Will we in Europe ever move beyond the stage of believing we live in a world we wish for, rather than the world as it actually is? In that desired world, values matter more than interests. Populations seem more concerned about the suffering of people in Gaza or Iran than about their own security, which Trump is putting at risk.
The situation in Europe is far more serious than many realize. Trump has abandoned Ukraine and has taken Russia’s side. Ukraine does not interest him in the slightest. The same applies to the defense of allies against an increasingly aggressive Russia.
In Davos, he reiterated his desire to acquire Greenland, thereby further increasing the threat to Europe. The dominoes could begin to fall: if Greenland is forced to become American, NATO will fall as well. If NATO falls, there will be no reason at all for Putin to restrain himself from committing aggression against, for example, the Baltic states. If that happens, Europeans will have little choice. They would then have to abandon Ukraine and focus entirely on defending their own territory.
At the same time, Trump is trying to dismantle the EU. Economically, the bloc is a superpower that stands inconveniently in Trump’s way.
How insane the current situation is becomes clear from the fact that Greenland is a NATO matter—after all, it concerns the security of the Arctic region—yet it is the EU that must deploy its economic instruments of power. NATO’s impotence makes clear that, just as during Trump’s first term, the organization is effectively brain-dead.
If institutions such as NATO and international law collapse, there is little left to protect smaller countries against great powers. The necessity of such protection was made clear by the devastating First and Second World Wars. That lesson has not been forgotten in Europe, but Trump, Putin, and Xi simply don’t care.
The current situation is reminiscent of the run-up to the Second World War. Like Hitler, Trump is overturning our worldview. And just like the British prime minister at the time, Chamberlain, Europeans are trying to calm the situation around Greenland with deals and diplomacy.
Leaders keep insisting that we cannot do without America and that this country is our ally. But they forget that, just as before the Second World War, we are dealing with a new kind of imperialism in which the law of the strongest prevails and new spheres of influence are being defined.
After the Second World War, European countries realized that cooperation was necessary. The threat from the Soviet Union was too great. This led to the creation of NATO. The same applies today. Without a stronger EU, the individual member states will lose. That decline would then not be caused by Trump, Putin, or Xi, but by the failure of our own political leaders.
The WEF in Davos was a litmus test. Did leaders remain stuck in a bygone world, or did they set power against power? Most leaders were hesitant, but those who actually had to deal with Trump—the Canadian Prime Minister Carney and the governor of California, Newsom—called for a hard-line stance.
Experts
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