Amid global demand for Patriot interceptors, Lockheed Martin recently unveiled its most advanced interceptor, the PAC-3 Edge, which could offer improved performance against ballistic missiles and hypersonic threats.

EurAsian Times takes a deep dive into the evolution of Patriot Air Defense Systems, but before that, let’s start with the news.

PAC-3 EDGE

The new interceptor missile builds on the combat-proven PAC-3 MSE technology, which has proven its worth in multiple conflicts, including Ukraine and the Middle East.

The new PAC-3 Edge incorporates a new seeker, an upgraded control system, and a more advanced solid rocket motor developed with Northrop Grumman.

These new features will improve the missile interceptor’s range, altitude, speed, and precision.

It is part of the US Army’s Future Interceptor program, which is currently in competition.

“The Army’s decision to progress Lockheed Martin into the next stage of development affirms its confidence in Lockheed Martin’s proven Integrated Air and Missile Defense (IAMD) experience and the company’s ability to deliver an advanced, layered defense,” the company said in a statement.

Lockheed Martin will advance development and begin testing PAC-3 Edge in 2027 to prepare for rapid deployment by 2031, it added.

“Lockheed Martin’s PAC-3 Edge interceptor leverages the combat-proven PAC-3 MSE, delivering even greater maneuverability, power and velocity to ensure the Army’s layered defensive architecture remains the most advanced in the world,” said Tim Cahill, Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control president.

PAC-3 interceptors come in three variants: the lower-cost PAC-3 ACE, legacy PAC-3 CRI, and the prestigious PAC-3 MSE.

The company said it invested US$250 million in the Strigo Product Center to fund new, industry-leading seeker technology that increases precision and maneuverability against evolving threats.

PAC-3 Edge is designed to be integrated with existing and future Integrated Air and Missile Defense (IAMD) capabilities, including the Integrated Battle Command System (IBCS), the M903 launcher, containerized launchers, and HIMARS Flex.

The US Army’s selection of Lockheed Martin’s PAC-3 Edge program highlights the service’s efforts to improve its existing layered air defense systems to address evolving aerial threats.

While the company did not provide technical details of the new seeker technology, analysts believe that it could be a dual-mode or multimode configuration that integrates multiple sensors to better detect, track, and intercept evolving threats such as hypersonic cruise missiles, hypersonic glide vehicles (HGVs), maneuvering ballistic missiles, and the ability to distinguish real threats from decoys.

In the war in Ukraine, while the PAC-3 MSE interceptors have proved highly effective in countering ballistic missiles and aircraft, they have struggled to intercept Russia’s hypersonic missiles, such as Oreshnik, Zircon, and Kinzhal.

Furthermore, while PAC-3 MSE interceptors were highly effective against ballistic threats in the initial phase, their performance gradually declined as Russia adapted its missiles to perform increasingly complex terminal maneuvers.

According to a Financial Times report based on Ukrainian Air Force data compiled by the Center for Information Resilience, Patriot interceptors’ ballistic interception rate reached 37% in August 2025 but fell to a low of 6% in September.

This decline was linked to Russian tactical improvements, such as missiles changing trajectory and missiles capable of performing terminal maneuvers.

However, despite this drop in interception rates, Patriot batteries remain Ukraine’s only defense against Russian ballistic threats.

The new PAC-3 Edge interceptors will provide increased protection against such maneuvering missile threats and hypersonic missiles.

Notably, the unveiling of new PAC-3 Edge interceptors comes as global demand for PAC-3 interceptors has increased, and Lockheed Martin is establishing new facilities to raise its interceptor production rate.

Lockheed produced nearly 620 interceptors in 2025; however, it plans to triple Patriot interceptor production to 2000 by 2030.

Patriot PAC-3 interceptors are also included in the Pentagon’s Munitions Acceleration Council (MAC), which is targeting 12 legacy and two “emerging” munitions as part of its ambitious plan to ramp up production and ink a series of agreements with key vendors to ensure cost efficiency while maintaining production stability, according to fiscal 2027 budget documents.

