Quote Originally Posted by Entropy View Post
Wasn't a threat to whom? Maybe not Germany, but it's hard to argue that a civil war in the Balkans wasn't a threat to Italy and bordering nations. Could Europe simply ignore what what's happening on their doorstep, or even in the foyer?
Slovenia had almost no civil war symptoms, we didn't intervene in Croatia - Bosnia and Kosovo can hardly be counted as neighbours.
The Greeks were not exactly favourable of the Kosovo intervention, so it was apparently not in their interest.

Yugoslavia could have burned down to the last man and the European NATO would not have been affected substantially. No-one from there was about to invade us, ever.

Well, save for the Kosovo-Albanian organised criminals who poured into our countries together with legitimate refugees. We only got them under control when we reduced the police pressure on domestic organised criminals who had better manners.


The reasons more fighters weren't deployed to southern Italy had to do with airbase capabilities. The bulk of tacair went to Aviano for a reason.
Utter complacency.
There were enough roads and enough civilian airports in Sicily. Close that ####, use it for the military. That's MUCH less stupid than to pay billions for additional mid-air refuelling aircraft "just in case".


Regardless, European military leaders recognize there are significant gaps in European capabilities that make it very difficult for them to conduct operations like Libya and Bosnia/Kosovo. It's not just a question of "doing something together."
Yes, European politicians want more toys to play with in stupid adventure games. That's not indicative of our security needs, of course!


What's at question is Europe's capability to utilize military force in Europe's near-abroad to defend Europe's interests and there European capability is lacking.
The total, utter 10000%, obvious, proven cost-inefficiency of such stupid political adventures means that this 'incapability' is EXACTLY as it should be. 'capability' is in this regard = stupidity.