“The growing influence of patriotic European parties gives us great optimism. Our goal should be to help Europe correct its current trajectory.” This is one of the many controversial statements made in the national security document published in the early hours of the morning by the White House.
Europe would be losing its essence, according to the Administration of Donald Trumpand would run the risk of being deleted as such. For Russia and its imperialism? No, due to the influences of immigrants and culture woke.
It is the version for the Old Continent of what was already announced on Tuesday as “Trump’s corollary” to the “Monroe doctrine.” If this is usually summarized as “America for Americans”, the current president reaffirmed it in a document on the occasion of the two hundred and second anniversary of its proclamation: “The American people – and not foreign nations or internationalist institutions – will always control their destiny in our hemisphere.”
The text was the typical hodgepodge of historical inaccuracies that Trump has accustomed us to, stating that Monroe intended to consolidate the superiority of the United States within Western civilization.
Obviously, in 1823, the United States was a country to be built, without any aspiration to reaffirm any superiority since it did not exist and involved in a constant war with the Indian tribes and the State of Mexico to expand its territory.
Donald Trump and his vice president, JD Vance, this Tuesday at the White House.
Reuters
The fight against liberal democracy
In 1823, to give an example, Napoleon Bonaparte He had just died in Saint Helena and Luis XVIII sent his troops to Spain to impose another ten years of absolutism Fernando VII. We are not talking about a world that is too similar to the current one, the truth is, and it is even scary that this is the historical reference of this White House.
Logically, there were no international organizations because the world was a “free-for-all” in which European countries fought among themselves both on the continent and in the expansion of their incipient colonies.
However, it is the world that Trump and his vice president miss JD Vancethe isolationist world that Deep America dreams of, always suspicious of any centralism, even that of Washington, and to which the aforementioned “patriotic” parties appeal, on which the MAGA movement wants to rely to carry out its agenda.
Europe, and specifically the European Union, does not mean progress and stability for them, as has been demonstrated since its foundation, but rather weakness, loss of values and misunderstood tolerance.
In other words, Trump thinks the same about European democracies as Putin and it is precisely the term “democracy” that he detests, at least in the sense of guaranteeing individual and collective rights, what has been called “liberal democracy” since the fall of totalitarianism in the middle of the last century.
The idea, undisguised, is to return to the reign of force and not law… and if that is what he wants for Europe, it is understandable that he will want the same for the United States and will do everything possible to achieve it.
How populism has taken over Europe
This global movement—there is something ironic about globalizing patriotism, but that contradiction does not seem to matter much to its leaders—parts from the rise of the so-called alt-right in the middle of the last decade.
Steve Bannonin addition to supporting Trump’s first candidacy and being his main advisor for years, dedicated a good part of his political activity to consolidating far-right alternatives in liberal countries. The collaboration and money from the Kremlin were not lacking in the process.
Thus, Trump’s election in 2016 coincided in time with the British Brexit and with the unexpected victory of the National Front in the French European elections.
Although, based on democratic dams, attempts have been made to isolate these forces and keep them away from power, the short-term prospects are not very promising for the moderate parties.
The National Group of Marine Le Pen y Jordan Bardella leads the polls in France, the Reform UK of Nigel Farage does the same in the United Kingdom, while the Alternative for Germany (AfD) competes with the chancellor’s CDU Friedrich Merz for first place. In the former GDR it is already by far the most voted party.
If we add to that that Giorgia Meloni already governs in Italy – although the initial bet of Bannon and Vladimir Putin out Matteo Salviniit can be said that populism is in luck… although its greatest reference in Europe, Viktor Orbánis going through a bad streak in the polls.
As for Spain, Vox maintains excellent voting prospects, although not at the level of its traveling companions. Even so, the inability of the two great parties of liberal democracy, PP and PSOE, to agree on absolutely anything, makes them, along with the nationalist and left-wing populists, a key element in the governability of the country.
Donald Trump during the White House Cabinet meeting.
Goodbye to the Atlantic Alliance?
Beyond words, there are actions. Just this Friday, it emerged that the Pentagon had informed its European partners of the need for them to take charge of most of NATO’s conventional defenses by 2027.
Obviously, the deadline, such as the 5% of GDP in defense investment, is unmet. Either this is a way to put pressure on their allies or, more likely, they are looking for excuses to step aside and leave the Alliance.
Already during his first term, according to the then National Security Advisor, John Boltonin his book The room where everything happenedTrump even gave the order to immediately leave NATO, considering that Europe was taking advantage of the United States economically and militarily.
Bolton reported the decision to the Pentagon, which prepared the disconnection protocols, but the president suddenly changed his mind again.
The idea of abandoning Europe to its fate is based on a lack of historical knowledge inappropriate for leaders of a superpower. Last week, one of President Trump’s court advisors, journalist Tucker Carlsonsaid he did not understand why England had gone to war with Adolf Hitler if the only thing the German intended was to “fight communism.”
As if it had not existed Neville Chamberlainneither the Munich Conference, nor the Molotov-Von Ribbentrop pact nor Pearl Harbor would have been a perfect example of what it means to side with the imperialist powers: sooner or later, it is your turn.
The fight against woke seems to legitimize any rancid authoritarianism. A Europe in which each country became an island would lead to the same conflicts that devastated the continent until the Second World War.
It was the United States who then brought sanity and who promoted, with its policies, its money and its soldiers, the creation of the UN, the European Union and the fight against Soviet totalitarianism. A totalitarianism that now seems to be back, but that is received with enthusiasm from the other side of the Atlantic. As if it wasn’t going to affect them. As if 1941 had never existed.