How will a Republican return to the White House affect European defence and the war in Ukraine?
Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election has cast a pall of uncertainty over the future of Ukraine. During his campaign, he had announced his intention to “end the war in Ukraine in 24 hours” if elected. Some experts believe that a fast-tracked agreement would be signed to the detriment of Kyiv.
“Mr. Trump has signalled his willingness and capacity to secure a super quick peace deal, which could very well imply that Kyiv would be forced to secure or to concede to Russian demands that it certainly doesn’t want to, to end the war”, Vassilis Ntousas, Head of European Operations at the German Marshall Fund’s Alliance for Securing Democracy, told Euronews.
In the corridors of the European Parliament, reactions are mixed.
Delighted by Donald Trump’s victory, António Tânger Corrêa hopes that the end of the war in Ukraine is near, while stressing the need to strengthen Europe’s defensive capabilities.
Calls for investement in European defence from both the right and left.
“I hope he’ll stop the war in Ukraine and that everybody likes the solution, number one. And we are not involved in that. As you know, we support Ukraine, but we are not directly involved in that,” the far-right Portuguese MEP (Patriots for Europe) told Euronews.
But Corrêa also called on Europe to invest in its defence industry: “You don’t have to go to war to have defence, but you prevent wars by having good defence”, he said.
Faced with the return of “America first” and American non-interventionism, Belgian MEP and former prime minister Elio Di Rupo (S&D) called on the old continent to develop “its own industrial policy in areas such as energy, security and defence.”
“There has not been a determination to be cutting edge in terms of new technologies and defence, with regards to our citizens’ own security,” he lamented.
“Today, we are totally dependent on the United States within NATO for our security. We must have our own capabilities. We are friends of the United States, but I don’t want to be the poodle of the United States”, he added.
While this may be a bitter pill for some, others in Brussels are hoping that Donald Trump’s victory will act as a wake-up call for Europe to finally take the initiative in its own security and defence.