Rising global demand for PAC-3 interceptors, requests from multiple countries to establish Patriot interceptor production facilities, and the unveiling of the advanced PAC-3 Edge interceptors underscore the Patriot air and missile defense system’s continued relevance more than four decades after it first became operational.

The Evolution Of Patriot Air Defense Systems

The MIM-104 Patriot is the US Army’s primary air-and-missile defense system.

Although it was initially designed as an anti-aircraft system, newer Patriot variants can engage ballistic and cruise missiles, drones, loitering munitions, and aircraft.

A typical Patriot battery includes a radar set, an engagement control station, power generation, other support vehicles, and several launch stations.

The US Army Missile Command first developed the Patriot concept in 1961 as the Army Air Defense System for the 1970s (AADS-70s).

The AD system was meant to be mobile and replace the static HAWK and Nike Hercules emplacements.

In 1964, the US Army renamed it Surface-to-Air Missile, Development (SAM-D).

Three years later, in 1967, the Department of Defense selected Raytheon as the prime contractor. SAM-D’s first flight test took place in November 1969.

Although Raytheon won the prime SAM-D contract in 1967, it did not build everything alone. Martin Marietta joined early as a major subcontractor to handle missile assembly, launcher vehicles, and canister production.

In 1974, the Department of Defense reoriented the SAM-D program to support a Track-Via-Missile (TVM) guidance system and a simplified concept of operations.

The revised and re-engineered system was renamed PATRIOT (Phased Array Tracking Radar to Intercept On Target) in 1976.

Patriot entered full-rate production in September 1980, and the US Army activated its first Patriot missile battalion in May 1982.

The Army added significant upgrades to the Patriot system throughout the 1980s and 1990s.

In 1985, the Department of Defense (DoD) started efforts to add a ballistic missile defense capability to the system.

In 1986, the Army upgraded Patriot to the Patriot Advanced Capability-1 (PAC-1) standard, which included software changes that allowed it to engage tactical ballistic missiles.

The PAC-1 was deployed by 1988.

Soon, the US Army began efforts towards the PAC-2 standard, which involved modifications to the missile fuze, warhead, and guidance to engage more capable ballistic missiles like the Soviet OTR-23.

The Patriot system first saw combat service during the 1991 Gulf War, defending critical assets in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Israel. The PAC-2 missiles were used to intercept Iraq’s Scud missiles.

Martin Marietta built the PAC-2 interceptors.

In 1993, the US Army added remote launch capability to Patriot systems, allowing missile launchers to be deployed over 10 km from the radar. This also more than tripled the system’s defended area.

Later, the US Army also developed the PAC-3 standard.

The most significant PAC-3 upgrade was a new interceptor with hit-to-kill technology, developed by Lockheed, which defeats targets by striking them directly rather than using a blast-fragmentation warhead.

Lockheed achieved the first-ever hit-to-kill intercept in 1984 with the Homing Overlay Experiment, using impact force alone to destroy a mock warhead outside Earth’s atmosphere. Further development and testing produced today’s PAC-3 missile, which won a 1993 competition to become the US government’s first hit-to-kill interceptor.

In 1995, Lockheed Corp merged with Martin Marietta to create one of the US’s largest defense aerospace companies, combining two key components of the Patriot program: Martin Marietta’s established Patriot infrastructure and production facilities and Lockheed’s cutting-edge hit-to-kill technology.

This newly formed mega-contractor rolled out the PAC-3 missile interceptor.

The PAC-3 standard itself included three distinct configurations, Configuration 1, 2, and 3, which improved its radar, seeker, and range.

The US declared PAC-3 Configuration 3 combat-ready in August 2002.

PAC-3 Configuration 3 had its first combat test in 2003 during Operation Iraqi Freedom.

In 2010, the US Army successfully tested an upgraded PAC-3 interceptor, the PAC-3 Missile Segment Enhancement (MSE).

