The Munich Security Conference is rightly at the top of the news, as it is rightly considered one of the most important international forums for defense and geopolitical issues. The high-level participation over time proves the truth of the word. From the height of the Cold War in 1963, which began, until today, it sets the tone for international developments.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the East-West Cold War, the conference has been organized both thematically and geographically (ed. It focused mainly on the Euro-Atlantic framework), while this year’s organization is of critical importance. The policy of the Trump administration is in full swing, challenging decades of stability in the international system. The key question is the new European security architecture, with the US less present and the main responsibility passing into purely European hands.
However, the war in Ukraine is not over, while the way in which the relations of the united Europe with the Russian Federation will develop will obviously determine the new balances on the Old Continent. It was in 2007 in Munich when Russian President Putin launched an attack on American policy that referred to a unipolar international system, inaugurating the period of Russian reaction with Ukraine at the center. Everything indicated that its integration into NATO, after the Baltic Republics, was the new central Western goal.
In 2014, after the annexation of Crimea by Russia, the conference became a central forum for confrontation between the West and Moscow. In the years that followed, neither side stepped on the brakes. In February 2022 -and- the warning that war was coming was broadcast from Munich. And so it happened. Now, the conference has turned into a forum for coordinating Western support for Ukraine. But with Trump’s America, the situation has changed fundamentally…
The time when Europe raised its head with America’s back is irrevocably gone. This is the message that Trump administration officials are sending. Even if the Democrats return to power, it is difficult to imagine dramatic changes in the substance of policy. Apart from those in style, which are not without significance.
Despite the conflict, the essential difference with the Republicans on high-strategy issues is smaller than many imagine. For example, both recognize China as a real geopolitical competitor and wish to have Russia on their side to address the challenge. At the same time, they would prevent the implementation of the basic nightmare geopolitical scenario of strategic cooperation between two great powers of Eurasia.
Republicans and Democrats have not moved away from the Anglo-Saxon geopolitical school of Mackinder, Spykman, Mahan, etc. It’s just that the Democrats went one step further. They tried to achieve regime change in Russia before Washington and Moscow aligned, motivated not only by ideological calculations.
The Ukrainian adventure fits into this context. While it is a strategic problem for Europe, for the planetary competition of the truly powerful it is a tactical issue. The Americans succeed in attrition-weakening Russia, the Chinese also benefit manifoldly from the forced priority of the Western front for Moscow.
Washington, under Republican leadership, understands the need to end the war, as it does not want Moscow’s dependence on Beijing to deepen and fears that it may become permanent. However, it is not easy for the US to sell this new goal to European capitals, changing the message that the US was sending with a Democratic president.
We are somewhere here. The turmoil is strong and the time of the change of governments on the Old Continent will probably determine the point of equilibrium that will lead to the final disengagement from the war. In the meantime, let’s watch the… cute exchanges of views between the leaders. To establish that the era of the rules-based “international order” has come to an end…
It is also to establish, after many doubts, that the US is not going to abandon Europe. They will simply force Europeans to take responsibility for security – and the costs it entails – but achieving increased levels of European “strategic autonomy” will reopen debates that we thought had been permanently buried in the dustbin of history.
- How destabilizing is the size of a united Germany for European security?
- How will there be an autonomous European nuclear umbrella?
- How will Germany be prevented from seeking its own nuclear option?
- And if today it exorcises concerns with Merz-type leadership, will the same happen if more right-wing nationalist parties are lurking?
