It matters because NATO matters and our European allies matter. On the one hand, exports to the European Union brought in the United States $369 billion in 2023. Exports to the United Kingdom add another $74 billion at this figure. These are exchanges of high-value products and services. This doesn’t kill American jobs, but it boosts them. And it reinforces the peace benefits that have supported European security and NATO stability since 1945. Trump is wrong to claim that NATO is only taking from Americans. On the contrary, this most successful alliance offers clear benefits for Americans.

Yet some important aspects are rotten in the state of US-EU relations.

Consider Europe’s arrogant contempt for Trump, offered openly to Vice President-elect JD Vance in Munich earlier this year. Take the example of Europe’s penchant for pursuing freeloading in defense matters. Take the governments of France, Spain and Belgium. Overseeing Europe’s second, fourth and seventh largest economies respectively, France, Spain and Belgium have spent the past four years openly attacking Trump in private diplomatic forums and in public. French President Emmanuel Macron has been the most prominent in this area. This will not engender the affection of the notoriously thin-skinned president-elect.

To be fair to Macron, he increased support for Ukraine This year. Macron also strengthened France’s defense posture and defense spending, although it is barely above NATO’s defense spending target of 2% of GDP. He wants to show Trump that he will take more charge of European security, even if he continues to work in close collaboration with China. If he continues these actions, the United States’ relations with its oldest ally could remain stable. But the question remains open as to whether Macron will continue on this path. U.S., British and Eastern European officials still warn that, like Trump, Macron likes attention far more than sustainable policy. The problem for Europe is that many European Union countries are not following Macron’s temporarily improved example.

Contrary to media rhetoric, too many European states continue to fail to meet NATO’s 2% of GDP defense spending target. or barely exceed it. Spain will spend only 1.28% of GDP in terms of defense, in 2024, Belgium will spend 1.30% and Italy 1.49% of GDP. These expenses are incompatible with the absolute need of the United States to divert more air and naval forces to the Pacific in the face of China’s rapacious growth of its naval, air and missile forces and its undeniably increasing aggression against Taiwan, the Philippines and Japan.

The pressing question follows: Now that Trump is back, will Europeans actually wake up to this concern and actually make the decision to do more for their own defense?

Eastern Europeans and the United Kingdom suggests the answer is yes, and France suggests maybe. But Germany suggests the answer is no.

After Russia invaded Ukraine two and a half years ago, Chancellor Olaf Scholz promised a “Zeitenwende” revolution to significantly increase defense spending. This implied that Germany ultimately saw its responsibility for the security of Europe and NATO as extending beyond Angela Merkel’s mandate. teach America a lesson and appease Russia. But today, Zeitenwende is on life support. German Defense Minister Oscar Pistorius wanted defense spending to increase by 11% by 2025. He got 2.3%. And Germany will halve its military aid to Ukraine next year. It is unclear how these policy choices are designed to encourage a Trump skeptical of the EU’s willingness to do more in its own backyard. In warning Scholz to this effect, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock was ignored.

The problem extends further.

His demands via the The Kiel Institute carefully evaluatedthe EU’s actual record of support for Ukraine is far from sufficient. Four EU countries border Ukraine, and Russia poses a clearly greater physical threat to the EU than to the United States. Once again, the United States should confront this Russian threat for reasons of mutual prosperity between the EU and the United States, and in the interest of preserving long-standing alliances. , and because the Baltic States and Poland constitute some of America’s closest and most trusted friends – friends who truly put their NATO money where their NATO mouth is. Indeed, Poland will spend almost 5% of GDP on defense in 2025!

The United States was right to oppose Soviet imperialism during the Cold War, and it is right to oppose the imperialism of Russian President Vladimir Putin today. Contrary to Trump’s illusions, Russia does not seek or act in pursuit of détente with America. This has the effect of bleeding American alliances, of threatening American interests, and harm the lives of Americans. Simply put, Trump would be foolish to abandon NATO and historic alliances. He should keep the American nuclear umbrella at Putin’s throat and maintain the formations of the American army in Europe. But it is neither inconceivable nor unfair that Trump will push for a NATO stipulation that members must meet at least the 2% of GDP target to maintain America’s defensive commitment. And if Europe does not do much more than the United States for Ukraine, it is inconceivable to think that Trump will.

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More optimistically, if Europe wakes up and Trump begins to receive his information about Russia and learns what Moscow is actually doing and saying about him, it is possible to think that we could see a stronger NATO (a NATO which involves more than a French plane during large-scale simulated war exercises), a more unified transatlantic partnership on China (rather than one in which leader Xi Jinping buy back Germany, Hungary and Spain to the detriment of all others), and a peace agreement between Ukraine and Russia with Ukrainian teeth (rather than opening the door to Russian invasion). that Merkel imposed on Kyiv).

However, if this great alliance is to continue and prosper, bold actions must be on the agenda.