As for Georgeia, their forces attacked Ocetia and Russian peacekeepers at first hand, and only after that Russians strikes back.

The Poles won’t invite the Bear back in and the last time the Russians fought the Poles by themselves they lost in 1920. If they try again I doubt they’ll obtain enough land to bury all their dead.

The sooner the US stands up to Putin the better.

Finland is a good example of why the Eastern Europeans want to be in NATO. Russia (and the Soviets) has always attacked their small weak neighbors. They thought the Fins would be easy (and were mistaken), they have invaded the Baltic States repeatedly over the centuries, they split Poland with Hitler (and never did give back the eastern half), the same with the Ukraine and Georgia.

They talked a lot of trash, but never took on NATO or the Chinese directly.

I separate Russian from Communist and do not equate the two. Communists included all ethic groups in the USSR, from Russians to Georgians to Jews and Ukrainians.

My point was during the Cold War they did not join nato or the warsaw pact and yet maintained a thriving democracy. Post Cold War they still have not joined Nato and still have a thriving democracy.

The Russians will huff and puff, and that’s it. They sent their best units into Georgia, and frankly, they suck. They are pissed because they know that Polish airspace is now closed to them. And those crappy Russian tanks are oh so easy to kill when they don’t have air superiority.

I am surprised that these side agreements have not been made an issue. Quite literally Poland’s demand for the agreement and Poland’s open disdain of NATO is very telling. I am certain that the Polish side agreements will be used a model for the other prospective “NATO” members.

Its becoming clear to me that unless Europe “read- Germany/Italy/France” significantly increase their defense budgets and become more involved militarily in world affairs – NATO will cease to be a viable military alliance.

As for an invasion of Poland being ruled out by Poland’s membership of NATO… do you really think most NATO members would want to risk nuclear war defending Poland? Personally I’m worried about Russia using salami tactics. Poland probably won’t be next but their turn may come.

Are you really going to base foreign policy around fear from Russian blackmail?

Bring Finland into NATO and you would see that situation deteriorate. Likewise, the nations around the western border of Russia could be democracies without joining NATO. They could be similar to Finland, Austria and Switzerland. It’s the NATO membership that is the issue. Alternatively they could have brought Russia into NATO.