by Rym Momtaz*
For the fourth time since U.S. President Donald Trump returned to the White House, his position on the Russian invasion of Ukraine has his European counterparts in a state of shocked consternation.
What’s striking this time around is that it hasn’t been accompanied by the previous string of bravado-laced statements or another group trip across the Atlantic to try to salvage a minimal—even if cosmetic—transatlantic alignment on European security.
Perhaps the more subdued reaction shows that European leaders had already anticipated Trump’s renewed preference not to increase pressure on Russia and rather push Ukraine, the invaded country, to give up on its territorial integrity. But the more realistic scenario is that it is another manifestation of the absence of grand strategic vision plaguing the bloc.
The European crisis is deeper than an inability to conceive of security outside the U.S.-dominated NATO framework.
For the bloc to avoid fading into irrelevant subservience in the post-rules-based order, twenty-seven countries with vastly different, sometimes even at odds, strategic cultures and threat perceptions must agree to completely overhaul the one security baseline they shared. And they must do so while most are experiencing political fragmentation of unprecedented depth and spread. The lack of political will—or courage—to make bold security moves at pace and at scale is hence almost inevitable. What must not happen, for the survival of the EU, is for these obstacles to prove insurmountable.
What’s more is that the illiberal, pro-Russian parties are the ones on the ascendant just as Moscow has been amping up its hybrid warfare against the EU and its member states.
There is a long trail of hamstrung minority or caretaker governments across the union. Liberal democratic parties are no longer driving their countries’ agora, instead they are mostly playing defense and catch-up to confident alt- and far-right parties whose ideas have pervaded the public sphere.
In the EU’s two pillar countries—France and Germany—nationalist populists now represent more than a quarter of voters. In Germany, the far-right Alternative for Germany is the second strongest political force, only one point behind the Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s Christian Democratic Union. In France, the National Rally now not only leads the polls with a solidly consistent 33 percent of the vote, but also commands a double-digit lead over its second place competitor.
In both countries, albeit much more dramatically in France than in Germany, governments are struggling to effectively tackle the issues citizens feel most impacted by—cost of living, security, and the tech, economic, and environmental transitions—or to move forward with their agendas.
In seven other member states, far-right parties are either in the governing coalitions or supporting the governments: in Croatia, Finland, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Slovakia, and Sweden.
In Poland, an essential actor in European defense, the conservative Prime Minister Donald Tusk is hamstrung by the cohabitation with the far-right-backed President Karol Nawrocki.
In Austria, the far right—while in opposition—is the dominant party and continues to consolidate its hold on the public agenda.
And both the Netherlands and Spain have dysfunctional governments. The first one has had a caretaker government since June after the far-right Party for Freedom quit the coalition, and the second hasn’t managed to pass a budget for the third year running.
Taken all together, it is no wonder that Europe has been unable to overhaul its strategic posture, accompanied by the industrial and financial oomph needed, fast enough to keep up with the dislocation of the order it has existed in.
But, while time is running out, it is not completely gone. Since 2022, the EU—despite the aforementioned difficulties—has managed to make some strides that would have been deemed revolutionary had they not been outpaced by the geopolitical context.
Trump could prove to be an opportunity. A central current in his political base—the restrainers—welcome European strategic autonomy, both militarily and industrially. That has not been the case with any other U.S. administration, which have simultaneously scolded the Europeans for not stepping up on defense, behaving like “free riders” as former U.S. president Barack Obama once called his allies, while also aggressively seeking continued European mass purchases of American weapons.
And, on the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Trump has been remarkably coherent, by his own standards. He never reversed his decision to stop donating weapons to Ukraine. Instead, he has only agreed to send weapons to Kyiv that have been bought by the Europeans. The clearest sign possible of his lack of strategic investment in the Ukraine cause. He neither considers Ukraine to be a core U.S. strategic interest nor is he vested in trying to support its fight to regain its territorial integrity.
Where Trump is more deeply destabilizing the current European political moment is through his movement’s active support for nationalist conservative leaders across the continent, against the incumbent political forces.
Yet, if these forces finally get serious about implementing the Draghi, Letta, and Niinistö reports—which, as a trifecta, make up the roadmap to European revival—they would generate enough of an industrial, technological, and security turnaround to reinfuse the mainstream parties with more political momentum among voters.
Fundamentally, it is about going back to basics. The EU and national governments must get serious about offering quick, effective solutions for their citizens’ core daily struggles related to jobs creation and growth, economic empowerment, and physical and cultural security with regards to immigration. That is the only way to get buy-in for the inevitable budgetary sacrifices needed to fuel the defense revolution to meet the geopolitical moment.
The EU’s geopolitical engine cannot fire on all cylinders if its internal political cogs are constantly jamming up.
*Editor in Chief, Strategic Europe
**Published first on Carnegie Europe
By: N. Peter Kramer