When the stability of your security is heavily reliant on a specific election outcome, it's a clear sign of distress. Our review of European news outlets revealed a pattern of reporting heavily influenced by wishful thinking. For instance, a German reporter tried to downplay the significance of Iowa, while the BBC's website suggested that Trump's overwhelming victory actually worked in favor of Biden's campaign. It's evident that when the history of the West's rise and decline is penned, the role of hopeful but unrealistic expectations will be significant.
In the context of the European Union, where many politicians see Atlanticism as a sustainable approach, this is particularly true. Effective partnerships require effort from both sides. However, the US political landscape is changing, with a new wave of both right-wing and left-wing politicians who are not committed to transatlantic initiatives.
The EU prematurely considered the problems resolved following the 2020 US elections. The invasion of Ukraine by Vladimir Putin made them feel fortunate to have Joe Biden as president. However, suggesting that the EU is unprepared for Trump's potential return would be an understatement.
Ideally, the starting point would have been back in 2016 when Trump first took office. Even though a defense union wouldn't be fully operational by now, progress would have been made. The EU's success during Jacques Delors' time was largely due to strategic, long-term planning. Just like the monetary union wasn't spontaneously created but was methodically planned, ratified in a treaty, and executed in stages, defense should be similarly approached. Starting with integrating defense procurement into the single market would be logical, leveraging the EU's expertise in managing a unified market to foster economic efficiency and spur high-tech defense research, something beyond the capacity of Europe's divided national markets. However, discussions shouldn't initially focus on a unified European army. Real power is built on strong, foundational structures.
This power won't emerge from Franco-German leadership. Returning to the influential Franco-German partnerships of the past, like those of Adenauer and De Gaulle or Kohl and Mitterrand, seems implausible. The future of German leadership appears limited to a few names like Scholz, Friedrich Merz, maybe Markus Söder, and some CDU state premiers, while figures like Marine Le Pen and various young populists are prominent in France. Currently, the Franco-German relationship is more symbolic than substantial, characterized by joint cabinet meetings and repetitive speeches rather than substantive cooperation. Deep divisions, especially in economic policies like energy and finance, overshadow the relationship. A sovereign debt crisis seems more probable than a Franco-German resurgence.
Should Trump win again, we anticipate a retreat into the illusion that the issues will simply dissolve. This is essentially a return to the comfort of baseless optimism. Denying Trump's impact is one way this optimism manifests, paralleled by the exaggerated fear that democracy will collapse with his election, reminiscent of the situation in Germany in 1933.
Confronting a figure like Trump is extremely challenging due to his unconventional political tactics. The Democrats' aggressive legal pursuits against him were a misstep. Similarly, the catastrophic predictions about the demise of democracy are likely to be counterproductive. Europeans, on their part, are in complete denial. Both groups share a common trait: like the Bourbons, they neither learn from the past nor remember it.