According to CSIS’s Missile Threat, the PAC-3 MSE features an enlarged motor and other enhancements to nearly double the PAC-3’s range. It achieved initial operational capability in late 2016.

The PAC-3 also features an active Ka-band radar seeker for endgame guidance. With its lighter weight and newer propulsion system, the PAC-3 can reportedly defend an area seven times greater than the PAC-2.

Patriot currently employs a single AN/MPQ-53, AN/MPQ-65, or AN/MPQ-65A radar set to detect and engage targets. Unlike other air defense systems, the Patriot radar combines surveillance, tracking, and engagement in a single unit.

The AN/MPQ-53 was the world’s first phased-array air defense radar and was employed with legacy PAC-2 systems.

The AN/MPQ-65A is the most advanced Patriot radar; however, the US Army is currently transitioning to use the new Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense Sensor (LTAMDS) radar, which offers 360-degree coverage and significantly greater detection range.

Furthermore, while the AN/MPQ-53 and -65-series radars are passively scanned arrays, LTAMDS is an active electronically scanned array (AESA) that uses gallium nitride (GaN) power amplifiers, offering greater jamming resistance, beam agility, and power efficiency than previous systems.

360-degree coverage is essential to counter Russia’s evolving “wolf-pack tactics,” which involve launching dozens of aerial targets simultaneously, including drones and ballistic and cruise missiles, that approach from different directions and strike at once.

Only the US and Poland are procuring the LTAMDS at present. In September, the US awarded a US$1.7 billion contract to produce nine radars for the two users.

Currently, 18 countries operate the Patriot AD system. These include the Netherlands, Germany, Japan, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Taiwan, Greece, Spain, South Korea, the UAE, Ukraine, Qatar, Romania, Sweden, Poland, and Bahrain.

In 2023, the US allowed countries to transfer Patriot batteries to Ukraine, where they have repeatedly intercepted Russian ballistic and hypersonic missiles.

For instance, on May 16, 2023, the Ukrainian Air Force claimed it used Patriot to intercept a salvo of six Kinzhal missiles over Kyiv.

However, rising global demand for PAC-3 MSE interceptors and Russia’s adaptive missile technology, which involves terminal-phase maneuvers, have necessitated a two-pronged strategy: boosting PAC-3 interceptor production and developing more advanced interceptors.

The PAC-3 Edge will keep the Patriot AD system relevant amid evolving aerial threats.

• Sumit Ahlawat has over a decade of experience in news media. He has worked with Press Trust of India, Times Now, Zee News, Economic Times, and Microsoft News. He holds a Master’s Degree in International Media and Modern History from the University of Sheffield, UK. 
• He can be reached at ahlawat.sumit85 (at) gmail.com

The post New U.S. Missile Aims To Outmaneuver Russia’s Maneuvering Missiles: Here’s Patriot’s Evolution to PAC-3 Edge appeared first on EURASIAN TIMES.

There is now a growing debate over what constitutes war and whether it should include strikes on data centers. They represent a new front in warfare, in which facilities powering the technology behind many critical industries have become targets.

As it is, the definition of a military attack seems to be changing over time.

Conventionally, it was understood to occur when tanks or fighter planes crossed a border. Then it was expanded to include the use of missiles that were fired without crossing the border but hitting a city and causing physical destruction of “vital infrastructure and death”.

Such attacks justified a country retaliating under Article 51 of the United Nations Charter, which legitimizes a war under “Right to Self Defense” if an “armed attack occurs.”

Now there is a growing school of thought that “vital infrastructure” must include any disruptive attack on data centers, whether kinetic or non-kinetic, amounting to significant loss of function. It should be treated as a use of force and trigger the affected country’s right to self-defense under Article 51, the argument goes.

Apparently, vulnerabilities in modern digital infrastructure have turned data centers into primary targets in contemporary warfare. As society becomes deeply integrated with cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and automated logistics, data centers have evolved into the nervous system of modern statecraft.

