Europe cannot rely on Trump’s protection – it must take the lead on defence

Even if it was through gritted teeth, most world leaders sent warm, boilerplate congratulations to Donald Trump after his decisive victory in the presidential election. Conscious of his love of flattery, the restoration of the stable genius to power was generally commended in uncomplicated, lavish terms.

The prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, who hardly needs to make the effort, was first out of the traps to salute the president-elect. President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, whose nation is about to be dismembered by Russia with American connivance, did his best to put a brave face on things.

British government ministers did their best to play down some embarrassing tweets dating back to Mr Trump’s first term in the White House, stressing the strength of the special relationship. Generally, diplomatic niceties were preserved.

Not so in the case of the French president and the German chancellor. The respective offices of Emmanuel Macron and Olaf Scholz made no secret of the fact that the election result had prompted crisis talks between Paris and Berlin. As a result, Mr Macron issued a rather pointed statement, in effect a joint communique: “We will work towards a more united, stronger, more sovereign Europe in this new context – by cooperating with the United States of America and defending our interests and our values.”

That, then, now serves as the context for the gathering of the European Political Community in Budapest, with Sir Keir Starmer in attendance. And it is the British who face the most difficult of dilemmas in balancing good relations with their closest trading partners and military allies – the EU and the US. Pre-Brexit, things were obviously simpler and better.

The UK’s trade and economic relationships were maintained in the wider EU partnership – and the sheer size of the bloc strengthened the Europeans’ collective bargaining strength. Within the EU and Nato, the British constituted an informal transatlantic bridge, something which helped British influence in Washington and in Brussels, as well as making British ministers feel a little more important. It worked well.

Now, the UK is having to make some more difficult choices about where its priorities and future interests lie – a more acute version of the long, post-imperial British dilemma of a medium-sized power looking for a new role in the world. In the case of trade and economics, the choice almost makes itself.

The EU, as a bloc, remains the main trading partner, and there is little chance of anything like a comprehensive US-UK Free Trade Agreement being concluded with Mr Trump, let alone being ratified by a deeply protectionist Congress.

The best that can be hoped for is that the UK will evade any punitive tariffs the Trump administration wants to impose on the European Union, and the retaliatory measures the EU will no doubt decide on in return. In this, highly likely scenario, the British would be the small creature cowering under a bush while the two elephants test each other’s strengths. The same applies to the blanket international tariffs Mr Trump is promising on the totality of American trade.

It will take considerable luck for the British to minimise the damage; “siding” with one faction or the other would probably make little difference to the outcome were it not for the British government’s powerfully avowed but perennially vague commitment to “reset” relations with the EU. If, as Sir Keir indicates, there is a real prospect of progress on migration and defence as well as on removing substantial trade barriers, then the British should cleave towards Brussels.

But such prizes remain more remote while the EU insists on conditions, such as free movement of young people, that the Labour government feels obliged to reject for domestic electoral reasons. Yet the truth of the implicit warning issued by Messrs Macron and Scholz is undeniable.

Mr Trump has made no secret of his reluctance to honour Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty and to risk US soldiers in a war to save Estonia, let alone Ukraine. It would be nice, in finer words, to think that the US would always stand with Britain as it has since 1941; and there’s no easy way of replacing American military power. But Europe, including Britain, has to look to its own resources for its own defence as America takes its isolationist turn and pivots its defence efforts towards the Indo-Pacific and China.

Of its nature as the loosest of clubs, the European Political Community has no power of decision making and nothing of immediate impact is likely to emerge from the Hungarian summit. However, the leaders of this disparate group of countries – from the most staunchly Atlanticist, such as Britain and Poland; the most “European”, including Italy and Spain; through the few remaining neutrals, such as Ireland and Switzerland; to the Russophiles of Serbia and Hungary – will be able to look one another in the eye.

In their conversations, and, in the most oblique terms, they must ask one another whose side they are on, whether they subscribe to the Macron-Scholz concept of a “sovereign Europe”, and how they will deal with Mr Trump. More than most, Sir Keir will find such questions troubling.