an unreliable friend and unaligned countries are perhaps tending to look to China as an ally rather than the US. It will be interesting to see the long term results of this war.
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The real losers are the US consumers, the sole purpose of the US bombing Iran was to increase oil prices and profits for the US oil conglomerates. Nazi Don did not care one iota about Israel, or religion for that matter. The US consumers have paid the price of US tariffs, and now that tariffs rebates are coming out it’s being given to US Corporations for the additional costs of imported products, which by the way, were passed on to and paid for, by US consumers.