↓
 
Home » Vance goes to Europe, and has a few things to say

Vance goes to Europe, and has a few things to say

The New Neo Posted on by

J. D. Vance gave Europe a tongue-lashing about their lack of devotion to free speech and liberty in general, and their reluctance to pay for defense. For example:

The threat that I worry the most about vis-a-vis Europe … is the threat from within — the retreat of Europe from some of its most fundamental values, values shared with the United States.

Lots more at the link.

Seems to me that Vance is taking a leaf out of Milei’s book. Or maybe vice versa.

At any rate, here’s the head of NATO:

I also want to thank you personally for everything you have done over the years in engaging with Europe. It has been noted before, and it’s really important. And I look forward also from that perspective to our talks and on Europe stepping up, the European part of NATO stepping up. You’re absolutely right. It has to be done. We have to grow up in that sense and spend much more.”

Rutte then took particular aim at the Minsk Agreements of 2014 and beyond, which negotiated a ceasefire between warring factions on the Ukraine and Russian sides, though ultimately failed to keep the peace.“We also have to discuss the defense industrial base. Of course, this is a problem we have both in the US and in the rest of NATO. We are simply not producing enough. We are not keeping up with the Russians and the Chinese. And then, of course, Ukraine, how to bring Ukraine to a lasting peace. And no Minsk again. So it has to be lasting.

Easier said than done. But sometimes people actually respond to leadership.

Comments

Vance goes to Europe, and has a few things to say — 25 Comments

  1. Watched it on YouTube, hope common European citizens got to see it as I think that was the audience JD wanted. The Ruling class wasn’t interested and sounds like they were horrified someone told the true situation.
    I hope JD is the real deal for a 2028 run.

  2. That speech was unthinkable just 6 months ago. Amazing performance and command of the argument and subject matter. Almost up there with Reagan’s “Tear Down This Wall”. Bravo JD. Bravo.

  7. I’m glad someone said it. The political class in occidental countries is pervasively repulsive, though the problem is less pronounced in Eastern Europe than elsewhere. The epicenter of awful appears to be the British Isles.

  8. But sometimes people actually respond to leadership.

    It has been my experience that true servant leadership leads to transformative positive movement in an organization, as people step up to be their best selves.
    May this be the case in our country.

  9. I also watched a replay of his speech…bravo!! It’s sad to see Europe go down the tubes; especially Britain.

  10. physicsguy:

    Regarding freedom of speech, Europe does not have a robust tradition of defending it.

    I discovered that close to 20 years ago. I wrote about France here. Around that same time I also wrote a post about Britain’s lack of serious protection for free speech, but I can’t find it now.

  11. Economically, Europe is not in a position to pay more for its military obligations. In the aggregate, inflation across Europe is much higher than in the US. Victor Davis Hanson recently declared that Germany, Europe’s manufacturing engine is continuing to commit economic suicide.
    https://elements.visualcapitalist.com/mapped-countries-with-highest-inflation-rate/
    Victor Davis Hanson: Germany’s ‘Slow-Motion Suicide’
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtT0GAtOSoU

  12. Western Europe, and the UK, have dug their own graves with mass unassimilated migration of Muslims and dedication to the “Net Zero” energy insanity. To this, they add suppression of criticism. I don’t know if they can recover. They’d have to want to.

  13. “Regarding freedom of speech, Europe does not have a robust tradition of defending it”

    In his memoirs, Kaiser Wilhelm expressed admiration for the press controls in place in Britain, and regret that he hadn’t had the same power to rein in press criticism in his own country.

  14. I had heard somewhere that Vance/Hegseth were doing a Good Cop/Bad Cop routine, but on reflection it was more of a keeping it real routine.

    Europe is so self-deluded the dose of reality by both men were received about as well as a dose of the proverbial cod liver oil.

    Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Friday he stands by his comments from Brussels earlier this week on it being unrealistic for Ukraine to be offered NATO membership as part of a settlement, for it to regain its pre-2014 territory, or for U.S. troops to enter the country to keep the peace.

    “My job today, and in Brussels, was to introduce realism to the conversation – the reality that returning to 2014 borders as part of a negotiated settlement is unlikely; the reality of U.S. troops in Ukraine is unlikely; the reality of Ukraine membership in NATO as a part of a negotiated settlement unlikely. And I stand by the comments that I made on that first day in the Ukraine Contact Group,” Hegseth said at a press conference in Poland Friday.

  15. Palmer Luckey talks with Shawn Ryan for 3hrs 50mins, but by all means use the slider to get to the good stuff starting around 2hrs in. As it happens the whole thing interests me, but the important conversation concerns Anduril, arming the US and the assholes of Europe against future necessities.

    https://youtu.be/bwSycrvcwAs

  16. Lee wrote

    It has been my experience that true servant leadership leads to transformative positive movement in an organization, as people step up to be their best selves.
    May this be the case in our country.

