The future is uncertain for the European Union as powerful regimes with inward-looking agendas have begun rolling out policy in the U.S., Germany, and France, due in no small part to the second Trump administration. For Europe, NATO, and the conflict in Ukraine, this could potentially lead to unprecedented changes in the modern global order.
(L-R) Prime Minister of Sweden Ulf Kristersson, Prime Minister of Norway Jonas Gahr Store, Prime Minister of Estonia Kristen Michal, Prime Minister of Canada Justin Trudeau President of Lithuania Gitanas Nauseda and President of Finland Alexander Stubb walk past People's Memorial of National Remembrance on February 24, 2025 in Kyiv, Ukraine. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyi and First Lady Olena Zelenska honored the memory of the fallen defenders of Ukraine near the People's Memorial of National Remembrance in Kyiv. Ceremony was also attended by 13 foreign leaders who arrived in Ukraine. After that, a meeting was held to discuss peace and security guarantees. (Photo by Eduard Kryzhanivskyi/Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine)
“The threat that I worry the most about vis-a-vis Europe is not Russia, it’s not China, it’s not any other external actor. And what I worry about is the threat from within.”
U.S. Vice President JD Vance’s words were met with a mixture of incredulous shock and sombre consternation in a room filled with European diplomats, bureaucrats, and politicians. After all, this was the Munich Security Conference - widely viewed by many as the last intellectual bastion and hub for European security, amidst an increasingly hostile, fractured, and discombobulating international environment. Many in the conventionally trans-Atlanticist bloc within the European Union (EU) were shocked by the swiftness with which the Trump administration had pursued its own brand of diplomacy and unconventional position towards the war in Ukraine. With both trepidation and quiet fury, some in the European political and policy elite are coming to recognise that President Donald J Trump’s second term marks an epochal shift in U.S.-Europe relations. This time around, it’s different.
Vance’s appearance was sandwiched between two sets of high-level conversations between the U.S. and Russia in recent weeks, which had largely been paused since the Russian invasion in February 2022. The first took place between Presidents Trump and Putin on February 12th, which encompassed a range of topics, including the war in Ukraine, artificial intelligence and energy, and the status of the U.S. dollar as a globally dominant currency. The call culminated in an announcement by Trump that he would commence immediate negotiations to end the war — with rhetoric reeking of his desire to appear as the “peace-broker” over the protracted, three-year conflict.
The second featured a meeting between U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov. Whilst trusted Trump advisor and whisperer Steve Witkoff steered the grand strategy of the ‘Grand Bargain’, Rubio and the National Security Advisor Michael Waltz set off to defend positions that neither would have openly endorsed a few years ago: that Ukraine was to accept territorial losses in exchange for peace; that Ukrainian membership in NATO is a non-starter, and that Russia purportedly had valid reasons in mounting its assault on Ukrainian soil. What a difference being in nominal power makes.
The European Union must defend its strategic autonomy — yet what does this look like?
In neither of these two conversations was Ukraine included. Nor, indeed, was the European Union.
Faced with a new administration clearly inimical to collaboration over areas that do not map onto a parochially defined vision of self-interest, Brussels is indubitably caught up in a pickle when it comes to the war. On one hand, Europe remains heavily determined that Russia must not “prevail” - defined loosely through a spectrum of outcomes, ranging from the increasingly improbable total defeat and expulsion of Russian troops from Ukraine, through to the regaining of industrially fertile lands in Zaporizhzhia and Kherson by Ukraine, as well as a tentative roadmap for Ukrainian membership in NATO. Such stipulations do not necessarily map onto what is politically feasible, though appear to reflect a tentative consensus amongst the European security establishment.
On the other hand, the extent to which European states can continually support Ukraine’s defence against the invasion leaves much room for questioning. Budget cuts, a hollowed-out weapons industry, and long-standing hubris have left European states largely incapable of sustaining - on their own - the highly munitions-intensive war on their doorsteps. Whilst individual countries such as Poland have embarked upon extensive consolidation of defence infrastructure on their borders with Russia and Belarus, with the hopes that doing so could pose effective deterrence, the fundamental crux of the problem is glaringly obvious: as the Draghi report highlighted, the EU is weak in emerging technologies determining future growth, and is entrapped in structurally weak growth.