Attacks on digital infrastructure are no longer limited to cyberattacks (non-kinetic) that cause banking collapses and disrupt vital systems like power grids and hospitals by cutting off Internet access; they now include kinetic strikes on data hubs that affect nations’ military capabilities and expose financial vulnerabilities.

After all, modern defense systems rely heavily on cloud-based logistics. Data centers process satellite imagery, coordinate drone operations, run predictive maintenance algorithms for fighter jets, and host classified communication networks. Thus, taking down these nodes effectively blinds an adversary’s command structure.

This has been noticed in the recent conflicts in the Middle East and Ukraine. For instance, on September 23, Russian Geran-5 jet drones hit the Inkom Business Center in Kyiv,  housing Datagroup’s data center. Four people died, and internet service for 100,000 households was down for hours.

On September 27, Kyivstar — Ukraine’s central mobile operator — and Vodafone Ukraine’s data centers were hit. Russia’s Defense Ministry  justified this by saying that “Data centers were being used for the benefit of the Ukrainian military.”

Two weeks later, Ukraine returned the favor. It launched highly targeted long-range drone strikes hitting major data hubs across Russia, inflicting significant disruption on the country’s digital economy.

Between October 8 and October 14, 2026, Ukrainian forces carried out a series of “symmetrical responses” to counter earlier Russian attacks on Ukrainian internet and telecommunications assets. The strikes specifically crippled infrastructure belonging to Yandex (often called “Russia’s Google”) and Sberbank, Russia’s largest banking and technology conglomerate.

Similarly, in February-March 2026, during US-Israeli strikes on Iran, the latter hit back not only at oil but at data centers — Google, Microsoft, and Oracle cloud infrastructure in the Gulf, particularly those located in Bahrain, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE.

Apparently, when Amazon Web Services’ Bahrain facility suffered “physical damage to cooling infrastructure from debris”, it became the first known case of an AWS data center damaged in an interstate war.

Iranian missiles near Al Udeid Air Base damaged an Oracle Cloud data center in Doha. Microsoft also confirmed “connectivity issues” in the Qatar Central region.

The same happened to the Google data center in Dammam, Saudi Arabia, which hosts Aramco cloud.

G42 [UAE AI company backed by Microsoft] data center in Abu Dhabi was also affected, forcing it into blackout mode.

In other words, from Kyiv to Bahrain, a pattern is clearly apparent  — belligerents no longer distinguish between cloud and command. Data centers that host banks and brigades are treated as brigades. They have officially transitioned from commercial tech infrastructures to critical national security assets.

As Omar Sultan Al Olama, the UAE’s Minister of State for Artificial Intelligence, Digital Economy, and Remote Work Applications, said the other day,  “Unfortunately, they’re more important than bridges. They’re more important than roads. They’re more important than tunnels because our whole lives are on these devices that we’re using”.

Incidentally, the UAE is revising plans for a 5-gigawatt AI data center project following the Iranian strikes. The original plan envisioned a 10-square-mile campus in Abu Dhabi, to be built in partnership with American tech companies like Oracle, Nvidia, and Cisco. Now the data centers will likely be spread out across the UAE. Sultan Al Olama said, “ The UAE will change its data centre rules and stop promoting where they are”.

According to Kirk Cameron, founding director of the Institute for Advanced Computing at Virginia Tech, “Data centers are now on the critical path for modern digital infrastructure. The loss of key data centers could collapse economies, disrupt public and private transportation with loss of GPS, and affect government essential services for health, emergency dispatch, and power grids.”

Many agree with him when he argues that  “Data centers are competitive advantages in warfare. Knocking out capabilities means potentially crippling combat operations for an adversary. It’s also a form of economic warfare and could lead to longer-term competitive challenges for the target.”

All this brings the question of whether bombing a data center constitutes an act of war.  Does the definition of war need to change?

The main challenge to this question lies in what is called the “Gray Zone” of conflict, particularly in non-kinetic attacks. Unlike a missile launch, which leaves clear radar signatures and identifiable points of origin, cyber operations offer plausible deniability.

