Do Republicans not think of mutually-assured destruction?

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Well one, we can do what we want NATO is very antiquated, it is the very definition of entangled alliances that our founders wanted us to avoid. Trump wants to negotiate a better deal and the only way you can get a better deal is with the real threat of walking away from the current one. There is nothing selective about it, there is a very big difference between the defense of say the UK/France/western Europe and Estonia/Bosnia. NATO was created to protect western Europe from being overrun by the Soviets after WWII, the Soviet Union no long exists so what purpose does this alliance have? Why are pushing further and further east to Russia's borders?

We still need the alliance.

Of course, we must negotiate with them, and improve our position there.

There is potential for Putin to revive the Cold War. At the very least, if provoked, he can begin to employ the rhetoric-threat of reviving the Cold War.

The USSR might be dead, and has been dead for 25 years; but there is desire in some circles for it to be revived in some way.

How does the US need NATO? How do we benefit? We spend like 75% of the expenditures even tho the other 28 members of the alliance have a combined GDP surpassing that of the United States. If the US were to leave NATO then nothing would change for us. Those that need America and have freeloaded off us for far to long need to pay up or be prepared to go their own way, we cannot afford this any longer.

There are far more Cold Warriors in the US that wish to return to the days of brinkmanship and obscene military expenditures, the military industrial complex is a very real thing as well as these ideologue extremists like the neoconservatives and their 'progressive' counterparts. If you want peace with Russia then Trump is the only choice and maybe this may be the only time we'll ever be able to make this choice in our lifetimes.

I certainly hope we do not return to the Cold War.

I certainly wouldn't benefit from it.

It's true: there are people who would be served by a revival of the Cold War.

We still need to be a member of a European Alliance. Without it, we'd be isolated. Isolated, we might do worse things than we do now; there would be nobody to police us.

The Cold War is over, but that hardly means NATO is antiquated. Rather, it needs to evolve with the times as a defensive organization against threats to western civilization, whether those threats come from Islamic terrorism, or from Putin's attempted schemes to retake lost Soviet Republics, as well as Satellite states.

Evolve how? What demands will Hillary make? I don't see anything realistically changing. The US should not be bound to the mutual defense of a)countries that would not do the same for us and b)those with imperialistic ambitions of their own. Turkey should not be part of NATO, straight up. Tiny anti-Russian former Warsaw Pact countries should not be part of NATO. NATO should not choose sides in the Balkans as it has, we should not be tied down to defending one of the more volatile places on the planet. Very antiquated, Europe is rich now not some bombed out wreckage like it was after WWII. They need to carry their own weight, we can't afford it any longer. No more enlargement, no more entangling alliances.

Evolve by setting a new agenda for NATO's continued existence.
And the reason why we chose sides in the Balkans was because the Serbs were proving themselves to be rabid, Slavophile nationalists who were bent on ethnic cleansing of their neighbors.

They all were, there was a lot of tit for tat in the Balkans. We allied with the people that we did because the Serbs were Orthodox and naturally allied with the Russians during a time that Russia was in a state of economic collapse. Our support of an independent Kosovo has set the precedent for self-determination of peoples, something we can't seem too accept when it's our own countries or goes against our self interests as it did in Crimea and eastern Ukraine.

What new agenda do you want? You speak in empty platitudes, what do you think should be done so the member countries of NATO pull their weight?



Either they up their defense budgets, pay a tribute, or go their own way. Anything else is the supporting for freeloaders, it has to end. The US military should not be stretched so thin, it should actually focus on matters of defense instead maintaining global hegemony.

Siding with people out of religious affiliation, despite horrible actions on their part, is a pretty lame reason. I'm a Lutheran, but I would hardly side with Nazi Germany because Lutheranism is the religion of the majority of Germany's people.
And while atrocities were committed by combatants from all the Balkan tribes, the Serbs exceeded them all.

This is a security advisor who previously was described as 'extreme' (which just indicates how much more extreme the nominee is)

John Noonan is a neoconservative Bush supporter, they 100% are extremists. Noonan no doubt probably supports Hillary.

Trump is the peace candidate, that's why these hawks are freaking out

So, Trump's cult has not only 1984 as a guidebook (peace? Only if excrement is the most nutritious snack on the planet... seriously), but supposed amnesia too (or, let's admit it, utter hypocrisy)... might I remind you that Bush was from the same party.

ps. I try not to judge a person by their superficial affiliations but their current narrative, it's an interesting exercise usually, really.