With friends like these.. . .

From The American Thinker:

Like some overblown African dictatorship, the EU keeps confusing grandiose ego projects with sensible expenditures on defense; as a result of which Europe and Britain look increasingly vulnerable and defenseless. On the day after Milton Friedman’s passing it is a reminder of the bizarre and self-destructive nature of politicized decision-making—- because that’s the trouble, of course: Everything in the EU is political, and all large military projects are pork-barreled to ensure that enough bacon fat goes to France, Italy, Germany and Britain itself. It works about as well as nationalized health care.

Britain’s MOD spent almost twice as much money for a German anti-artillery radar than a US version would have cost. More than five hundred million dollars were wasted on a failed effort to produce European anti-tank missiles, which then had to be purchased from the US anyway. An armored vehicle had to be dumped after spending about 75 million dollars because it was too big to go into Hercules transport planes.

The Defense Ministry has ordered 232 Eurofighters at more than 90 million dollars each for “an acknowledged Cold War relic.” The Eurofighter can’t perform ground support or other bombing missions, but the terrorists don’t have fighter jets to knock out.

[snip]

All this would be funny if it weren’t tragic. British troops in Afghanistan do not have proper IED-car bomb protection. In Basra, the Brits have now taken a shrinking defensive role. One reason why the Europeans loudly proclaim their “pacifist values” is because the same story is repeated over and over again; pacifism in the face if Iranian nukes and Al Qaida bombs is the only option if you don’t have a functioning military. France has 359,000 military personnel, but it can’t keep Islamist “youth” from rioting and burning cars every day of the year.

A cynic might suspect that Europe keeps floundering on military matters because they want to postpone the day when they might have to handle their own defenses. Uncle Sam is so useful – he pays for Europe’s protection, gives it a nuclear umbrella, keeps Europe’s oil free of interference, and is willing to let his soldiers spill their blood—- all for the sake of 450 million welfare clients who are living it up, thousands of miles from American shores. And then he can be despised as a warmonger.

What a marvelous deal! Why would Europeans defend themselves when the United States is willing to carry the load?

Exactly! Why should Europe divert money from its bloated welfare bureaucracy for defense when the US is willing to do it for them?

The most tempting, no the most JUST response from America would be to withdraw from NATO and bring our troops home. However that is the one thing we can't do. Without America to protect them Europe would not "rise the occasion". What they would do is move completely into the Islamic orbit. We have to keep guaranteeing their protection for at least long enough to groom some new allies.

My suggestion for who these new allies should be are Eastern Europe, Japan and Ireland. Here are my reasons.

Eastern Europe. This part of the world has spend the last 50 years being ground down under the USSR. Now they are free and they still retain in their living memory the concrete fact that the bromides of the political left are damnable lies. The very fact that their economies have been raped and ruined by communism means that they have no place to go but up. Remember Japan after WWII. Their industries were in ruins and they rebuilt using the newest and best technology and produced a miracle of industrial power and efficiency. Eastern Europe could do the same with American help. Nations which are largely free of Muslim immigrants whose people hate the political left with every fiber of their beings and who are poised to become the world's next economic powerhouse will be very useful allies in the coming struggle to eradicate global Islam.

Ireland. This nation is already head and shoulders above the rest of Europe in terms of its economic climate. They have embraced the idea of low taxes and minimal regulation and are reaping the rewards as they become the "Hong Kong of Europe" attracting corporations from all over the continent. The fact that they have kept themselves free, for the most part, of Muslim immigrants means that they do not face the internal pressures to capitulate to the Islamic onslaught that other European nations must deal with.

Japan. One of the most racially and culturally homogeneous nations on the planet Japan faces no internal threat from Islam. However as a nation whose economy is totally dependant on imported petroleum they are highly vulnerable to economic blackmail from the Middle East. They know this and are eager to find a way out. They are also directly threatened by North Korea's insane dictator and his nuclear aspirations and they are fully aware that Kim is in bed with the Islamofascists. The old saying about the "enemy of my enemy" comes into play. Indications are that Japan is willing to step up and begin to play its part by increasing its military spending and abandoning its post WWII reluctance to engage in foreign military operations. We should encourage this.

While America might well be able to go it alone in the brave new world of the 21st Century it will be much easier with allies to share the load. While we should not abandon efforts to save "Old Europe" we should steel ourselves to the fact that it is almost certainly too late. The three new allies I have identified here, along with India (a nation which is locked in its own death struggle with Islamism) are a good place to start in building a new "confederation of free nations" to fight the coming war.

Of course all of that depends on defeating the political left here at home. If we cannot win that struggle no other will be possible.