> What happens to Europe with an expansionist Russia and no US security guarantee?
While European military strength isn't in its prime right now, their capabilities without the US are often way underestimated. Not that most of the other issues aren't applicable - everyone appears to be more or less fucked in multiple ways - but losing a conventional war to Russia isn't on the table, barring unthinkable mismanagement or a world-changing event (preemptive use of nukes, etc). Russia has stalemated a war against a singular country that has a fraction of Russia's wealth, loads of antiquated equipment and a small sample of Western tech. The Russian economy has a massive hole in it largely thanks to said war, and is only propped up by existing savings - they're not in danger right now, they're rapidly approaching that point with no way of stopping. Even if the war never happened, they'd still be far weaker than the whole of Europe and likely some individual European countries.
While European military strength isn't in its prime right now, their capabilities without the US are often way underestimated. Not that most of the other issues aren't applicable - everyone appears to be more or less fucked in multiple ways - but losing a conventional war to Russia isn't on the table, barring unthinkable mismanagement or a world-changing event (preemptive use of nukes, etc). Russia has stalemated a war against a singular country that has a fraction of Russia's wealth, loads of antiquated equipment and a small sample of Western tech. The Russian economy has a massive hole in it largely thanks to said war, and is only propped up by existing savings - they're not in danger right now, they're rapidly approaching that point with no way of stopping. Even if the war never happened, they'd still be far weaker than the whole of Europe and likely some individual European countries.