NIB

So you are supposed to experience a life of misery, so that others around you wont have to suffer momentarily(mostly after your death)? That doesnt sound like a good argument.

You dont need the F-35 just for the russian planes, you need it for the russian ground to air missiles and radars(and targets that those things might protect). While you can suppress enemy air defences with non stealthy aircraft, that is much riskier and much more limited in scope. Which is why Russia isnt using its massive airforce in a way that is expected(by western standards). Even Ukraine's very limited anti-air capability has shut down the ukranian airspace to russian aircraft.

A stealth aircraft allows you to penetrate much deeper into enemy airspace and/or in a safer manner. It unlocks a completely different mission capability.

This is also useful against airplanes. Imagine if european planes have a radar with 120km range and a missile with 60km range. The equivalent russian planes have a 100km range radar and a 50km range missile. So while the european planes have the advantage, this advantage is anything mindblowing.

Now imagine a european stealth aircraft, with the same missile and radar but because it is stealth, it can only be detected within 20km of a russian aircraft. That means that the stealth plane can go in, shoot a missile and get out before the russian plane even detects it. The advantage is immense and allows the stealth aircraft to be orders of magnitude more effective.

There is a reason why everyone, including China, is spending billions to make stealth airplanes. The only reason people think stealth is irrelevant is because of russian propaganda, because Russia is too poor to produce stealth airplanes. The thing is, designing AND producing a stealth airplane is very expensive. There are a few european designs but those things wont be coming out for another 10+ years at the earliest(or in 20 years if we want to be realistic). In the meantime, Europe decided to use the f-35, which is a very capable and cheap aircraft(actually cheaper than rafale, etc).

It doesnt help that we have 2 different 6th generation airplane designs in Europe. It's a clusterfuck. Maybe Trump will help Europe get its shit together.

Literally 1984

Partially but the big advantage of being in a big alliance, is sharing stuff. That is the most effective way of progressing.

Take microchips for example. Taiwan is making them, with european machines and the european machines use american technology. Taiwan is able to create cutting edge microchips because they are allied and dependent on their allies. Similarly, a lot of russian technology has its roots in the soviet era, when russians had access to scientists/technology from all over eastern Europe.

Apes together strong. Thats the strength of alliances. But if you have a bad faith ape, that ape can destroy the effort of all other apes. Thats the weakness of alliances. For strategically important things(jet planes), you might be willing to take an efficiency hit, by creating things independently for security reasons. Which is why the french have rafale.

But keep making cutting edge things in order to maintain and improve your defence industry capabilities is very expensive. Thats why Canada doesnt have a jet plane industry, even though they used to have a very capable fighter jet industry. Or you could be like Russia, where you can design new planes but dont have the money to produce them, so you are basically spending a lot of money, creating one off planes.

This meme is from a different game but similar

Because none of them have the capabilities of the F-35. And they are even more expensive than the F-35.

Do you think european nations dont have any tanks?

Close enough. Especially if you add Norway, Switzerland and the UK.

Population means very little when we have to fight tanks, boats, planes and missiles.

Those things cant automatically teleport to european soil. Aircraft carriers can only do so much and they also cant teleport. Numbers are still relevant, especially when backed by existing european military. Morale is also relevant.

Europe is a giant place, with shitload of people, that have a strong desire to defend against invaders. Look what happened to Vietnam or Ukraine. As long as you have a large enough group of people, with decent equipment and morale, you can do great things.

The EU has 500+ million population. Do you you think that the few thousands of american troops in Europe can fight against that? Even if the EU had no military, it would be an impossible fight. And the EU has a lot of military, vastly outnumbering american military stationed in Europe.

Mike Pence might be a religious zealot who wants to ban abortions, etc but he is still an american patriot. There is no way you can be pro US and supporting what Trump is doing. Trump is destroying alliances, good will and all the soft power the US had accumulated in over 100 years.

Soft power was the real american super power. China might have had industrial might, might have gotten equivalent military strength eventually but China didnt have much soft power. Thats why China launched the Belt and Road initiative, 10 years ago. This is a multi-trillion dollar program, that invests on infrastructure to make it easier for China to trade with the rest of the world(and to cultivate positive attitudes towards China).

With the destruction of american soft power, Trump opened a huge door for China. There is a non zero chance of Europe pivoting towards China, similarly to how China pivoted towards the US(and away from USSR) in the 1970s. If China can offer a more "reasonable" peace plan for Ukraine, it can get the EU to be more neutral towards China in exchange, maybe even staying out of future Taiwan conflict.

Ukraine can survive without american support. Russia has the GDP of Spain. The EU has the resources to help Ukraine, we just need

1. Political will
2. Ability to produce(or procure) stuff for Ukraine

For the last 100 years, everyone was dependent on each other, since we were all allied, it made less sense for every country to reinvent the wheel. Now the EU will need to create new production capabilities and that takes time and money. This will have a noticeable negative effect to the quality of life of europeans so the europeans will need to be willing to deal with that.

South Korea has a strong defence industry that can help cover the gap, especially if things are chill in SouthEast Asia.

If the EU can guarantee the safety of Greece(maybe with the creation of an EU army or through stronger defence treaties), Greece has a lot of military equipment that could potentially be sent to Ukraine, especially if Turkey is cool. Greece for example has more Leopard 2 tanks than any other country(including Germany).

I think if the EU sends troops to Ukraine, the EU will need to completely commit to that. The war in Ukraine is rough and very different than any other war, especially the wars western forces have fought in the last 50 years. So you cant half ass it and send a couple thousand soldiers to die there, you need to commit with proper air support, etc. This escalation needs to be managed carefully.

The EU needs to start pumping nukes and developing its missile program. Without the american nuclear shield, the EU needs its own. There is a reason that China is pumping nukes like crazy, because they are way behind the americans and russians. MAD is the only way to de-escalate and prevent a nuclear war.

Most of the aforementioned cost is these nukes/missile and building capabilities(stealth planes) programs. Helping Ukraine is cheap.