Under International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Conventions, attacking a dual-use target is governed by the principles of distinction and proportionality.  Here, attacking a dual-use target is legal only if the military advantage gained outweighs the civilian collateral damage.

If an attack on a data center shuts down military communications but also disables the life-support monitoring systems of dozens of regional hospitals, the strike violates proportionality. Such an operation can be classified as a war crime, reinforcing the argument that major cyber infrastructure operations carry the same legal weight and consequences as traditional warfare.

But any clear distinction in such cases is neither easy nor free from contention. For instance, when Russia attacked data centers in Ukraine, it claimed that these were being used by Ukrainian intelligence and military. However, Ukraine denied the charge.

As  Kasia Klonowska, an authority on international law, says, “Due to a lack of a definition of the treaty- terms weapons, means or methods of warfare, it is unclear whether non-weaponized AI decision-support systems should be subjected to a legal review prescribed by Article 36 of the Additional Protocol I. It remains a challenge to determine exactly what should be subjected to review beyond weapons.

“You have very limited situations in which they would actually qualify as lawful targets when they’re used by the military, and even then, it’s very difficult for the attacker to know whether that’s happening or not. If they are purely processing military data, they could be legitimate targets. But many, if not most, are dual-use.”

To address the legal ambiguity surrounding digital warfare, Prof. Ben Hines has proposed what he calls a “Substantive Necessity” framework, reinterpreting international law under Article 51 of the UN Charter.

Under this framework, a non-kinetic cyber attack amounts to an armed attack when the victim state, based on clear and convincing evidence, apprehends a hostile act that has fundamentally compromised, or is imminently poised to compromise, the functioning or security of infrastructure crucial to the state’s ability to function.

The framework argues that traditional international legal thresholds for “force” and “gravity” do not inherently require physical destruction or kinetic weaponry. Under this test, taking down a country’s primary data center cluster that hosts banking, health, emergency dispatch, GPS — even without an explosion — is an armed attack. Because effects equal or exceed kinetic.

Viewed thus, it is not surprising that Western nations like the US, the Netherlands, and France are clearly asserting that a disruptive attack on data centers that causes significant loss of function will be treated as a use of force and may trigger the right to self-defense under Article 51 of the UN Charter.

In sum, as the line between the physical and digital worlds disappears, international law is adapting to treat high-consequence infrastructure attacks as equivalent to an armed attack.

Data centers are now firmly on the front lines of global conflict, where a single breach can serve as the definitive catalyst for war. The lines between civilian infrastructure and military assets are dangerously blurring.

• Author and veteran journalist Prakash Nanda is Chairman of the Editorial Board of the EurAsian Times and has been commenting on politics, foreign policy, and strategic affairs for nearly three decades. He is a former National Fellow of the Indian Council for Historical Research and a recipient of the Seoul Peace Prize Scholarship.
• CONTACT: prakash.nanda (at) hotmail.com

The post Iran Hit Amazon. Russia Struck Kyiv’s Data Centers. Ukraine Hit Yandex. Can Such Attacks Trigger Article 51? appeared first on EURASIAN TIMES.

Since it was established in 1956, Manuel’s Tavern in Atlanta has hosted legendary Democratic leaders while its founder played a key role in the city’s move from a Republican to Democratic stronghold. With the state’s Democratic Senator Jon Ossoff leading the polls in the midterms amid rumours of a future presidential run, the tavern is once more at the heart of the political action.   

Since it was established in 1956, Manuel’s Tavern in Atlanta has hosted legendary Democratic leaders while its founder played a key role in the city’s move from a Republican to Democratic stronghold. With the state’s Democratic Senator Jon Ossoff leading the polls in the midterms amid rumours of a future presidential run, the tavern is once more at the heart of the political action.   

The U.S. negotiates with Moscow and Europe is left commenting. Zakharova’s “none of her business” says it all.

