“We will pay any price, bear any burden, face any difficulty, support any friend, confront any enemy to ensure the survival and success of liberty.” Thus, in his inaugural address on January 20, 1961, President John F. Kennedy declared the goals of his administration.
It was the height of the Cold War. For people in a divided Europe, the speech was electrifying. In retrospect, this grandiose ambition led to the excesses of the Vietnam War. But it also pointed to the ennobling idea of a superpower with a moral purpose.
Despite all the failures, people continued to believe in this goal: unlike the Nazis and Communists, the United States believed in freedom and democracy.
For no people was this commitment more significant than for the Europeans. This ultimately led to the collapse of the Soviet empire, the liberation of Central and Eastern Europe, and a new era of unification, peace, and prosperity. As is often the case in history, hopes were disappointed. They have been thwarted by the rise of xenophobic and anti-democratic forces within Europe itself, by the resurgence of an authoritarian, vengeful and bellicose Russia, and by the seething hostility towards the central ideas of contemporary Europe from the second administration of Donald Trump.
The new “National Security Strategy of the United States of America” has many strange features. But the strangest and, for Europeans, the most worrying, is that they come to be considered the only ideological enemies of the United States. In the rest of the document, interests are treated as merely material and not ideological. Threats to democracy and freedom would now only come from the United States’ internal opponents and its closest allies.
Thus, it is asserted that the powers of the American government should never be “abused…under the guise of…’protecting our democracy’.” Just below (and this is no coincidence), the text declares: “We will oppose anti-democratic, elite-imposed restrictions on fundamental freedoms in Europe, in the Anglosphere and in the rest of the democratic world, particularly among our allies.”
Furthermore, “American diplomacy must continue to champion true democracy, freedom of expression, and unapologetic celebrations of the character and history unique to European nations. America encourages its political allies in Europe to promote this renewal of spirit, and the growing influence of European patriotic parties is, indeed, a reason for much optimism. »
The meaning is clear: America’s main goal in Europe is to help put right-wing “patriots” in power across the continent. Furthermore, some argue that any attempt to resist these parties would itself be undemocratic. It is worth remembering, however, that unlike the United States (so far), Europeans have painful memories of the consequences of granting right-wing extremists the right to seek power democratically. They still remember how Hitler came to power.
Unfortunately, this alliance between the United States and the European far right is entirely deliberate. The document affirms the desire to protect Europe from the “specter of civilizational elimination” promoted by the institutions of the European Union, from mass migration, from the censorship of “freedom of expression” and from the repression of political opposition. The message is explicit: “Our goal must be to help Europe correct its current trajectory. » How does the United States intend to “correct” this trajectory? This obviously helps today’s right-wing authoritarians, neofascists, and Putin admirers rise to power.
Much of the rest of the document seems empty or ridiculous. For example, there is no coherent strategy for dealing with China. It also contains the firm belief that countries will continue to trust the United States, no matter how unfair, irrational and unpredictable its behavior is – especially with regard to tariffs and other means of obtaining concessions. This suggests that the United States can impose a subordinate status on South America despite China’s growing influence. He is convinced that American technological supremacy will survive the country’s war on science and racist hostility toward immigrants.
But one statement is actually important: “We reject the disastrous ideologies of “climate change” and “net zero” that have so harmed Europe, threaten the United States, and subsidize our adversaries. » This is therefore a way of entrusting the future to China.
For Europeans especially, this new strategy is the most significant. This shows that they are alone in defending Ukraine. Worse still: it shows that the US wants to dismantle the EU as an institution and hand over power to the sycophants of Trump and Putin. It will be extremely difficult for Europeans – marked by learned helplessness, fragmented and traumatized by the memories of two world wars – to react. But there is no alternative but collapse. Much of this also applies to the United Kingdom, which decided to embark on Brexit at a time that proved disastrous.
What to do then? The immediate goal must be to support Ukraine, by whatever means necessary and by whatever means possible, towards a just and stable peace. Europe must also create an effective counterpoint to Russian threats. An excellent proposal from Philipp Hildebrand, Hélène Rey and Moritz Schularick on “European defense governance and financing” goes exactly in this direction.
As I reread Kennedy’s words, I imagined a satirical version of Trump: “We will demand any sum, impose any burden, inflict any hardship, oppose any friend, and befriend any enemy to secure the wealth and power of myself, my family, and my friends.” »
But even if Trump were as self-centered and transactional as that, the Maga movement is not. Noah Smith asserts that “the American right values Europe because it sees it as a white Christian homeland.” If today’s liberal Europe is to survive, these reactionary fantasies must be confronted and defeated.
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