Especially when co-president Musk is tweeting that the F-35 is a dud and the US should leave NATO.
That's a double whammy for European countries who signed on to spend hundreds of billions on these planes in the belief that they're part of a NATO security umbrella. Now it seems like NATO will soon be in shambles and the planes might not even fly if that one drunk frat guy with Nazi tattoos running the Pentagon says so.
Finland bought F-35's recently, and the Finnish government is saying that nothing should change because America will hopefully be back to normal before the fighters are delivered. I don't think that kind of ostrich strategy is going to pay off.
Finland can't afford that kind of thing. It's a bit unique because it has a large and well-trained army (by European standards) but a smallish defense budget.
The Finnish military basically runs on the collective trauma of the last Russian invasion. There's a general conscription for male citizens, and reserve forces receive regular refresh training to keep their skills active. But you can't transform that kind of spirit into fighter planes.
That's a double whammy for European countries who signed on to spend hundreds of billions on these planes in the belief that they're part of a NATO security umbrella. Now it seems like NATO will soon be in shambles and the planes might not even fly if that one drunk frat guy with Nazi tattoos running the Pentagon says so.
Finland bought F-35's recently, and the Finnish government is saying that nothing should change because America will hopefully be back to normal before the fighters are delivered. I don't think that kind of ostrich strategy is going to pay off.