1. America is going to loose Europe as a strategic and economic partner regardless. Europe is dying demographically. Have you looked at the demographic pyramid chart of Europe lately?

Germany, Greece, Italy, Spain, non Muslim France, Holland, Belgium---all are in demographic death spiral. Economically, the current moment is as good as Europe gets from here on out. It is all down hill from here.

Their demographics are beyond the point of recovery. If every breeding age female in Europe marched out from this moment and had five children back to back, the population would still continue it's decline. Europe is already lost to America. It is just a matter of how we go about it, and when.

1. You need to look at Russia's current order of battle, and the operational units. Their defense modernization will not really take hold until the middle of the next decade, and given the crash in oil prices it is highly dubious if they will be able to complete it now.

Once again you need to consult the demographics. Russia's military age population has a precipitous drop of 50% starting three years from now. These are the children of the collapse of the Soviet Union, and their health is also much more degraded than the youth up till now. In five years Russia is not going to have the manpower to engage in military action of any kind.

It is highly doubtful that Russia could conquer Ukraine, much less pacify a population that had been armed, and you can forget them ever resuming control of an armed Poland. Poland is demographically sound, has loads of manpower, and manpower in the right age range.

1. I think Europe's continued exploitation of America is cynical, as is it's free loading on American security arrangements. They count on us to maintain the 500 billion a year cost of keeping the sea lanes open, and maintaining their access to markets and resources, and then they undermine every move we make in the world.

If America decoupled from Europe, and pursued a a Blue Water Strategy with a focus on the Pacific, we would not need the European bases. They have already disarmed unilaterally in fact, and we don't need their bases if we are not going to be defending them anymore.

As to arming and giving the Ukraine and Poland the means to defend themselves from Russia if they wish, I see nothing cynical in that. If they want to submit, no problem. If they wish to stand for their freedom, why shouldn't we give them the arms to do so?