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A Senate session

On October 14, 2026, in her address to the Senate ahead of the European Council, Giorgia Meloni did something that, until just a few years ago, would have seemed unthinkable for a right-wing Italian government: she publicly distanced herself from the President of the United States to defend a position even more uncompromising than his own. The issue at hand was the diesel fuel agreement announced by Donald Trump following a phone call with Vladimir Putin, accompanied by a temporary license from the U.S. Treasury that reopens the global market to Russian fuel. For the prime minister, this is a “very risky” decision: it legitimizes Moscow while bombs are falling on Ukrainian cities, provides it with new revenue, and weakens the leverage of sanctions. During the same session, Meloni argued that Putin is seeking a new enemy, and that that enemy could be Europe; and that a Ukraine that stopped defending itself would not achieve peace, but occupation.

So much for the news report. The rest was left to the chamber and the newspapers. The applause from the majority was joined by that of a portion of the opposition: Azione, Italia Viva, and the reformist wing of the Democratic Party. La Stampa framed support for Kiev as a matter of values and borders – those borders that “are being defended there.”

There is also a detail that speaks louder than many analyses. When questioned by ANSA, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova dismissed the prime minister’s remarks with a curt response: “It’s none of her business.” At the same time, Volodymyr Zelenskyy was in London, welcomed by Prime Minister Andy Burnham, and denouncing the restriction of military satellite services provided to the Ukrainian army. Elon Musk, for his part, clarified that the StarShield network belongs to the U.S. government and that any restrictions depend on the U.S. military and, ultimately, on the president. Washington deals with Moscow; Moscow responds to Washington. Rome applauds itself. Pathetic, isn’t it?

Not an exclusively Italian case

It would be a mistake to view the October 14 session as merely an episode of domestic politics. Italy’s stance is the national manifestation of a framework that today unites nearly all European capitals, and which has three rules. The first: the conflict in Ukraine is presented as an existential clash between political civilizations, in which any compromise amounts to surrender. The second: the Russian threat is projected beyond Ukraine, onto EU territory, so as to make rearmament an indisputable necessity. The third, the most insidious: internal dissent is attributed to the enemy’s influence.

Germany offers the clearest example. Defense Minister Boris Pistorius, who as early as 2023 had called for the country to become kriegstüchtig – capable of waging war – and who has since pointed to a timeframe of just a few years within which Russia could attack a member of the Alliance, has argued in recent days that the widespread fear of war in German society is being deliberately fueled by Putin and the AfD. This line of reasoning deserves attention. In a country that lost millions of lives in the two world wars, the fear of a new conflict would not need external agents to explain itself. Attributing it to Moscow and the main opposition party means transforming a legitimate political sentiment into a national security issue.

The same pattern is repeated elsewhere, albeit with different nuances. Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski claims credit for the results of Ukrainian attacks on Russian refineries and infrastructure; his German counterpart, Johann Wadephul, argues that now is not the time to ease sanctions, but to tighten them. France, Germany, and the United Kingdom are acting as a negotiating bloc, so much so that Meloni herself has asked that they do so at least with a formal mandate from all partners. These words are backed by numbers: the ReArm Europe plan presented by the Commission in March 2025; the commitment made at the NATO summit in The Hague to raise defense and security spending to 5% of GDP by 2035; and the 90-billion loan to Kiev approved by the European Council in December 2025. This rhetoric is not the eccentricity of some minister; it is literally the official language of the Union – and unfortunately, we have grown accustomed to it.

A foolish and counterproductive stance

Calling this approach foolish is not polemical hyperbole, if by “foolishness” we mean the stubborn persistence in repeating behavior that produces effects opposite to those declared. This is evident on three levels.

The first is strategic. Deterrence theory has taught us for decades that a threat is only as valuable as the credibility of the one making it, and that credibility depends on the ability to back up one’s words with action. Today’s Europe is raising the tone without having the tools to back it up. The Starlink affair has demonstrated this with almost textbook clarity: the Ukrainian military, which Europeans fund and encourage, depends for communications and drone guidance on infrastructure owned by an American company and controlled by the Pentagon. All it takes is a decision in Washington for part of the operations to grind to a halt. Promising victory in a war where one does not control the satellites is a form of strategic hypocrisy, and adversaries see it for what it is.

