40.000 is what is currently part of the reaction force - not the total force strength.
Active service/Reserve forces of the nations with direct borders to either Belarus or Russia:
Norway: 33.000/60.000
Finnland: 18.000/ 180.000-280.000 (And we all know how this turned out the last time)/18.000
Lithuania: 23.000/104.000
Estonia: 7.700/80.000(but almost half in rapid response readiness)
Latvia: 17.000/38.000
Poland: 216.000/670.000
That does not include the countries that are currently heavily investing in the Baltics.
Germany plans to have 4.000 soldiers stationed there permanently with 30.000 active personal rotating in and out.
Canada has also a brigade stationed there, the UK does the same and hosts the command in the UK.
If you count the other Baltic sea nations that mostly have a very high interest in keeping the Russiand at bay you also have Sweden (24.000+22.000 Homeguard/32.000), Denmark (16.000/12.000+51.000 HomeGuard) and Germany (180.000/930.000) you have even higher numbers.
These are roughly twice as many soldiers as Putin currently can access at the moment - and he is heavily based on conscripts and semi general mobilization which is not part of the equations for most countries here, neither are other key players (e.g. UK 135.000/32.000), France (270.000/63.000), Spain(133.000/264.000), Italy (165.000/35.000), Romania (81.000/55.000) and the smaller but often highly motivated nations, e.g. the Czech Republic (34.000/4000).
Even though there are some countries who’s motivation may be shaky (Italy, to some extend Germany and some smaller players like Hungary) Europe very likely would be united against a common cause in a situation like that. The most interesting point would be how Erdogan in Türkiye would respond - he has one of the largest armies on this side of the pond (481.000/380.000) and there are quite a lot of people who believe that Erdogan would actually stick with “European NATO” in this case simply he would be too afraid that Putin could either reconsider his “future” border (post Georgia invasion which is far more likely) with Türkiye or simply because he would be afraid of his old military guard.
Would that guarantee victory against a joint Putin-Trump full on attack against Europe? No. Not at all. All sides would loose. Terribly.
In total soldier numbers Europe does actually surpass both the current Russian and all US armed forces combined (narrowly). Of course the US have a huge material advantage,but this is partially based on logistics from Europe (and often stored here). All this facilities would be lost then and Russia would be unable to easily supply similar logistical capacities - they simply don’t have them and transport via eastern polar routes(as the western routes are within Norwegian and Finnish reach) or the eastern ports of Russia is bothersome.
While the US navy is mighty,it would be operating very far from home - further away than it has operated from any allied base ever and in very very hostile waters. (Actually the British navy is the last modern navy to have operated that far away from an allied base during a combat mission)
So the US would be limited to high flying stealth bombers (don’t do that much damage and can absolutely be detected by modern western radar), stuff they drag all the way through Russia, whatever they can ferry through the pond which would be infested by various submarines that, while mainly non nuclear, are still a major treat to their navy (ask the Swedes).It would certainly not be enough for a D-Day like operation.
So the other option is:
Well… intercontinental ballistic missiles.
While I am absolutely sure that the fascist orange wouldn’t hesitate a minute to use this option if someone tells him it makes his golf course worth more as all of Scotland’s course are now burned to crisps it would also mean that Putin and Trump himself would be fucked. Because the very next minute he presses the button someone else will press a button - either in London or Paris. France is already offering to place nuclear capabilities in eastern and central Europe for this very reason. In the end Washington would be nuked the same way Moscow, London, Paris and Berlin would be.
And while the Orange acts irrational his buddy Putler does not - the mediocre KGB officer understands what happens to him if his puppet in Washington overreacts.
The NATO wargamed expectation for the Baltic’s is that Russia invades very quickly ( faster than the planned ukraine 3 day operation as they’re smaller), overthrowing the government before NATO can react in the expectation that NATO would struggle to invade a deafeated nation, and so fragmenting the alliance.
If this sounds insanely risky, well Putin never did it. But as a plan it’s not too bad.
I think you know better than me the state of Europe’s readiness to counter this, they are extremely aware of the possibility.
The other point is that for Ukraine support this isn’t just a generic issue with size of military in the abstract, Europe as a whole does not have enough factories producing specifically artillery shells to support the artillery dominated land war in Ukraine.
Ramping those up would take time, so even if Europe tries to help the forms it can take will differ to the USA and force different (worse? I can’t judge) choices on the ground.
The NATO strategy reacted by placing the ARF there + placing some Polish high readiness forces there.
Artillery shell production is an issue,but has been massively expanded during the last year, so has been the production of other ammo- the issue with Ukraine is more the fact that they do not use NATO standards and that there are a multitude of systems in use.
But art. ammo also is an issue for the Russian armed forces,so at least in that direction it basically equals out.
