Are Europeans 'pathetic European free loaders'?

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WhatsApp chat released today from the US calling Europeans 'pathetic European free-loaders'.

One of our closest allies! What about support from European countries after September 11th?

AIBU to expect more professional language?

I sometimes visit various Slavic FB groups. One time the conversation centred on Melania: "Typical Slovene! Found herself a rich tourist!"

[Not All Slovenes, etc.]

I think yabu

what do you expect from the tanks? Seriously after the last 2 months? Trump is in it up to his neck with Russian money, the corruption is beyond anything believable.

the facts is Europe has put more money in than the US is list on these people, they believe their own propaganda

NATO was established with US bases all over Europe and with Europe buying and relying on US weaponry. The US designed it like that, to be central to and essential to European safety. Even now we are reliant on buying US military tech. After 70 years you can’t turn round and say it’s our fault. Yes, we should have paid more, but claiming the US are doing all of this for our benefit rather than theirs and that we need to repay them for attacking the Houthi's flies in the face of the last 80 years of international diplomacy and military cooperation.
similarly the Budapest Memorandum of 1994 between the US, UK, Ukraine and Russia guaranteed that if Ukraine gave up its nuclear power the US and UK would protect its sovereignty. It fell short of saying it would guarantee military support. For the US to now agree to carve up Ukraine and hand chunks to Russia, for their negotiators to accept the Russian line that they are not really a country, and for the US to demand their minerals is the worst act of a so called friendly nation. It also leaves the UK stuck. We are a signatory but without the US we are hopelessly weak. We can’t support Ukraine against Russia. Trump is forcing Zelenskyy out of office because Putin wants to run a rigged election while most of Ukraine is either on the front line, under Russian occupation or in exile overseas.
Whatever these government ministers in Trumps government think, they should respect Europe, UK and Ukraine. Personal animosities shouldn’t create geopolitical crises.

You think the average UK citizen is any better informed? Whilst I despise Trump and his cronies, I think people in the UK need to be a bit less cocksure about US voters. This is, after all, the small ex-colonising territory that decided to go it alone in the 21st century, and the campaign material many fell for was in no way short of "make Great Britain great again", and is still going strong. People in glass houses...

Trump didn't get half of the voting electorate - Brexit did.

I still can’t get over the fact we did end up with Trump and Boris. I was devastated when Boris got in and I don’t think the political apathy that seeped in has left me. I want to fight, but it’s so exhausting when you hear people’s reasons for repeatedly choosing dangerous, racist, sexist and classist men and it’s only getting worse. Are they naive? Or are they just as bad? I feel a great fear for the future.

I agree to an extent BUT the underlying presumption in this comment is that America is still one of the good guys and is risking international security by giving the bad guys a chink in their armour with their reckless incompetence.

America is one of the bad guys now and is itself a real and concerning security issue.

Trump didn't get half of the voting electorate - Brexit did.

No it didn't The electorate most decidedly did not vote for Brexit. In the same way the electorate did not vote for the Tories in 2019.

How do you work that out. 51.9% of the voting electorate voted for Brexit and 48.1% of the voting elctorate voted remain. I am fairly sure that is evidence that they DID vote for Brexit.

Ah, but which Brexit? Nobody knew. The Brexit we ending up getting, courtesy of Boris, was never on the ballot paper.

And Labour 2024?

If you take billions of other people’s money and spend it on yourself, and then kick up a fuss when the other party refuses to fund you, then yeah, that makes you a pathetic freeloader.

The US is not the US we knew. It's gone and may never return. Trump and his cronies destroyed it.

So I am not sure we can count on them as "allies" anymore.

Yes it’s a bit rich to laugh at Trump for his trade/immigration/foreign policies when our own dear government has done something every bit as stupid and damaging.

US and U.K. are both currently headed for big humiliation.

I'd have responded "if it wasn't for the French, you lot would still be speaking English now"

That would probably have gone over their head completely.

You are totally ignoring the fact that for decades America perceived it to be in it's own interests to protect Europe from encroachment by Communist ideologue regimes.

America was on one side and the USSR was on the other side and US administrations poured money into military assets accordingly.

In addition, the Marshall Plan which rebuilt Europe after WW2 created a strong and prosperous Europe which was able to avidly consume American goods and services. Their investment in Europe yielded handsome returns for themselves.

I do agree that Europe became complacent and has under-invested in it's own security. However, if Trump wants the world to pay him back for NATO, then he owes the world half a trillion dollars for Iraq and Afghanistan.

I’ve been trying to avoid American companies- I don’t drive a Tesla but that company is suffering the effects of a boycott driven by Europeans. So I’m trying to do my bit- but avoiding the tech companies is hard. Any advice on a non American search engine? This exchange reinforces my view- these idiots want our money but have no respect for anyone who isn’t in their gang.

Or: it was really the Russians that won the war. 80% of the Wehrmacht died on the Eastern front.

We have all those financial and societal cons, plus energy dependence, food dependence and defence dependence. How's our welfare reform going as we're trying to grab back billions from welfare and education? I'd take France's knackered power stations and truly independent nuclear deterrent over our sweet fuck all any day.

Leave = 17,410,742/46,500,001 = 37%

So just over one in 3 Britons actually voted for Brexit. And those absent voters did matter when Brexiteers wondered why they were unable to get what they wanted.

@LauderSyme absolutely my view too . It’s been a mutually beneficial arrangement for decades that Trump has decided is now one sided- and it’s just easier for him to suck up to Putin as it won’t cost them zillions of dollars. I am flabbergasted at some perfectly intelligent women on here who decide that because he’s ’right Wing’. Everything is fine and dandy and anything he says is correct and ok - presumably they think it’s fine and dandy that he’s going around making threatening overtures towards Canada and Greenland too - perfectly democratic country’s that have made no indication of wishing to be taken over by the USA. Would they have thought everything was all fair game if Biden had been out there making such overtures - of course not - but that’s different because he’s a ‘liberal’ -

Same rules, same outcome.

The legitimacy of this government is exactly the same as the legitimacy of the previous one.

When we switch to PR, that statement may not be true.

The US was the only country to make a profit out of WW2.

I think in terms of defence spending tbh yes.

It shouldn't really be about whether he "likes" us, but you're not wrong - which is why I've often commented on those who expected to carry on holding one hand out for ££££, making V signs with the other and complaining about other people's diplomatic skills

We don't have to like the man (fortunately!!) but he was elected and somehow we have to get on with dealing with it ... not unlike the Brexit result, which many also didn't expect (and as a PP just mentioned they didn't bother to make a plan for that either)