The second aspect is economic, of course. As early as 2024, Mario Draghi’s report on European competitiveness identified the energy price differential with the United States as one of the factors behind the continent’s industrial lag. Since then, the rejection of Russian hydrocarbons has become dogma; the war in Iran has driven fuel prices even higher; and the commitment to spend 5% of GDP on defense promises to absorb resources that public budgets simply do not have – unless at the expense of healthcare, pensions, and civilian investments. The paradox is clear: just as Washington, for entirely domestic reasons tied to the midterm elections, is seeking cheap diesel even from Moscow, European governments are touting the fact that they pay more for energy than their competitors as a moral principle.

The third level is diplomatic, and perhaps the most decisive one. A foreign policy that rules out negotiation on principle dooms itself to being left out of the talks when negotiations finally begin. And that is exactly what is happening: the United States and Russia are hammering out energy agreements, the pace of the war, and the terms of a possible truce, while Europe merely comments. Zakharova’s response to the Italian prime minister is not merely a diplomatic snub.

It is the exact measure of the weight Moscow currently attributes to European capitals. One can debate whether it is right; it is harder to argue that it is wrong as a description.

The price of credibility

The deepest damage, however, is not measured on the front lines or even in the markets. It is measured in the relationship between institutions and citizens. When the gap between what is proclaimed and what actually happens becomes visible to the naked eye, public discourse loses its value. For four years, European citizens have been told repeatedly that Russia’s defeat is near, that sanctions are bringing it to its knees, and that every new aid package will be the decisive one. Now they see their main ally negotiating with Moscow, Ukraine dependent on decisions made in Washington, and their own governments increasing military spending while public services deteriorate. No foreign disinformation campaign is needed to breed mistrust. A simple comparison between rhetoric and results is enough.

This distrust stems from a crisis of representation with deeper roots. About a decade ago, in his book *Ruling the Void*, Peter Mair described – well in advance – the withdrawal of political parties from society toward the state, and the gradual separation between responsible government – that is, one faithful to external constraints – and representative government – that is, one responsive to the demands of voters. Together with Richard Katz, he coined the term “cartel party” to describe political formations that compete in the electoral arena but share the management of resources and fundamental policy decisions. The cross-party applause on October 14 is an almost perfect illustration of that model. On an issue of life-and-death importance – the cost of energy and the fate of industry – voters who dissent find no political alternative in Parliament that represents them.

The effects are plain for all to see. In France, governments fall one after another without a stable majority emerging. In Germany, the ruling coalition governs with the strongest postwar opposition breathing down its neck. In Italy, abstention has become the largest “party.” Procedures remain intact, elections are held regularly, but significant decisions are made elsewhere, and the vote ends up merely confirming choices that have already been made.

Governing through distrust

At this point, a less obvious question arises. If distrust damages institutions, why do Europe’s ruling classes continue down a path that fuels it? The simplest answer would be incompetence. But there is a more robust hypothesis that better explains the facts: distrust, within certain limits, is a resource for governance.

Here’s how the mechanism works. A disillusioned electorate becomes fragmented, abstains from voting, and scatters among new and unstable parties. Fragmentation leads to ungovernability; ungovernability, in turn, makes “responsible” grand coalitions, technocratic governments, and cross-party agreements – which keep forces deemed unreliable out of power – indispensable. The more unstable the system is, the more necessary the center becomes, as it promises stability. The crisis of representation, rather than weakening those in power, consolidates their position, because it makes them the only bulwark against the chaos that the crisis itself has produced.

War perfects this mechanism in two ways. First, it allows dissent to be treated as a security issue. When the fear of conflict is attributed to Putin and the opposition, those who call for negotiations cease to be political adversaries and become vehicles of enemy influence. Carl Schmitt identified the state of exception as the place where sovereignty is revealed; Giorgio Agamben has shown how the exception tends to become an ordinary technique of governance.