French President Emmanuel Macron has repeatedly advocated a Europe that possesses “strategic autonomy.” Defining this term is as straightforward as jumping through hoops of fire unscathed. Strategic autonomy is best translated as the ability of individual sovereign states (and non-state actors) to pursue the interests of their own people, in ways that are not fundamentally determined or subjected to overwhelming control by one or more external parties. Autonomy, in other words, must always be anchored in interests, which in turn can take a multitude of forms - economic, territorial, military, security, financial, strategic, technological, or symbolic-discursive.
For long, Macron’s advocacy has been met with harsh derision by those who posit that Brussels’ geopolitical future requires alignment with Washington - a nominally free and fair counterpart committed to advancing international democracy. However, such castigation is unwarranted, for it ignores the fact that the U.S., too, is becoming more parochial, inward-looking, and fixated upon securing myopically conceived gains at the expense of long-term partnerships. Europe should recognise the importance of de-risking against both China and the U.S., as opposed to fixating upon exclusively the former.
Three steps Europe must undertake in upholding its core interests.
Where lies the path forward for Europe? I have no comprehensive answer, but the broad strategy should comprise the Three Ds - De-escalate, Diversify, and Develop.
First, the EU must find a way to pragmatically de-escalate the current conflict in Ukraine, and carve out a swift path towards peace. It is high time that European countries came together in re-asserting their position and baselines on Ukraine, but not before figuring out - through deliberation and negotiation - what these core red-lines are, within the provisos of political feasibility. Both the Trump administration and the Kremlin view Europe as weak, divided, and hence undeserving of serious treatment in negotiations. European leaders must negotiate with the aims of an off-ramp in mind, one that would preserve their core security interests, as well as precluding the prospects for further intensification of casualties and military action in the battle-ravaged oblasks of Ukraine. To yield without bargaining, as the U.S. has done thus far, would be devastating; to settle for a conditionally advantageous compromise, one that is superior to the position yielded by U.S.-Russia talks - is not, even if suboptimal. This path towards de-escalation can only materialise through the exhibition of strong and determined leadership amongst European heads of state, as well as the consultation of the Ukrainian policy and political elite - of which there is effectively none between Washington and Moscow.
Second, the EU should diversify beyond the U.S.. The pollyannish faith in the trans-Atlantic relationship has been tested, time and time again. Yet the past two weeks of shifts and transformations exemplify a long overdue rude awakening. Beijing and Delhi, despite all their bombastic rhetoric in positioning themselves as neutral over the war and long-standing ties with Russia, may emerge to be more reliable partners for Brussels in bringing the war to an end, than an adversarial and intentionally provocative Trump leadership. There is more to diversification than merely the war in Ukraine. Firms in Europe seeking manufacturing collaboration and capacities should reach out to Chinese and Japanese counterparts, as opposed to building walls that keep them out. European innovators should also tap into Middle Eastern capital and ASEAN talents as they seek to meet the challenges of the renewable transition. The EU can no longer rely upon the U.S. as a steady collaborator in the era of naked self-serving geopolitical machinations.
Third and finally, the EU must develop its in-house industry and military capabilities. The linchpin of NATO - if it is to remain a relevant organisation - would increasingly shift ‘Eastward’, from the U.S. to Western Europe, and from Western Europe to Central and Eastern Europe in the direct line of fire from Russia. Poland will become an increasingly important logistical and operational hub for NATO, whilst Italy and Spain struggle with filling the vacuum left open by a fundamentally inward-looking, rightward-shifting Germany and France. Beyond defence and security, Europe would also be looking to shore up its manufacturing capabilities; yet such efforts could prove futile in the absence of conscious efforts aimed at tackling over-bearing labour laws, excess red tape, and bureaucracies that are fundamentally inimical to rapid change and immediate responses to disruptions.
These overarching points are by no means specific policy recommendations. Yet they can hopefully serve as guiding principles for the formulation and advancement of a Trump 2.0 policy by the EU. If the EU is to have a future, it must earn it, as opposed to hoping that the forces of history would eventually come through in its favour.
