For years, European leaders have worried about reducing their dependence on a rebel from the United States. On Monday, during a meeting in a hurry in Paris, the maneuver gave way to the artificial acceptance of a new world where the most powerful ally in Europe began to behave more as an opponent.
The plan of President Trump to negotiate a peace agreement in Ukraine with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, with neither the Ukrainians nor the Europeans invited to take part, has forced stunned leaders in capital such as Berlin, London and Paris painful compromises e new expensive weights.
Already on the table there is the possibility that Great Britain, France, Germany and other countries deploy tens of thousands of troops in Ukraine as Peacekeeper. European governments are affirming the need for serious increases in their military budgets – if not 5 percent of the gross domestic product required by Mr. Trump, then at the levels not seen by the days of the cold war of the early 80s.
“At the moment everyone is enthusiastic, understandably,” said Lawrence Freedman, professor of war studies emeritus at King’s College in London. “What is clear is that anything happens, Europe will have to intensify.”
This could put its leaders in a difficult point. While public support for Ukraine remains strong throughout Europe, committing troops to a potentially dangerous duty on Ukrainian soil could quickly become an internal political responsibility. The estimates of the size of a peace maintenance force vary widely, but in any scenario, it would be an extremely expensive undertaking at the time of restricted budgets.
President Emmanuel Macron of France, who for the first time flooded the idea of a peace maintenance force last year – widespread skepticism in Europe – was weakened by his decision to call the parliamentary elections last summer failed And he left him with a fragile government.
Germany may not have a new coalition government for weeks after its elections on February 23. On Monday, his chancellor, Olaf Scholz, rejected Peacekeeper’s speech as “completely premature” and “highly inappropriate” while the fights continued to infuriate.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer of Great Britain, who does not face voters for four years, said that Great Britain was open to “put our troops on the ground, if necessary”. But former military officials said that after years of budget cuts, the British soldiers were not equipped to conduct a large -scale long -term mission in Ukraine.
“Frankly, we don’t have the numbers and we don’t have the equipment,” Richard Dannatt, former head of the British army, told BBC. He estimated that Great Britain should have provided up to 40,000 troops to a force of 100,000 people.
For some Europeans, it is too early to talk about a post-American era on the continent. The Prime Minister of Scholz and Poland, Donald Tusk, warned the leaders not to pay the transatlantic alliance, whatever the current tension.
As a practical question, a peace maintenance force would be difficult without the logistical support of the United States. The American security guarantees, analysts said, have been crucial to make it politically acceptable in European capitals, in which some leaders will have to overcome approval from their parliaments. Starmer spoke of an “American backstop”, saying that it was “the only way to effectively dissuade Russia from attacking Ukrainian again”.
Professor Freedman said he believed that high officials of the Trump administration such as the Secretary of State Marco Rubio and the National Security Councilor, Michael Waltz, understood those realities and were not willing to pull the American security umbrella from Europe. But he said that Mr. Trump’s goals were more difficult to decipher; His push for power not interpreted at home was deeply alarming for the Europeans.
“In the past, you thought this was a serious and competent country,” said Professor Freedman. “It is unnerving to think that it may not be the case. There is the feeling that the guardrails are not there. “
At the Safety Conference of Monaco last week, vice -president JD Vance kept a speech from blisters in which he urged Europeans to stop avoiding the far -right parties and accused them of suppressing freedom of speech.
Those comments pushed the anguish among Europeans. “We must fear that our basis of common value is no longer so common,” said Christoph Heusgen, who chaired the conference. Mr. Heusgen, who was clearly emotional at the end of his speech, later clarified that his strong feelings were because he was leaving his work and was not a reaction to the comments of Mr. Vance.
Many Germans have seen Mr. Vance’s comments as a brazen electoral interference. The vice-president, who skipped a meeting with Mr. Scholz, found the time to meet the co-leader of the far-right alternative for the Germany party, or Afd, Alice Weidel. The traditional German parts refused to enter coalitions with the AFD, which German intelligence agencies classify as an extremist organization.
In the meantime, Trump has threatened to hit the European Union with large rates. This could damage the block economies, which would make it even more difficult to raise the shopping in defense. NATO Secretary General, Mark Rutte, invited the members of the alliance to increase their expenses to “considerably more than 3 %” of the gross domestic product (the United States spend 3.4 percent).
In 2023, Germany spent 1.5 percent of its gross donkey product in defense, while France spent 2.1 percent and Great Britain by 2.3 percent.
In addition to political and economic provocations, European leaders are struggling to make sense of the strategy of the Trump administration for Ukraine. Hegseth’s observations have reported a reduction in American support for Ukraine war goals, which European leaders are pently but recognize to share.
However, the Treasury Secretary Scott Besent, during a visit to the Ukrainian capital, Kiev last week, suggested that the United States could provide a “long -term security shield” for Ukraine, provided that he had obtained the ‘access to the precious minerals of the country. Trump’s announcement of the negotiations between him and Putin has blinded the European leaders and the president Volodymyr Zelensky from Ukraine.
“A contradiction crosses the United States approach”, Nigel Gould-Davies, Senior Fellow for Russia and Eurasia at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a research group in London, wrote in an online essay. “He reported that the United States alone will treat the end of the war, but also that Europe alone has to pay and enforce a result that has not played a role in deciding.”
This assumes that Mr. Trump can conclude an agreement with Mr. Putin. Analysts note that the United States have already granted Russia two important concessions – excluding Ukrainian adhesion to NATO and suggesting that it is not realistic for Ukraine to claim all its territory – without receiving anything in return.
Some compared Mr. Trump’s approach to his nuclear diplomacy with the leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-un, during his first term. Meeting Mr. Kim in Singapore, Mr. Trump gave him a precious concession – no more military exercises between the United States and South Korea – without obtaining a mutual gesture. The negotiations remained outside and North Korea has not yet given up its nuclear arsenal.
In this case, analysts said, the probability against a rapid turning point could save the European leaders to have to commit troops, at least for now.
“Unless the position on the ground does not improve considerably to the advantage of Ukraine, it is difficult to imagine that Russia enrolls in an agreement that allows a large number of NATO troops – including British ones – on its border,” Malcolm said Chalmers, deputy director general of the Royal United Services Institute, a research group in London.
Professor Freedman said that Mr. Trump should have convinced Mr. Putin to accept the acceptable terms for Mr. Zelensky – an extremely long shot.
“We are very far from the circumstances in which it makes sense,” he said of a peace maintenance force. “I can’t overcome the incompatibility between what Trump can offer and what the Russians want.”