Authored by Conor Gallagher via NakedCapitalism.com,
Donald Trump is the gift that keeps on giving for the western misleadership class. Any anti-democratic swindle on the EU wish list is now being sold as a remedy to the Orange Man. (And if it’s not Trump, it’s Russia).
The US is no longer a reliable defense partner, they say.
We must give more power to Brussels and send untold billions to weapons companies.
The US is no longer a reliable economic partner, they say.
We must increase competitiveness by weakening labor and empowering finance.
The UK voters may have opted for Brexit, but London and Brussels are “defying Trump” with a “free and open trade” declaration that includes negotiations ‘on defense and security, fishing and energy, as well as a “common understanding” of which topics will be covered by intensive Brexit reset negotiations this year.’
The strange thing about these plans, however, is that they include reliance on US weapons and energy and alignment with US geopolitical and geoeconomic goals.
Let’s focus here on how the EU is pressing ahead with plans to dramatically increase defense spending due to Trump Abandonment Syndrome.
The EU Jazz Band
Recent commentary by Rosa Balfour, director of Carnegie Europe, perfectly sums up these arguments. In a piece titled “Europe Tried to Trump-Proof Itself. Now It’s Crafting a Plan B” she explains why the EU has no choice but to redirect social spending towards the arms industry.
Balfour’s romantic version of recent history starts on February 28. That’s when “the televised humiliation of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky” took place, and “Europe realized it could no longer rely on its longtime ally, the United States.” And here she is on the jazzy wreckage:
The shocking depth and breadth of this realization cannot be overemphasized. Political leaders in European states, the European Union, and NATO displayed composure and coordination, but behind the scenes, the soundtrack was a frantic free jazz jam session with dramatic thuds and a long pause—the silence at the realization that the European comfort zone was over.
And now, what are these composed and coordinated “political leaders” doing? They announce that Ukraine is Europe’s first line of defense, make grand plans for a “coalition of the willing,” and declare that Ukraine will become a “steel porcupine”
The coalition of the willing has fallen apart. The steel porcupine was ridiculed. And while those in the Kremlin likely aren’t losing any sleep, Europeans should be. That’s because, as Balfour writes, the European Commission “can play supporting roles by mobilizing financial resources and handling complicated in-house horse trading.”
That’s one way of putting it.
The Commission is inching its way towards invoking emergency powers to push through parts of its rearmament slush fund. It’s getting pushback from the European Parliament, but the fact is Ursula can do it anyways with minimal support from EU governments. She’s likely just waiting for the right moment. Let’s look at the status of the European militarization billions.
On March 19, the Commission introduced a 150 billion euro proposal — a first installment of what’s to be at least $900 billion— for establishing the Security Action for Europe (SAFE) through the reinforcement of European defence industry Instrument.
It wants to move forward with it under Article 122 emergency powers which need only a qualified majority in the Council —as opposed to the usual consensus— which allows Ursula and friends to get around pesky vetoes from member countries. The procedure for 122 is as follows:
1) the Commission proposes a Council measure; following which 2) the Council adopts the measure in line with [qualified majority voting]. No additional elements or participants are envisaged.
This article allows the proposal to bypass parliamentary negotiations and go straight to the Council for negotiation and adoption. The Parliament’s role is reduced to submitting suggestions and requesting debates.
How’s that for your democratic rules-based order?
In an April 23 secret vote, the European Parliament’s Committee on Legal Affair unanimously backed a legal opinion rejecting the Commission’s attempt to bypass it on a 150 billion euro rearmament fund.
While it is a non-binding vote, it does signal opposition to Ursula’s plan, but it’s not some principled stand for the will of the people or any romantic notion like that.
No, it’s more about dividing up slices of the pie as European weapons industry lobbyists are increasingly active in Brussels and are trying to make sure their clients are rewarded. And so much of the feeble opposition is over getting a stronger “buy European” clause in SAFE (it currently requires 65 percent of war consumables and complex systems to come from within the EU, Ukraine, or EEA/EFTA states, which includes Turkiye and Norway.
Why must Ursula’s commission sideline the Parliament and some member states in order to spend 900 billion on military purchases? They lay it out in their proposal. There’s the usual nonsense about Russia:
The EU and its Member States now face an intensifying Russian aggression against Ukraine and a growing security threat from Russia. It is also now clear that this threat will persist in the foreseeable future, considering that Russia has shifted to a war-time economy enabling a rapid scaleup of its military capabilities and replenishment of its stocks. The European Council therefore underlined, in its conclusions of 6 March 2025, that “Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine and its repercussions for European and global security in a changing environment constitute an existential challenge for the European Union”.
There’s also the Trump abandonment syndrome:
At the same time, the United States, traditionally a strong ally, is clear that it believes it is over-committed in Europe and needs to rebalance, reducing its historical role as a primary security guarantor.
One itching question is what happens to this latter selling point now that the Trump administration has tied itself to Ukraine through the so-called minerals deal, but surely if the European powers have made it this far on manufactured crises, they’ll be able to overcome that hurdle by pointing to Trump’s insistence on what they call an unjust peace for Ukraine.
