No, European Strategic Autonomy Drive is not Trump Related

also, is the USA Really NATO's #1 Sceptic?

If you or someone you care for is “having a moment” in the triangle that is President Trump, NATO, and Europe—then help them help themselves. They are most likely suffering from too narrow a spectrum in their reading or have an inability to recognize the long-time time constant in a world’s constantly changing strategic environment.

This is not new, it just has extra flavor because Trump and his administration are more direct in trying to get the United States to head in a direction that three Presidents have been trying to steer our nation towards.

That won’t stop the drama from those who are too invested in the comfortable patterns of the past to address the uncomfortable reality of the present and future.

People, mostly on the American left and way too many Europeans who should know better, over the last few months have been doing a fair bit of knee-bent-running-about working themselves into a tizzy over the least surprising reality of the post-election conversation about security in Europe: the USA needs Europe to do more of its own heavy lifting as it has larger problems in the Pacific that demands more of its focus.

“America First” in this context is, “American strategic requirements first.” The USA cannot be “Europe First” when the largest threat to Europe—besides its increasingly anti-democratic trends and massive unassimilated migration of military aged males from its south—is a nation, Russia, with the GDP of the US state of Texas, a population ~25% of European NATO, and an economy ~10% of European NATO.

These people need to take a powder. Their uninformed and ahistorical rantings are spooking the herd and making the womenfolk and children all nervous.

I am more and more seeing this as a manifestation of not just the above, but part Trump Derangement Syndrome flavored with no small part of scapegoating and icky American loathing to avoid addressing very real European systemic shortcomings. This reality has little to do with Trump Part I or II—if anything his elections are a byproduct of larger movements.

As a NATO staff officer, over drinks from Stavanger to Kabul two decades ago, I warned people their assumptions were wrong that “the USA will cover it” as if alliance maintenance was just another CJSOR exercise. I’ve repeated the core of that warning over and over here through the years.

Just as a reference point for new readers, here is a quote of mine from seven years ago:

… the USA is one election away from leaving Europe to its own devices (see the Norwegian series, Occupied - it ain't just me who sees this, and it pre-dates Trump).

Somewhere in the archive is an older quote along the same lines, but this is what came up in a quick search and should suffice.

Smart minds in Europe saw this. Heck, half a decade ago when he was CJCS, even Gen. Mark Milley, USA (ret) saw it.

The larger brief I gave people was in the language we operational planners were most comfortable with, Courses of Action (COA).

Blue Most Likely COA: The USA will continue to be fully invested, but at a steadily declining degree as the growing demands of the Pacific challenge exert its pull on finite resources.

Blue Most Dangerous COA: Plan Salamander that I have been describing from the start of my writing. Here is an example from 14 years ago:

…withdraw all maneuver forces from Asia and Europe except for what is needed at Combined Training and Logistics Bases with our most important allies.

If you want the most dangerous COA, it doesn’t have to be the result of politics or Europe-USA friction and weariness with each other. No. It could simply be an economic, natural disaster, or an unexpectedly stronger China than expected earlier…or even war.

The United States’ military must:

• Restructure itself to be more expeditionary, to move east or west from North America as the future requires it—with investments in strategic airlift and sealift to enable it.

• It should be weighted towards its natural and technological comparative advantage in maritime and aerospace power.

• It must dominate and establish the norms for lunar and Martian exploration, exploitation, and colonization.

Those three priorities are what is best not just for the USA, but for our European and Pacific allies. We cannot achieve them if we invest finite funds underwriting decades more of European entitlement as they slip in to birth-dearth dotage.

The breathlessness in response to Trump II from the usual European suspects is as predictable as the tide. For a whole host of reasons, mostly having to do with where they get their news, Western Europe’s opinion of Republican Presidents this century is always horrible. It wouldn’t need to be Trump to provoke hostility. It would have been the same if it were McCain, Romney, Walker, Rubio, Jeb!, or Nikki. Trump is just in big, beautiful, bold typeface. This is Pew’s report from 2022 we’ll return to down-post.

Let’s get back to the breathless rantings I mentioned earlier. People who should really know better are saying things like this from CSIS’s Max Bergmann, Director, Europe, Russia, and Eurasia Program and Stuart Center back on November 8th:

…when a debate in Europe emerged over “European strategic autonomy” with the election of Donald Trump and French president Emmanuel Macron, the U.S. national security establishment reacted in strong opposition. The United States saw “strategic autonomy” as leading to a transatlantic divorce. A senior U.S. defense official quipped years ago, “I told my wife this morning that I wanted more strategic autonomy and tonight I am staying in a hotel.” When the European Union proposed modest defense initiatives, Trump’s Department of State and Department of Defense strongly opposed them. Despite Trump’s aversion to NATO, his administration sought to ensure the United States’ primacy in Europe. That continued in the Biden administration. Yet there has been a subtle and quiet shift, with the United States no longer vocally opposing European Union–led initiatives but not actively supporting them either.

We can go back seven years to see another example of this by Hans Kundnani at the German Marshall Fund in 2017. So tiresome and blinkered.

