First - my sense is that Trump prefers a civilizational alliance between MAGA and Russia over the Progressives of Europe. As Vance said in Munich, the biggest threat in Europe isn’t Russia - it’s Europe itself. I don’t think we can properly parse all this without first counting the cultural friends and enemies on the global chess board. Especially by a man who progressive westerners tried to imprison and assassinate multiple times. As the old men teeshirts at Trump rally famously said “I’d Rather Be a Russian than a Democrat”. To my eye, the overwhelming energy of Trump’s first moves are to punish western sins of progressive overreach - in government, in corporations, in media, in Canada, and in Europe.
Second - the realpolitik advisors in his ears are telling him the truth where Fukuyama is not. Our global enemies are well organized, wealthy, united in their determination to overturn American domination, unmoved by our human rights prattling (especially since we’re so busy self flagellating our wicked societies), and disdainful of our rules based order. China and Russia are on the UN Security Council! Trump understands the chessboard is fast flipping. We don’t have a military AI or drone swarm lead. Sanctions increasingly fail vs BRICS. Trump at least recognizes these emerging “new truths” on the ground and is willing to address the world as it is - not as we wish it were.
The abandonment of Ukraine is as much a repudiation of feckless, smug Brussels as it is an embrace of Putin. An orderly nation of Christian conservatism under non-democratic rule looks better than the atheist chaos he sees destroying the EU.
If you are, say, Elbridge Colby, you likely think the most valuable concession we could get from Europe is for them to take over continental defense and spend accordingly, so that the US can spend its limited resources defending Asian allies from China. For all the evil lies and dishonorable extortions that attend Trump's "pivot" on Ukraine, the silver lining we may yet hope for is to shock the Europeans into giving us that.
I'm not Elbridge Colby, though I'm familiar with his thinking. I think the reality is that a Europe that is fully prepared to defend itself might well be *less* helpful to the U.S. on China than a Europe that is profoundly dependent on us. But I've long felt more comfortable with the idea of a truly multi-polar world than with trying to run Cold War II with the U.S, Europe and Japan facing off against a Russia-China axis. And even in a truly multi-polar world, I'd rather a Europe that is able to defend itself than a Europe that isn't.
"I’m hard pressed to name any important concessions America extracted from our European allies in consequence of our support for Ukraine."
You didn't look very far. Europe stopped buying cheap Russian gaz and started buying expensive American gaz, that's a rather big change that directly benefited the US. LNG imports from the US were multiplied by 3 between 2021 and 2023.
Then, obviously, there are the weapons. As Europe scrambled to rearm themselves, they bought a lot of American weapons (sending old stocks to the US and buying back new American weapons - patriots batteries, F35, himars, etc.)
A number of European countries continue to buy Russian gas; even Germany continues to buy Russian gas through intermediaries. You're of course correct that European imports of Russian gas are way down, and that purchases of American LNG have made up a big part of the slack. But I don't consider that -- or the purchase of American weapons, which has been real but hasn't amounted to a massive rearmament -- to be an "important concession" extracted by America. Rather, those are the bare minimum responses to suggest that Europe is actively engaged in the Ukraine war -- a war that impacts them more than it does us.
What I'm talking about is stuff like: America has been trying to corral Europe into a unified front against China, and while we've made some modest headway there, it's really only modest. I can't name an area where European nations said "it's really important that we give this to the Americans, even though it isn't obviously in our interest, because it matters a huge amount to them and we need them in the fight against Ukraine." Can you?
ASML, the Dutch company that build machines that are critical for making last generation chips, has been asked by the Dutch government to restrict its exports to China. Again, 10s of research. https://www.asml.com/en/news/press-releases/2023/statement-regarding-partial-revocation-export-license
That's a totally legit point, and one that I was aware of (I've written about it before) but failed to think of in a moment of hyperbole.
Just to be clear: I'm not writing a brief for Trump, just trying to understand what is going on.
So much to unpack Noah!!
First - my sense is that Trump prefers a civilizational alliance between MAGA and Russia over the Progressives of Europe. As Vance said in Munich, the biggest threat in Europe isn’t Russia - it’s Europe itself. I don’t think we can properly parse all this without first counting the cultural friends and enemies on the global chess board. Especially by a man who progressive westerners tried to imprison and assassinate multiple times. As the old men teeshirts at Trump rally famously said “I’d Rather Be a Russian than a Democrat”. To my eye, the overwhelming energy of Trump’s first moves are to punish western sins of progressive overreach - in government, in corporations, in media, in Canada, and in Europe.
Second - the realpolitik advisors in his ears are telling him the truth where Fukuyama is not. Our global enemies are well organized, wealthy, united in their determination to overturn American domination, unmoved by our human rights prattling (especially since we’re so busy self flagellating our wicked societies), and disdainful of our rules based order. China and Russia are on the UN Security Council! Trump understands the chessboard is fast flipping. We don’t have a military AI or drone swarm lead. Sanctions increasingly fail vs BRICS. Trump at least recognizes these emerging “new truths” on the ground and is willing to address the world as it is - not as we wish it were.
The abandonment of Ukraine is as much a repudiation of feckless, smug Brussels as it is an embrace of Putin. An orderly nation of Christian conservatism under non-democratic rule looks better than the atheist chaos he sees destroying the EU.
That is certainly the line that Vance is putting out there.
If you are, say, Elbridge Colby, you likely think the most valuable concession we could get from Europe is for them to take over continental defense and spend accordingly, so that the US can spend its limited resources defending Asian allies from China. For all the evil lies and dishonorable extortions that attend Trump's "pivot" on Ukraine, the silver lining we may yet hope for is to shock the Europeans into giving us that.
I'm not Elbridge Colby, though I'm familiar with his thinking. I think the reality is that a Europe that is fully prepared to defend itself might well be *less* helpful to the U.S. on China than a Europe that is profoundly dependent on us. But I've long felt more comfortable with the idea of a truly multi-polar world than with trying to run Cold War II with the U.S, Europe and Japan facing off against a Russia-China axis. And even in a truly multi-polar world, I'd rather a Europe that is able to defend itself than a Europe that isn't.
"I’m hard pressed to name any important concessions America extracted from our European allies in consequence of our support for Ukraine."
You didn't look very far. Europe stopped buying cheap Russian gaz and started buying expensive American gaz, that's a rather big change that directly benefited the US. LNG imports from the US were multiplied by 3 between 2021 and 2023.
https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/infographics/where-does-the-eu-s-gas-come-from/
Then, obviously, there are the weapons. As Europe scrambled to rearm themselves, they bought a lot of American weapons (sending old stocks to the US and buying back new American weapons - patriots batteries, F35, himars, etc.)
A number of European countries continue to buy Russian gas; even Germany continues to buy Russian gas through intermediaries. You're of course correct that European imports of Russian gas are way down, and that purchases of American LNG have made up a big part of the slack. But I don't consider that -- or the purchase of American weapons, which has been real but hasn't amounted to a massive rearmament -- to be an "important concession" extracted by America. Rather, those are the bare minimum responses to suggest that Europe is actively engaged in the Ukraine war -- a war that impacts them more than it does us.
What I'm talking about is stuff like: America has been trying to corral Europe into a unified front against China, and while we've made some modest headway there, it's really only modest. I can't name an area where European nations said "it's really important that we give this to the Americans, even though it isn't obviously in our interest, because it matters a huge amount to them and we need them in the fight against Ukraine." Can you?