Survey some European news headlines from the weeks after Donald Trump’s election win. On 15 November: Olaf Scholz holds a telephone conference with Vladimir Putin, to icy statements from Paris and Warsaw (the Elysée observing that this was “not coordinated” and Poland’s prime minister Donald Tusk retorting “no one will stop Putin with phone calls”); 21 November: the Swedish battery maker Northvolt, Europe’s best chance of rivalling American and Chinese clean-tech giants, declares bankruptcy; 27 November: Poland and France join forces to block an EU trade deal with Mercosur, the South American trading bloc, that would serve the union’s economic and geopolitical interests.
Three news stories; three illustrations of a fissiparous Europe dismally unready for inauguration day on 20 January. Since 2016 the continent has become more, not less, dependent on the US for its security, energy and exports. Its relative wealth and power have shrunk, not grown.
As I wrote in these pages in March 2023, “Europe is in no way prepared” for a second Trump term. That remains true. Dark spectres loom over the continent as 2025 nears: a settlement imposed on Ukraine that leaves the country insecure and unstable as perhaps ten million refugees flee west; an emboldened Putin intensifying sabotage acts in Europe while eyeing Moldova or even the Baltic states; blanket tariffs and America-first energy policies accelerating Europe’s deindustrialisation; Nato hollowed out; the West fracturing just as the “rest” are gaining momentum.
All of which means that Trump’s return to office ought to be a deafening wake-up call for Europe. But will it? The continent’s leaders have grandly announced such moments at reguwlar intervals over recent years, but rarely acted proportionately. Whether this time is different depends on the interaction of two sets of forces that the returning US president will likely unleash among Europeans.
The first are centrifugal. It is easy to imagine a Trumpian hurricane flinging Europeans outwards and away from each other. Early in the new presidency, leaders may be tempted to rush to the White House to secure bilateral deals, undermining common negotiating positions. Over time, the pressure of Trump’s policies could pitch Europeans against each other. Some may respond by seeking closer relations with China. Some could strain the far-from-complete single market to breaking point with acts designed to protect their domestic industries. Some may reach for unilateral migration policies – especially if reckless Trumpian policies in the Middle East trigger a new influx of refugees.
On top of these could even come deliberate attempts by the president to drive wedges between European states. Any offer of a special deal for the UK in return for dealignment from the EU should be understood as such. Trump and his allies could also seek to encourage European radical right parties; the most obvious prize being a Marine Le Pen presidency in France from 2027. And they seem likely to endorse Serb expansionism in the western Balkans, jeopardising the fragile peace order in Bosnia and northern Kosovo.
The other set of forces are centripetal. The harsh winds blowing from across the Atlantic could spin Europeans closer together. Trump 2.0 might just be “the hour of Europe”. Recent weeks have brought some small promising glimpses: a flurry of meetings between major states; Ursula von der Leyen urging “massive investments in our security and our prosperity”; an invitation to Keir Starmer to join an informal EU gathering in February.
But if centripetal forces are to prevail over centrifugal ones, these glimpses must become urgent action. EU leaders should implement the bold proposals of two former Italian prime ministers, Enrico Letta and Mario Draghi, for deepening the single market and making it more competitive. They should strike a grand bargain to boost the union’s pooled resources: budget reform (fewer agricultural subsidies, more R&D) and stronger democratic oversight in return for a doubling of the budget, common borrowing (initially for defence), and EU taxes. Governments on both sides of the Channel should marshal yet-greater ambition for the UK-EU reset, especially on security and reducing barriers to trade.
All of this requires leadership. Often in the past an inner core of governments has driven European cooperation. The Franco-German engine, say, or more recently the “Weimar triangle” also including Poland. But the scale of the challenges, and the multipolarity of today’s Europe, still demand something broader. Italy and Spain should be added in light of their economic size and crucial security role on Europe’s southern flank, completing a new “E5” group capable of steering the EU, clearing regional differences, and unlocking deals. But on defence and security especially, Britain’s significance should, too, earn it a seat at the table. Call it the E5+1.
This format has already manifested itself in recent weeks. At a meeting in the Polish capital on 27 November the foreign ministers of all six countries – David Lammy joining by video – gathered to insist that Europe must use “all levers available to us”. It was the most emphatically centripetal European display since the US election and, hopefully, a sign of things to come. The moment demands more far-reaching leadership than the Weimar triangle can provide. The hour of the Warsaw hexagon has arrived.
[See also: The unfiltered world of Gregg Wallace’s Instagram]
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