Marco Setaccioli challenged Marco Travaglio's calculations on European and Russian military spending, stating that Travaglio had indicated 450 billion euros for Europe and 150 for Russia and had argued that Russia had reason to fear Europe, which had invaded it four times in the last 200 years. According to Setaccioli, in the current year Russia would have spent around 17 trillion rubles on defense, equivalent to 181 billion euros, a figure indicated, according to him, by most analysts. He noted that the nominal comparison did not take purchasing power into account: applying indices developed by specialized research centers, Russian spending would rise to 574 billion international dollars, compared to about 700 billion for the entire EU. He added that the EU would have three and a half times the population of Russia and a GDP nine times greater. Setaccioli argued that the Russian federal budget did not show all military costs. He cited studies by economist Craig Kennedy, according to which part of the spending would be financed through subsidized loans and would thus remain on the banks' balance sheets. He also recalled an investigation by Dozhd', which, according to him, had documented pressures on private companies to hire people before signing contracts with the military and to supplement salaries with corporate funds. He added that at least three militias would be linked to Gazprom, which would cover part of the costs. For these reasons, he dismissed as false the claim that Russia spent less than the EU. Historically, Setaccioli criticized Travaglio's reconstruction, according to which the Napoleonic and Nazi invasions, along with interventions in Crimea and support for the Bolsheviks, would justify Russian fears toward Europe. Setaccioli listed Russian troop interventions in Poland in 1939, Finland in 1939-1940, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Romania in 1940, Bulgaria in 1944, Hungary in 1956, Czechoslovakia in 1968, Moldova in 1992, Georgia in 2008, and Ukraine in 2014 and 2022. He stated that there were no Russian regions occupied by European countries, while eight regions—one in Moldova, two in Georgia, and five in Ukraine—would be under Russian control. Finally, Setaccioli accused Travaglio of presenting a selective and misleading reconstruction to make Russia appear not dangerous, portray Europe as a threat, and argue that rearmament was unnecessary and risky. In his view, that reasoning could legitimize a potential Russian attack on Europe and constituted a form of collaborationism. #Russia #Europa #Difesa (translated)