And so “rearmament” by supranational emergency decree it must be—with Balfour from Carnegie and all the other plutocrat court jesters at the transatlantic think tanks cheering this on as a victory against the autocratic hordes outside the garden walls. Here’s Balfour again summarizing the mood among this crowd:
…a trajectory of change has been charted, and it has transformative potential—not just for the European continent, but also for the global reordering of post-American international relations. The jazz band has picked up rhythm, even if the melody is not fully harmonic.
I’m not sure if that’s music Balfour is listening to or the jangle of gold and silver. While it can be difficult to hear anything over the din coming from the elite ‘Spirit of 1914,’ there’s always one chord missing from the militarization genre. Surely Balfour, the jazz aficionado, must know that curiosity was considered one of the essential ingredients to the music. If we apply that to her extended jazz metaphor we might start asking some questions like:
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Why does the EU need to perform this whole militarization song and dance routine at all?
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Why can’t there be peace with Russia?
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Why did European nations help sabotage past Kiev-Moscow peace negotiations?
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Why did the EU help the US overthrow the government of Ukraine and use the country as a battering ram against Russia?
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Why does the EU elite so crave war with Russia?
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Is the EU not more secure and prosperous through friendly ties and trade with Russia?
And why must the EU, which collectively already ranks second in the world in defense expenditures, spend boatloads more? How much will make it safe, competitive, and independent?
These questions are never addressed. It’s simply treated as the natural order of things that Russia is the EU’s enemy and it must get big expensive weapons because Trump bad. The sad thing is, this relentless messaging pumped out of European media is working — at least according to the EU’s own polls. That wouldn’t be entirely surprising considering this message is endlessly pumped out of EU media.
Either way, European governments are running with it. Sixteen countries are asking the EU for fiscal leeway to spend big on defense — requests that are never made during the endless social austerity.
Yes, the citizens of the bloc will continue to see their standard of living fall, but don’t worry, EU enlargement and spending more on militarization will lead to more “competitiveness.” Can’t you feel it already:
Despite considerable hurdles for the European defense industry (and a brief cooling off period due to tariff shock), their stock prices are going through the roof as investors expect Brussels to come through with endless support.
About those hurdles…
Research by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) shows that Europe increased its imports of weapons two-and-a-half times over in the past five years compared with the previous five years with two-thirds coming from the US.
Even others at Carnegie Europe have doubts about the EU scheme. Here’s Judy Dempsey, nonresident senior fellow at Carnegie Europe:
Tell Poland. It is rapidly building up its defense infrastructure by purchasing American kits. When Warsaw wanted to shop elsewhere, like in South Korea, it came under huge pressure from Washington not to do so. This is an important point. The United States wants Europe to take more responsibility for its defense but not at America’s military industrial expense. It is a major military supplier of components to many European countries. Making that break would take time and a political will for Europe to build up a common defense and procurement strategy.
Beyond the considerable political pressure, there’s also the fact that lead times when it comes to defense capabilities are long. So part of the EU’s strategy is to send billions more to Ukraine so it can build up its defense industry. The rationale is that it is a far cheaper place to manufacture weapons than Western Europe, and it already has a defense manufacturing sector up and running. Okay, then.
But are there some chinks in that logic?
For one, Ukraine is now the world’s biggest arms importer, absorbing 8.8 percent of global transfers. Two, Russian Kinzhals might have a say in the output from Ukrainian weapons manufacturers.
It’s hard to see what this all does for European competitiveness, let alone the average Josef, Jose, or Giusseppe. Here’s Balfour on this should be sold to the proles:
Politically, to ensure public support for rearming Europe and to offset the inevitable costs, defense efforts ought to be part of a broader strategy of economic and technological innovation. Indeed, these efforts could boost Europe’s stagnant economy. At the EU level, the recipes are available in recent recommendations addressing competitiveness, productivity, and technological innovation.
Indeed, Trump’s first 100 days are pushing the EU to put some momentum behind projects that have been underway for years. Tying these objectives with the enlargement of the EU to include Ukraine, Moldova, and the Western Balkans adds a new perspective to upscaling the single market. Expanding the EU and deepening the relationship with other European countries—like the UK, Switzerland, and Norway—would counter the fragmentation that great power competition and political disruption at home are inflicting on the continent.
It’s scary for its rote, simplistic confidence. Nowhere in this hopeful Powerpoint is there an appearance of the considerable downsides, which at the more disastrous end of the spectrum happen to include the complete destruction of Europe.
Perhaps the best hope is that these fools’ plans for EU rearmament plans are just a giant racket. But one could say the same about the US military industrial complex, and look at what that has unfurled: endless death and destruction and numerous lost wars. One key difference between the transatlantic militarization schemes, however, is that the US is isolated between two oceans. The EU borders not only Russia, but also a collapsing neo-Nazi regime in Ukraine, making its embrace of a military-industrial complex a far riskier proposition.
Rackets have a way of taking on a life of their own. Indeed, one could argue the EU’s current trajectory is that of a zombie driven along by its Russophobia — and redistributing money upwards in the name of that hatred. Problem is that life expectancy isn’t long for zombies and those around them.
