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| ▲ | lovich 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | If you’re referring to Ukraine as one of the two, we already heavily reduced our support under Trump and there is no chance in hell that removing the leftover support causes Ukraine to capitulate by tomorrows, especially after recent territory gains and destruction of Russian logistical supply lines with Wildberries and their refinery infrastructure. Also if the other is Iran, lol at “stopped supporting respective belligerents” as if the US itself was not one of the major belligerents. | | |
| ▲ | paimapi 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | I think the other example is Israel which seems like the much more obviously belligerent, actively colonial nation state that the US is largely propping up (and wouldn't exist otherwise) also, arguably, the half-century of creating, establishing, funding, and build-up of NATO largely supersedes the point that Trump cut spending there temporarily. that all came from American coffers and the current conflict there is a long hangover from that | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross an hour ago | parent | next [-] | | > colonial nation state that the US is largely propping up (and wouldn't exist otherwise) This is a baseless, American-centric notion I've heard frequently in New York and San Francisco. If America pulled support from Israel, it would find partners in other countries. India and China are at the top of the list–they want Israeli weapons technology and intelligence. Russia would probably play too. And depending on the kind of mess we leave Iran in, some Gulf countries may also find a way to come to a nuclear technology transfer deal with Tel Aviv. | | |
| ▲ | paimapi 42 minutes ago | parent | next [-] | | oh? I didn't know China and Russia had such solid relationships with Israel. my understanding was that Israel has been repeatedly condemned by both and last I heard, the free-trade agreement with them has been stalled for years. but what do I know? | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 38 minutes ago | parent [-] | | > my understanding was that Israel has been repeatedly condemned by both and last I heard, the free-trade agreement with them has been stalled for years. but what do I know? India-Israel trade has been growing since diplomatic relations between the nations were established in 1992 (including since the war in Gaza) [1]. In 2025 they signed a bilateral investment agreement. And Israel is a growing defence provider to India. I know less about the China relationship, but it remains a major trading partner with Isrel [2]. (I do not believe there are significant military relations. China has recently been calling what Israel is doing in Gaza a genocide, and I'll note they started doing this a year ago, before Trump bungled into Iran, though for obvious reasons Beijing isn't dwelling on the question.) Russia is currently embedded with Iran, but nothing about that is geostrategic. Israel and the USSR once had close relations. Putin needs weapons for Ukraine. An Israel searching desperately for partners would be useful to Moscow. Note, too, that both China and India have governments in power that explicitly reject the rights of their domestic Muslim populations. [1] https://www.indembassyisrael.gov.in/pages?id=nel5a&subid=7ax... [2] https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/5/22/which-countries-tra... | | |
| ▲ | paimapi 14 minutes ago | parent [-] | | Israel sanctioned BYD and China sanctioned Israeli cybersec firms back recently to my knowledge. The average Chinese citizen also is much more willing to call it a genocide and if there's one thing the Politburo knows to do, it's not to unnecessarily foment unrest by collusion I don't personally think it's likely relations would improve on this and I consider myself much better read on the goings-on of the PRC than most For the other nation states you discussed, I'm far from an expert on them so you very well might be right. But I doubt it'll be straightforward if the US were to cease aid. I also seriously doubt Israel would be so aggressively expansionist without the 300 billion or so they've received from the US. An un-invaded Iraq in combination with Iran would have put its existence at major jeopardy | | |
| ▲ | JumpCrisscross 9 minutes ago | parent [-] | | > Israel sanctioned BYD and China sanctioned Israeli cybersec firms back recently to my knowledge Yup. China is also shipping arms precursors (and very likely intelligence) to Iran. China and Israel aren't friends. But Israel pivoting from the U.S. absolutely brings it back to the table. China isn't, like, sanctioning Israeli firms in general, or even Israeli firms in the West Bank. > doubt it'll be straightforward or that Israel would be so aggressively expansionist without the 300 billion or so they've received from the US My personal hypothesis is the aid turned Israel into a monster. Removing the aid, however, won't change that. It just means more broad-based munitions. Israel and Gaza have natural gas. The world has shown it will tolerate a lot of nonsense from an energy supplier, particularly a nuclear-armed one. |
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| ▲ | lovich 42 minutes ago | parent | prev [-] | | I don’t know why so many people take it as a given that Israel only exists because of America. They used to be aligned with the USSR and we did a lot of work to peel them off into our own domain. They also have their own military industrial complex and are perfectly capable of manufacturing the weapons they need domestically. They also have nukes. | | |
| ▲ | paimapi 41 minutes ago | parent [-] | | it probably has something to do with the fact that a full 2% of their GDP comes from US military aid alone: https://www.cfr.org/articles/us-aid-israel-four-charts | | |
| ▲ | lovich 37 minutes ago | parent [-] | | And they can redirect resources to the war if we removed it. If anything, removal of our support probably leads to the use of dumber less targeted weapons like carpet bombing or good ole white phosphorus that they’ve already demonstrated use of in past conflicts. If we were giving them 30+% of their gdp then yea, dropping that probably stops the conflict. 2% is just a budget reshuffle. | | |
| ▲ | paimapi 19 minutes ago | parent [-] | | you should look up how much the 2008 financial crisis shrank the US GDP. 2% of an entire nation state's GDP especially with aid concentrated in gov\mil sectors of which a huge part of Israel's private sector is dependent on for grants is not a 'budget reshuffle' |
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| ▲ | lovich 39 minutes ago | parent | prev [-] | | Israel vs Palestine is not a major conflict, especially given the one sided nature of the fight. Israel + US vs Iran is a majorish conflict but the US is directly a belligerent in that one. > also, arguably, the half-century of creating, establishing, funding, and build-up of NATO largely supersedes the point that Trump cut spending there temporarily. that all came from American coffers and the current conflict there is a long hangover from that Glossing over the Russian propaganda points accusing a defensive pact as a reason for starting a war, that still means that the conflict “ could be over tomorrow” is incorrect even if the US ended all support today. |
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| ▲ | pphysch an hour ago | parent | prev [-] | | The USA is heavily supporting Ukraine with intelligence sharing, private financial support, StarLink, and """indirectly""" providing arms through European middlemen. The latter was Trump's innovation so that he can pretend he is upholding some foreign policy campaign promise without materially changing anything. |
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