As the first anniversary of the inauguration of Donald Trump as president of the United States approaches, Europeans are still debating how to respond. The most fundamental question is about the U.S. security guarantee toward Europe, which Trump had radically questioned during the election campaign and even after winning it. After conspicuously failing to commit to Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty at the NATO leaders meeting in Brussels in May, he finally did so a month later in the Rose Garden at the White House. So should Europeans now feel reassured that the uncertainty about Article 5 is over? Or should they quickly move toward “strategic autonomy” — just in case it turns out that they can no longer depend on the United States?

I’m not going to even try to refute the errors in both of these articles. If you can’t see them all, I really can’t help you besides asking you to read broadly.

Now, when did this talk of a need, which is smart and I support as a friend, start of European Strategic Autonomy?

The Obama Administration. Yes, Obama. A few years after his 2011 Pacific Pivot statement, four years to be specific: 2015. Incidentally, also in 2011 was the public taunting by Obama of citizen Trump that many people are saying is what drove Trump to run for President in 2016. Fun year 2011 was. As I’ve documented in a long running thread on X, the last sane year.

So, if you must assign blame—which you shouldn’t because this is simply the byproduct of a changing world strategic balance— it is Obama, not Trump who’s your Huckleberry.

Don’t take my word, read what the European Parliament has to say:

EU strategic autonomy (EU-SA) refers to the capacity of the EU to act autonomously – that is, without being dependent on other countries – in strategically important policy areas. These can range from defence policy to the economy, and the capacity to uphold democratic values. ... From 2013 to 2016, it was mainly seen as an approach to security and defence matters. From 2017 to 2019, EU-SA was considered as a way to defend European interests in a hostile geopolitical environment, marked by Brexit, the Trump Presidency and China's growing assertiveness. In 2020, the Covid 19 pandemic shifted the focus to mitigating economic dependence on foreign supply chains. ... Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, steps towards achieving EU-SA are being taken, while the concept nevertheless remains blurred by the variation in terminology. ... Political will was expressed in the European Council's Versailles Declaration of 11 March 2022, which aims at greater EU-SA in defence, energy supply and the economy. However, EU-SA can be constrained by Member States and non-EU (third) countries or international organisations that challenge the EU.

You can read the full report from the summer of 2022 here, but an important thing to remember is that when you hear about EU military autonomy, what you are really seeing is a desire in Europe that goes back over 1,000 years. It has an accent that is either German or French depending on the era, but it is a will to harness the full power of Western and Central Europe under the leadership of one major power. With Germany still supine, that means France.

This landscape was one in which the EU had been reduced by Brexit, redefining its trade and security relations with the United Kingdom (UK), and faced pressure from US protectionism and Chinese economic expansion. US President Donald Trump's adagio of 'America First' did not facilitate constructive relations with the EU, and the terms 'geopolitics' and 'geo-economics' were on the rise.4 Although the French President did not use the full expression 'strategic autonomy', he spoke about the need to ensure Europe's autonomous operating capabilities in defence matters and develop a shared strategic culture. His call was initially picked up in France. A 2018 article by the Institut français des relations internationales (IFRI) reflects on the possible meaning of strategic autonomy for the EU, while being aware of other countries' 'fear that France would love to commit the EU to a Gaullist turn, pushing it to sever the transatlantic link while bolstering French influence'.

Yeah, I don’t have to warn Europeans about this undercurrent. They know it.

In any event, if we are concerned about this nation or that under this leader or that when it comes to NATO, the USA isn’t the real issue here. If anything, the American people are just playing catch up to larger alliance trends.

Ten years ago, this problem already existed, but it wasn’t from the USA.

It isn’t a “right” and “left” issue either. Of note, “right” in Europe is more along the lines of “Establishment Republicans” and what used to be known as “Conservative Democrats,” but I really wish I could find the details on how they define it.

A final note: I am an unapologetic supporter of NATO. I was a NATO staff officer for years and consider that time the most rewarding duty outside of sea duty I had in my 21 years of service. However, I also continue to feel that America’s quasi-imperialistic stance in garrisoning the world, mixed in with the free-riding and sense of entitlement amongst our allies that it brings—flavored with the resentment that comes with it—are the greatest threats to the alliance.

NATO has been pretty good at keeping Europe off each other’s throats since the end of the Cold War, if you ignore the former Yugoslavia, Georgia, Armenia, and Ukraine outside NATO…and if you ignore the unending Greek-Turkish troubles waiting in the wings…but it is a success, really. However, it also has to accept that the world of the mid-21st century has different challenges.

From a strictly American security perspective, having too much stationed in and designed strictly for an European fight pins down forces and reduces global flexibility that we have to have in order to be ready for what the world will throw at us, whether we want it or not. (see the last few weeks in the Red Sea as an example of the USA doing what needs to be done as indispensable nation because no one else can).

We will continue to back the play of our European allies and will still continue to be the largest troop contributing nation, but Europe must be at their own front. They must be the first in their fight. They must hold the line before asking North America to come back their play.

They can do this. We must do this.

Pray for peace.