40.000 is what is currently part of the reaction force - not the total force strength.
Active service/Reserve forces of the nations with direct borders to either Belarus or Russia:
Norway: 33.000/60.000
Finnland: 18.000/ 180.000-280.000 (And we all know how this turned out the last time)/18.000
Lithuania: 23.000/104.000
Estonia: 7.700/80.000(but almost half in rapid response readiness)
Latvia: 17.000/38.000
Poland: 216.000/670.000
That does not include the countries that are currently heavily investing in the Baltics. Germany plans to have 4.000 soldiers stationed there permanently with 30.000 active personal rotating in and out. Canada has also a brigade stationed there, the UK does the same and hosts the command in the UK.
If you count the other Baltic sea nations that mostly have a very high interest in keeping the Russiand at bay you also have Sweden (24.000+22.000 Homeguard/32.000), Denmark (16.000/12.000+51.000 HomeGuard) and Germany (180.000/930.000) you have even higher numbers.
These are roughly twice as many soldiers as Putin currently can access at the moment - and he is heavily based on conscripts and semi general mobilization which is not part of the equations for most countries here, neither are other key players (e.g. UK 135.000/32.000), France (270.000/63.000), Spain(133.000/264.000), Italy (165.000/35.000), Romania (81.000/55.000) and the smaller but often highly motivated nations, e.g. the Czech Republic (34.000/4000). Even though there are some countries who’s motivation may be shaky (Italy, to some extend Germany and some smaller players like Hungary) Europe very likely would be united against a common cause in a situation like that. The most interesting point would be how Erdogan in Türkiye would respond - he has one of the largest armies on this side of the pond (481.000/380.000) and there are quite a lot of people who believe that Erdogan would actually stick with “European NATO” in this case simply he would be too afraid that Putin could either reconsider his “future” border (post Georgia invasion which is far more likely) with Türkiye or simply because he would be afraid of his old military guard.
Would that guarantee victory against a joint Putin-Trump full on attack against Europe? No. Not at all. All sides would loose. Terribly.
In total soldier numbers Europe does actually surpass both the current Russian and all US armed forces combined (narrowly). Of course the US have a huge material advantage,but this is partially based on logistics from Europe (and often stored here). All this facilities would be lost then and Russia would be unable to easily supply similar logistical capacities - they simply don’t have them and transport via eastern polar routes(as the western routes are within Norwegian and Finnish reach) or the eastern ports of Russia is bothersome.
While the US navy is mighty,it would be operating very far from home - further away than it has operated from any allied base ever and in very very hostile waters. (Actually the British navy is the last modern navy to have operated that far away from an allied base during a combat mission) So the US would be limited to high flying stealth bombers (don’t do that much damage and can absolutely be detected by modern western radar), stuff they drag all the way through Russia, whatever they can ferry through the pond which would be infested by various submarines that, while mainly non nuclear, are still a major treat to their navy (ask the Swedes).It would certainly not be enough for a D-Day like operation.
So the other option is: Well… intercontinental ballistic missiles. While I am absolutely sure that the fascist orange wouldn’t hesitate a minute to use this option if someone tells him it makes his golf course worth more as all of Scotland’s course are now burned to crisps it would also mean that Putin and Trump himself would be fucked. Because the very next minute he presses the button someone else will press a button - either in London or Paris. France is already offering to place nuclear capabilities in eastern and central Europe for this very reason. In the end Washington would be nuked the same way Moscow, London, Paris and Berlin would be. And while the Orange acts irrational his buddy Putler does not - the mediocre KGB officer understands what happens to him if his puppet in Washington overreacts.
The NATO wargamed expectation for the Baltic’s is that Russia invades very quickly ( faster than the planned ukraine 3 day operation as they’re smaller), overthrowing the government before NATO can react in the expectation that NATO would struggle to invade a deafeated nation, and so fragmenting the alliance.
If this sounds insanely risky, well Putin never did it. But as a plan it’s not too bad. I think you know better than me the state of Europe’s readiness to counter this, they are extremely aware of the possibility.
The other point is that for Ukraine support this isn’t just a generic issue with size of military in the abstract, Europe as a whole does not have enough factories producing specifically artillery shells to support the artillery dominated land war in Ukraine. Ramping those up would take time, so even if Europe tries to help the forms it can take will differ to the USA and force different (worse? I can’t judge) choices on the ground.
The NATO strategy reacted by placing the ARF there + placing some Polish high readiness forces there. Artillery shell production is an issue,but has been massively expanded during the last year, so has been the production of other ammo- the issue with Ukraine is more the fact that they do not use NATO standards and that there are a multitude of systems in use.
But art. ammo also is an issue for the Russian armed forces,so at least in that direction it basically equals out.