A permanent state of emergency – whether health-related, financial, or military – removes decision-making from democratic debate and entrusts it to those who present themselves as guarantors of collective survival. Second, war justifies shifting decision-making to forums beyond electoral control: the European Commission, the European Council, NATO, and small-group formats such as the E3.

We must be precise on one point, so as not to slip into caricature. This interpretation does not presuppose a plan agreed upon in some secret room. There is no need for that. It is enough that interests converge: the defense industries seeing orders increase, the European bureaucracies acquiring new powers, the ruling parties finding a raison d’être in the emergency, and the major media conglomerates peddling moral mobilization. Each acts in its own self-interest, and the sum of these self-interests produces a self-perpetuating system. We are, to all intents and purposes, in a Gramscian “organic crisis” – the phase in which the old dies and the new cannot be born, and in which morbid phenomena proliferate. The management of mistrust is one such phenomenon: a way to survive the crisis without resolving it.

Winning at any cost

The final question remains – and it is the most serious one. What are these elites willing to sacrifice to emerge victorious from the current phase? Looking back at recent years, the answer is that part of the sacrifice has already been made. Politics was sacrificed when fundamental decisions were shifted outside of parliaments and the distinction between majority and opposition became merely ornamental. The economy was sacrificed when the continent’s industrial competitiveness was subordinated to geopolitical objectives set elsewhere, accepting unsustainable energy prices and the very real risk of deindustrialization. Those who have already given up these two pillars have little to lose when it comes to the third – the human cost.

For now, that cost is being borne primarily by the Ukrainians. Even members of the Verkhovna Rada who zealously supported the line of all-out war – such as Mar’jana Bezuhla – or who have distanced themselves from it – such as Anna Skorochod – describe a country with destroyed infrastructure, forced mobilization marked by abuses, and a population on the brink of collapse, and admit that the conflict has become a business opportunity for some; but the cost is also beginning to fall on European societies: in public budgets, in wages eroded by energy inflation, and in the idea – now voiced without embarrassment by sitting ministers – that we must get used to the prospect of fighting.

Here, the rhetoric of war reveals its deepest function, for it does not serve to win the war against Russia, which no European government has the means to win on its own. It serves to win the domestic battle, to maintain control over political systems that can no longer generate consensus and that need an external enemy to justify their continued existence. In this sense, the human cost is not a side effect of the calculation. It is a variable, adjusted according to the convenience of the moment, in the perpetual dance of death that is political utilitarianism.

There is an alternative, and it does not amount to surrender: it consists of bringing diplomacy back to the center of European foreign policy, recognizing that a now multipolar international order cannot be governed by moral crusades, and restoring to parliaments and voters the power to decide on war and peace. The indicators for gauging whether anything is changing are concrete: the mandate that the next European Council will – or will not – entrust to the negotiators; the fate of the sanctions regime following the U.S. exemption on diesel fuel; and the stability of national budgets in the face of the 5% target.

As long as the response remains the one applauded on October 14, Europe will continue to pay an ever-increasing price for a war it does not control, while those who govern it will find in its very instability the reason to remain where they are.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Saturday that US President Donald Trump’s decision to waive sanctions and tariffs on Russia would last 60 days, as the move drew bipartisan criticism and raised fears in Ukraine that Washington could ease further restrictions on Moscow.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Saturday that US President Donald Trump’s decision to waive sanctions and tariffs on Russia would last 60 days, as the move drew bipartisan criticism and raised fears in Ukraine that Washington could ease further restrictions on Moscow.

“No Kings, Vote Now” was the theme of a rally in Atlanta, one of many organised across the US on Saturday. While many demonstrators denounced US President Donald Trump’s policies, organisers said the rally was aimed at getting out the vote in the November 3 midterm elections and protecting democracy in America.

“No Kings, Vote Now” was the theme of a rally in Atlanta, one of many organised across the US on Saturday. While many demonstrators denounced US President Donald Trump’s policies, organisers said the rally was aimed at getting out the vote in the November 3 midterm elections and protecting democracy in America.