re: What would happen if we completely got out of Russia Ukraine conflict?

It would end tomorrow.

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And I'm perfectly aware of our financial situation.

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I'll start here because I don't think you are aware. Wars are very expensive, they can financially ruin countries in good shape. Wartime output is not production, it's destruction. The US dollar is at risk today and has been for quite a long time because of excessive debt and excessive trade deficits. You have an idea that we can conduct a war against Russia at bargain basement prices. We can't even manufacture many things we use every day at an affordable cost, or at all. We've already sent $`100's of billions of dollars to Ukraine, and would send much, much more if this escalates.

What you're saying is, "we can afford this, it's no problem, we'll just get rid of some old unused stuff". If any politician gets on TV and says that, the response should be, "Pay for every nickel with an immediate federal job cut, or a tax hike levied immediately before the money is spent. Build replacement war materiel before you expend one bullet." We'll find out how affordable the war is and how quickly and cheaply we can replenish our weapons.

Yes, Russia is weak, but a weak Russia would still be prohibitively expensive to defeat in their own neighborhood using conventional force. The main way Putin is a military threat to the US is if he launches a nuclear attack, which becomes much more likely if we start attacking (directly or via proxy) his territory. Fighting this war would be in direct opposition to our national security interests. But, if Russia is such an immediate threat that it requires a US attack, go to Congress and get a declaration of war. Tell the American people that this has nothing to do with Ukraine, it's really about eliminating the Russian threat.

If it's cheap and easy, let Europe do it. We have no alliance with Ukraine. If we want to send a message to China, build factories to manufacture the things we'd need to fight a war, instead of hoping they'll keep us stocked if the day comes when we really need it. Start that process now, and let our private industry use whatever hundreds of billions, or trillions, we'd spend on Ukraine to get it going.

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It would grind into a gorilla war that I don’t think Russia could win.

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This is the most astute post of this entire thread.

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In fact an honest accounting of the pentagon would find we’ve run down our strategic reserve stocks of missiles, ammunition and particularly artillery rounds to incredibly dangerous levels which for various reasons we obviously aren’t admitting to publicly.

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We have acknowledged the shortage of ammunition and reserve stocks, but the whole point of them in the first place was to kill Russians and Chinese so they are actually doing their job. It's also worth noting that missile fuel has a shelf life and that it costs money to properly dispose of them, so giving them to the Ukraine not only serves American foreign policy it actually saves taxpayers a few pennies.

Let me repeat this: Your military is built with the express purpose of killing the Russians and, by default, the Chinese, whose own weapon systems are just cheap Russian knock offs, so the ammo and equipment we send are actually doing their job, that's why we aren't alarmed. But again, this does require some vision.

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I’m also greatly amused that you think NATO membership somehow saves us money.

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No, I know that NATO costs us a great deal, but it's not meant to 'save' money, it's meant to be a deterrent to war and, should one occur, provide allies against a common opponent. While I absolutely do want NATO to pay more, they have also absolutely lived up to both the spirit and the letter of the agreement; the USSR didn't invade any of us, when 9/11 happened we declared Article 5 and they come with us to Afghanistan, and Russia is screwed because of all of us working together. From that standpoint NATO has been an incredible bargain.

But now we are about to face China and NATO should be our biggest weapon; it's Europe, after all, that is China's biggest trading partner, not the US, and if China wants to challenge US hegemony in any way we should be able to go to our NATO members and ask for help militarily, economically, politically, etc. Before this current administration I would have told you this was a slam-dunk, no-brainer - now that's not the case.

We have decided to walk away from them right when we may need them, negating the whole purpose and throwing away the decades of support you have pointed to - it's literally the worst of all possible actions. And this over an uber-weak Russia. It's a horrible decision.

Make no mistake - we run the world. We control the worlds ocean ways, we garner 70% of the worlds investment, we (stupidly) invade countries at a whim with no real ramifications outside of a finger wag and a dirty look. Our military reigns supreme with hundreds of bases all over the world, and our media, arts and entertainment, and culture running rampant throughout the world, and we are able to wantonly rip up treatise at our own behest. Anybody who thinks Europe is running things isn't paying attention, and telling them they are own their own is the very thing that would prompt them to compete with us. This policy doesn't make any sense.