Europe’s Trump dilemma: must it de-risk from both the US and China at once?
With the transatlantic alliance on life support, a new debate is raging in Europe about whether it should decouple from the United States.
Sparked by US President Donald Trump’s move to cut aid and intelligence-sharing with Ukraine, influential voices have questioned whether depending on the US for security, weaponry or information is a risk to be avoided.
The sudden geopolitical shock led many to speculate that Europe’s relations with China may receive a sudden boost – an outlook that is unlikely to change significantly in the wake of Trump’s apparent flip-flop this week on his Ukraine policy.
But while EU leaders have voiced a willingness to improve ailing ties to Beijing, its squadrons of bureaucrats are pushing ahead with long-planned moves to cut what they see as dangerous dependencies on Chinese supplies.
Through a series of policy moves and public comments in recent days, it appears that Brussels’ plans to de-risk from China are moving forward – even as it faces calls to do the same with Washington.
For some, it has raised a question that would have seemed implausible just six months earlier: must Europe de-risk from both of the world’s economic superpowers at once?