Originally Posted by
racedo
NATO's purpose ended at the end of the Cold War.
However there were and still are many people who have enjoyed the personal benefits that come with being a member of NATO. Those who enjoy them are against giving them up because in truth it would devalue their vaulted status they believe they have.
Since the Cold War ended, there have been attempt after attempt to reivent NATO, to use whatever justification they can. Otherwise it becomes the "Emperors New Clothes" with nothing of substance behind it.
Anything Russia does within its own borders is trumpeted up as being a threat to a member of NATO yet any action by a NATO member is overlooked.
The real danger is that the continued poking of the bear elicits a response, NATO will parrot as a justification for conflict and a "I told you so", all very fine until buckets of sunshine start.
USSR lost 1 in 7 of its population during WW2, UK lost 451,000 or less than 1% and had it suffered at same rate then 6.3 Million more UK citizens would have died, US lost 419,000 or 0.3%, if suffered the same casualties US would have lost 18 Million citizens. No amount of spinning will make the figures different.
Nobody seems to be able to answer about WTF would the Russians do with the Baltic states or other places if they invaded, there is not exactly a requirement for additional land.
War is ultimately about economic theft, west however with US Federal Debt 25% bigger than economy and individual State debt adding couple of trillion $$ onto this then ultimately something has to give. It is only a matter of time before the Debt burden does to the US what it did to the USSR in late 1980's. Issue then becomes "What Then ?"
On the subject of war losses of population, it's true the figures are staggering but if we had lost those sort of numbers I doubt there would have been anymore taste for the war. Our politicians are answerable to us. Stalin was perhaps only answerable to his immediate colleagues if that. I get the impression he simply did not care about numbers lost.
So the real question on population losses is 'are these WW2 losses really part of the thinking of today's Russian people or more importantly today's Russian politicians?'. I suspect they are just our way of trying to look at their perspective.