Arguably it switched sides in November 2016… sure, it briefly tried to step back from the edge, but then in November 2024 it fully committed to jumping off.

Cancelling development programs for quite advanced programs like the E-7A and F/A-XX at the last mile just makes me think, maybe these guys really are playing for the other team. Not just with regards to Ukraine, but just broadly trying to sabotage the US and broader allied interests.

E-7A in particular seems like such a crucial system. We're going to be stuck using prehistoric mechanically steered radar (E-2D Hawkeye)? Until some hypothetical space based system can magically do the entire job? Defense today is about being able to out see the opponent, and the "leaders" are plunging us backwards into the dark in this fight.

Maybe we didn't actually buy the F/A-XX, but man, development costs were expected to be $75m remaining. We should have at least brought the design to buildable state! We probably should have build 3-8. To learn, to find out the merit and limits.

But we definitely need an airborne eyes & ears, and without E-7A, well, the war fighters that Pete so vociferously pumps up are going to be shooting in the dark.

As a kid in 1961 at the height of the Cold War I watched from outside the U.S.'s reaction to the Communists erecting the Berlin Wall and later in '62 the Cuban Missile Crisis—the confrontation between the U.S. and the Soviet Union that nearly lead to nuclear war. Over thirteen tension-filled days in October Americans and most of the World watched in horror fearful whether they would see out the next day.

For those of us who lived through those events they'll be forever etched on our minds, they weren't just news stories but were defining forces that created the then zeitgeist.

It's important for those who weren't around then to learn that that ethos permeated everything, even popular culture. Toni Fischer's 1962 song West of the Wall was a big hit in the West, in Australia where I am it was top of the Hit Parade for several weeks (there are many copies on YouTube and there's even a Wiki entry about it).

Thus, I never would have envisioned the U.S. nor its president would have shifted their political stance—even their allegiances—to such an extent during my lifetime. Frankly, it's hard to believe it's happened.

It's a most disconcerting revelation. What's truly alarming is that Donald Trump actually lived through those dangerous encounters with Russia/the Soviet Union, he was a 15/16-year-old teenager back then. Given that background, he has to be unfathomable to the average mind.

About the only thing I can say with any certainty is that most Australians believe that Trump has put the 80-year-old alliance between Australia and the U.S. in doubt, many of us now believe the U.S. is an unreliable ally. The Country can no longer be trusted.

If Trump hasn't yet openly torn down the long-term allegiance between Australia and the U.S. then he's done so in the minds of many Australians.

The damage has been done, it's questionable whether the relationship between the two countries can ever be restored to the strength it once was.

I believe switching sides in war, such as abandoning the interests of our NATO allies and those we have sworn to defend, is usually called Treason and those who do it are called Traitors.