The Transatlantic Alliance Is Dying—What Comes Next for Europe?

With US power in retreat, Europe must decide: unite, or face irrelevance in a dangerous world.

The last great constant of the postwar order is breaking before our eyes. What set American hegemony apart from the old colonial empires and the former Soviet bloc—or at least what once distinguished it—was the United States’ willingness to invest in a system of voluntary alignment. States were, as a rule, not coerced into submitting to the US-led order. They retained the freedom to place themselves under the protection of American power. Washington was prepared to involve Europeans as (junior) partners in maintaining a global order dominated by Western interests. While the relationship was not one of equals, the United States still took allied interests into account. This was not a system of subjugation but of integration—one in which every state acknowledged US leadership but retained the capacity to articulate its own concerns.

For the United States, this voluntary cooperation with weaker nations was a source of strength. American dominance rested not only on military and economic power, but also on the attractiveness of a democratic community of values—a coalition that offered allies respect and a voice. The construction of multilateral institutions like the United Nations, the IMF, the World Bank, the WHO, the WTO, and NATO after World War II was a diplomatic masterpiece by the American superpower.

States do not want to be at the mercy of others. That is why many countries favour a rules-based world order, even when those rules skew in favour of the powerful. In a multilateral system, even the smallest nations have a voice. That voice may carry little weight, but small states can seek to make themselves heard and, in concert with others, wield influence.

Under Joe Biden, US support for Ukraine was an attempt to reassert American leadership of the West in the 21st century. The new US administration sees it differently. For years, America has been rightly criticized for its double standards on human rights. Yet in the face of an “America First” policy devoid of standards altogether, it becomes clear how valuable it is when the powerful feel at least an obligation not to ignore principles of democracy and human rights altogether. International law and the postwar order—largely crafted by the United States—no longer seem to guide the thinking of the new President and his circle.

Many experts are tearing their hair out. Surely, any rational person should see that the old hegemonic system is better even for the US itself. But this view is rooted in a bygone era of transatlantic consensus. The humiliation of Western democratic leaders in Europe and Canada is easier to grasp when viewed through the lens of America’s domestic political struggle. To Trump and his Republican allies, Europeans lean toward the camp of Biden and Obama rather than Trumpism—siding, in other words, with those Trump fights at home. In a friend-enemy framework, yesterday’s allies become today’s opponents. To Trump and the American right, the liberal democracies of Europe are not friends but potential enemies of their domestic agenda. Regime change in these nations is part of a new hegemonic strategy that fuses plutocratic power expansion with a cultural counter-revolution. Or, as JD Vance quipped in Munich: The firewall against the AfD is more dangerous than China or Russia.

But beyond political shifts in the US, Europe’s diminishing significance also contributes to the decline of the transatlantic partnership as the core of Western hegemony. Beneath the surface of institutional continuity, power dynamics have shifted. It is anachronistic that France and Britain retain their Security Council vetoes or that Europeans and Americans still claim the top posts at the IMF and World Bank. Over the past 45 years, the EU’s share of global GDP has fallen from 27 percent to 14.5 percent, while China’s has risen from 2 percent to 19 percent. In 1960, Europe accounted for 20 percent of the world population; today, it is just 9 percent. Europe has literally lost value and weight as a strategic partner to the US.

The sympathy of rising powers in the Global South—India, Indonesia, South Africa, Brazil—for a multipolar world stems partly from the reluctance of the established powers to adapt the rules of the international system to new realities. UN Security Council reform is stalled; the industrialized nations shirk their fair share of the climate burden; and they resist offering developing countries better terms for agricultural exports under the WTO. Trump’s decision to engage Russia over Ukraine and Europe’s heads is a public rebuke of Europe and a disaster for both Ukraine and Volodymyr Zelenskyy. For three years, Ukrainian diplomacy has been uncompromising—legally barring talks with Putin, insisting on maximalist peace terms predicated on Russian defeat, and publicly criticizing allies for insufficient arms deliveries. Western leaders, in unison, declared that only Ukraine could decide on peace, its territorial integrity was non-negotiable, NATO membership was coming, and any ceasefire rewarding Russian aggression was unacceptable.

Trump now makes clear that those with power call the shots. With Trump’s election, Zelenskyy has retreated from one position after another: admitting the occupied territories cannot be reclaimed militarily, seeking security guarantees instead of NATO membership, and finally, signalling readiness to negotiate with Putin. Trump has been offered Ukrainian resources to pay for US arms. No blame should fall on Zelenskyy—appeasing America is his only choice. The mercantile pivot is stark: the US now demands 50 percent of Ukraine’s mineral wealth in return for military aid, without linking this extraction deal to security guarantees.

Speculating about alternative Ukrainian strategies over the past three years is futile. Ukraine is now in a position of desperate weakness. Trump knows Ukraine has no choice but to accept whatever the US and Russia agree upon. Europe is reduced from junior partner to auxiliary force just asked to fill in a questionnaire on security guarantees for Ukraine. The impotence of European militaries underscores NATO’s reality: everyone shares costs, but only the US holds the military keys.

Unlike China, Russia, or the US, Europe can only survive as a multilateral project. The EU is the most successful supranational community of values and cooperation, an antithesis to the neo-nationalisms of other powers. It stands as a liberal countermodel to party dictatorship, plutocracy, and kleptocracy. Europe is both the most attractive and fragile of the great political forces—which is why rivals agree on weakening it. Ironically, Europe’s right-wing nationalists are courted by both Trump and Putin.

Everything now hinges on Germany. A European response is impossible without Berlin, and even with its best intentions, it will be a Herculean task. European states are weighing integration against national self-interest. From an American perspective, Europe is weakened most if Germany and France are punished while others—for example Poland, Italy, Hungary—are rewarded. Imagine high tariffs on German cars paired with duty-free access for goods from other European countries.

Germany must choose: invest in Europe as a power or carve out a national niche. If it seeks to avoid sliding into voluntary irrelevance, it must lead generously and cooperatively. This means joint debt for industrial policy and defence, majority decisions in foreign and security policy, fiscal alignment, investment in social peace and participation in peacekeeping in Ukraine..

Europe’s deepening and transformation cannot be brokered in Brussels backrooms while nationalist sentiments reign outside. We need public mobilization for Europe as a bastion of freedom, security, social justice and democracy. That demands smart politics, compromise, and charismatic leadership. The hour calls for nothing less.