"If the cradles are empty, the future is bleak"

The Z Blog › Empty Cradles:

Is Putin moving on Ukraine in a bid to get Russians to bear more children? Hmmm....

And here is a handy little "List of sovereign states and dependent territories by fertility rate," although its data are five or more years old by now.

Ukraine has one of the lowest birth rates in the world. It hit a low in 2001 of 1.08 live births per woman, and even though it had rebounded to 1.53 in 2012, that is still very much below mere replacement rate.

Most of the rest of Europe is no higher or not much higher, and of the major European NATO powers, only the UK and France are higher. Germany and Italy are in a race for the bottom of all Europe. Poland, which would be key terrain in defending either Ukraine or the NATO-member Baltic states, has a birth rate only marginally higher.

So my question to anyone proposing such military action by the United States: if the European nations threatened by Russia will not have children to grow up to defend their own nations, why should we ask American women to bear children to go defend those nations? It seems to me that they have already decided that their country is not worth dying for. I do not see why we should.

HT: American Digest