Europe Will Struggle to Stand United Against Trump’s Threats
Many of the continent’s leaders are under so much pressure at home that they won’t have the political leverage to take decisive action on global affairs.
Donald Trump has threatened to drag the European Union into a new round of trade wars and to dictate a Russia-Ukraine peace deal that may singlehandedly redraw the region’s security architecture. Yet many of Europe’s leaders are under so much pressure at home that they won’t have the political leverage to take decisive action on global affairs. And those ready to formulate a plan to strengthen the continent’s economic and military defenses lack the power to get things done. In other words, the EU has a leadership problem.
It’s a situation that may haunt Europe for decades. The 20-member euro zone has struggled to grow since a rebound engineered by government stimulus faded. Europe will need additional investments of €800 billion ($840 billion) a year to boost competitiveness and beef up its armies or resign itself to a “slow agony,” warned former European Central Bank President Mario Draghi during a briefing in September at which he presented a report packed with policy prescriptions.