    I’m not a Trump cultist, but how’s this for servant leadership: serving as President without taking a salary, and fighting wicked elements of our government who tried to financially ruin, imprison and kill him?

  18. @R2L:UK common law also used to be strong on the Englishman’s right to bear arms

    Used to be strong on personal liberty in general. Most of their restrictions on personal liberty were extralegal: if you’re a mudlark and don’t touch your forelock when the Duke of Earl flips you a half-crown he may have his footman thrash you and if you complain to the bobbie on the corner he’ll ask “what did you expect”. That sort of thing. But on his own land or in his own home an Englishman could do most things without it being the government’s business. (Englishwomen, less so, of course.)

    Now they live in the Health and Safety hell described by C. S. Lewis:

    Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.

    As Blackstone said, which was once true,

    The idea and practice of this political or civil liberty flourish in their highest vigour in these kingdoms, where it falls little short of perfection, and can only be lost or destroyed by the folly or demerits of its owner: the legislature, and of course the laws of England, being peculiarly adapted to the preservation of this inestimable blessing even in the meanest subject. Very different from the modern constitutions of other states, on the continent of Europe, and from the genius of the imperial law; which in general are calculated to vest an arbitrary and despotic power of controlling the actions of the subject in the prince, or in a few grandees.

  19. NC: “[UK] Used to be strong on personal liberty in general….
    Now they live in the Health and Safety hell …”
    And what baffles me is just what caused this type of transition? How close are we to succumbing ourselves?
    We may now be more willing to accept rules and regulations suitable for a more complex technological society than before, but most of us still really don’t like other people telling us what we must do. Suggestions and guidance or recommendations are OK, commands less so.

  21. You could say that a peace agreement which rewards Russian aggression by allowing them to keep a section of Ukrainian territory is a loss for the Ukrainians and the West.

    But, on the other hand, as the price for gaining that territory, Russia has essentially destroyed a large part of it’s offensive forces/capabilities, lost hundreds of thousands of soldiers, and suffered grave damage to it’s economy.

    All things which greatly decrease Russia’s ability to mount any future credible threat to Europe for many years to come and–given the demographic collapse currently taking it’s toll in Russia–perhaps actually effectively destroying any further major Russian offensive capabilities.

    So, presuming it’s coming to an end, was this war “worth it?”

    Well, not likely for the Ukrainians.

    But, “keeping it real,” for the West, for Europe, and for the U.S., likely very much worth it.

  22. ”…the reality that returning to 2014 borders as part of a negotiated settlement is unlikely; the reality of U.S. troops in Ukraine is unlikely; the reality of Ukraine membership in NATO as a part of a negotiated settlement unlikely.”

    Then Ukraine will acquire nuclear weapons. Is that what you want?

    Because if Ukraine is not part of NATO and doesn’t have tens of thousands of American troops stationed on its soil, then that’s what will happen. It’s going to be one of the three.

    Choose carefully.

  23. ”But, on the other hand, as the price for gaining that territory, Russia has essentially destroyed a large part of it’s offensive forces/capabilities, lost hundreds of thousands of soldiers, and suffered grave damage to it’s economy.”

    Russia does not care.

    They gladly sacrificed a quarter million of their young men for a chunk of Ukraine. And in a few years they will gladly sacrifice another quarter million more for the rest of it. And then they will sacrifice another quarter million for the Baltics, and another quarter million for eastern Poland. And then another quarter million for Finland.

    Just because *you* wouldn’t make that trade doesn’t mean they aren’t doing so gladly.

  24. They gladly sacrificed a quarter million of their young men for a chunk of Ukraine. And in a few years they will gladly sacrifice another quarter million more for the rest of it. And then they will sacrifice another quarter million for the Baltics, and another quarter million for eastern Poland. And then another quarter million for Finland.
    ==
    Which ‘they’ and who are doing so ‘gladly’?

  25. mkent

    Exactly. Among other things, back sixty years ago, one year past high school made you a soldier. Won’t take long in Russia, either.

    “gladly” isn’t the same as “grimly determined”, but it has the same result. Along with “worth it”.

    As to “who”, it would be the most likely to be in charge in Russia, along with sufficient of society, at least at the start, to get going.

    It’s as if seeing the Russians continually doing this doesn’t mean they’ll continue doing it.

    Let me put it briefly; IT’S WHO THEY ARE AND WHAT THEY DO. Endless discussions of what happened, didn’t happen, should have happened, how what happened should have been perceived….don’t count.

    IT’S WHO THEY ARE AND WHAT THEY’VE DONE. Over and over.

    Each time, they run out the rapidly accumulating dross, get streamlined…maybe that lasts until the next time, or perhaps the stuff they did while streamlined (manufacturing, technology, full cabinets, etc.) gives them a good start.

    To insist that this time will be different is an imprudent bet.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

HTML tags allowed in your comment: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>

↑