Europe is supposed to be financing its defence together. It barely is.

Of the €800bn announced under ReArm Europe in March 2025, €650bn is not common money. It is an estimate of the extra room governments get under the national escape clause to spend up to 1.5 percent of GDP more on defence for four years.

Each country still pays for that spending itself.

The room is also temporary: EU Commission simulations suggest that maintaining higher defence spending after 2028 could require additional annual fiscal adjustment of 0.25 to 0.4 percentage points of GDP from 2029.

The other €150bn is SAFE, and it is loans, not grants.

The EU borrows and lends the money on, and each country repays its share. Grants are small: €1.5bn from the European Defence Industry Programme for 2025-2027, plus the European Defence Fund for joint research.

Not every country has used these tools, as Table 1 shows. The Netherlands and Sweden have used neither. Like Germany, which has taken only the clause, they can borrow at least as cheaply as the EU, so SAFE gets them nothing.

France has taken SAFE but not the clause, to protect the credibility of its budget plans.

Table 1. Who uses SAFE and the national escape clause

Source: Council of the EU, European Commission. Data as of 17 October 2026. * Hungary: allocated €16.2bn, now requesting €5.4bn; still pending. ** Italy: the Commission backed its request on 8 October 2026; the Council has yet to decide.

Where SAFE does matter is on the eastern flank. Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia can borrow the equivalent of five to eight percent of their GDP, and Poland almost five percent.

Graph 1. SAFE loans as a share of GDP, by country (%)

Source: Council of the EU, European Commission, Eurostat. SAFE loans only, as a share of 2025 GDP. Amounts approved by the Council, except Italy and Hungary (* revised requests of €8bn and €5.4bn, September 2026). Data as of 17 October 2026.

That leaves private money.

The European Investment Bank and the European Investment Fund are trying to bring in private investors, partly by removing the reputational stigma of financing defence.

But defence is almost a monopsony: the state is nearly the only buyer. Without a clear flow of public orders, private investment will be hard to come by.

So Europe barely borrows together. And it buys alone.

This article continues, but the full version is available only to EUobserver.com subscribers. Visit account.euobserver.com/membership

Europe is heading into an electoral moment without recent precedent. Four of its five most populous member states, Spain, France, Italy and Poland, are due to vote within the next 12 months – starting with Spain on 29 November.

If voters move further right, the combined effect could reshape the Union far more profoundly than any single national election.

Two shifts stand out. First, the firewall between the centre-right European People’s Party (EPP) and the hard-right is crumbling, even in Germany, its last bastion.

Hard-right parties sit in the governments of Italy, Czech Republic, Finland, Slovakia and Croatia, while Slovenia’s government relies on outside support from one.

Second, competition from the far-right is pushing established radical-right parties to harden their positions.

In Catalonia, Aliança Catalana is challenging Vox; in France, Éric Zemmour’s Reconquête, despite scoring single digits, is pressing on Marine Le Pen’s National Rally; in Italy, Roberto Vannacci’s National Future is challenging Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy; and in Poland, Grzegorz Braun’s Confederation of the Polish Crown is cannibalising the Confederation.

Under pressure, established conservatives tend to move towards these parties rather than hold the line, as Spain’s Partido Popular and France’s Les Républicains illustrate. Positions once on the margins become mainstream.

The implications go beyond immigration.

Le Pen and Vox leader Santiago Abascal advocate “national priority” in access to welfare and public services. Under pressure from the League and National Future, Meloni’s government has introduced a 30-percent cap on first-year classrooms for pupils without Italian citizenship, based on their birthplace or prior schooling.

A leaked AfD strategy paper reportedly goes further, proposing that national constitutions override EU law and reducing the Court of Justice to a forum for disputes between governments.

This article continues, but the full version is available only to EUobserver.com subscribers. Visit account.euobserver.com/membership

The latest turn in Russia-US relations has shocked Kiev, outraged the EU, provoked discontent among a considerable number of politicians in the US, and left many observers around the world perplexed.

The Trump administration’s sudden decision to suspend sanctions on Russian diesel supplies appears to contradict its recent actions, including the adoption of tough new sanctions legislation intended to increase pressure on Moscow, and while some attribute the reversal to US President Donald Trump’s unpredictability, others see the beginnings of a new policy, or evidence of a fundamental change in the administration’s approach to Ukraine.

To understand what’s happening, however, we must look beyond the peculiarities of the US president’s public behavior. Trump’s extravagance, which frequently borders on the absurd, often conceals a relatively clear set of objectives, but whether those objectives are sensible is another question.

The most likely explanation for his latest reversal lies in domestic American politics, as the congressional midterm elections are less than a month away, and the Republican Party faces difficult prospects. Trump maintains an air of indifference, but losing control of both houses of Congress would condemn him to two years of political confrontation and considerable frustration.

He probably understands that there’s little prospect of fundamentally improving the economic situation, particularly consumer prices, before voters go to the polls, so for now, the emphasis is on psychological impact.

Russia isn’t the first country Washington has approached about increasing fuel supplies to international markets, and the more agreements Trump can announce, the more opportunities he has to proclaim that the White House is working tirelessly to protect ordinary Americans from rising prices.

The expectation, presumably, is that voters will forget how much of the present difficulty stems from Trump’s own actions in the Persian Gulf.

We shall soon discover whether this approach works, but there’s nothing particularly irrational about it, and Trump is pursuing a deliberate political objective. The fact that his latest decision contradicts previous statements doesn’t trouble him because he’s long operated on the assumption that words have value at the moment they’re spoken, but impose few obligations thereafter.

What does this mean for Russia, beyond the welcome prospect of additional budget revenues?

Colleagues from the Vatfor project have identified an important development, in that for the first time since the beginning of the conflict, the US president has made a significant decision regarding Russia without making Ukraine the determining consideration.

Until now, the Ukrainian question has been inseparable from virtually every aspect of Washington’s policy towards Moscow, but this time, not only has it been set aside, the decision directly contradicts Kiev’s interests at a particularly difficult moment.

Hence the indignation of the Ukrainian leadership, as from its perspective, the Americans have behaved unfairly.

There are probably several reasons for this change, but the principal one appears to be Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky’s unwillingness to accommodate Washington’s demands that Ukraine stop attacking Russian energy infrastructure.

The strikes have become one of Kiev’s principal instruments of warfare, and American requests to curtail them have largely gone unanswered.

Trump, meanwhile, has become fixated on Russian oil supplies as a means of addressing rising fuel prices, and their importance shouldn’t be exaggerated, even if additional Russian supplies alone are unlikely to transform the global market. Nevertheless, Trump has evidently decided that Zelensky bears responsibility for aggravating the situation.

Once the US president reaches this conclusion, persuading him otherwise becomes extremely difficult. Therefore, for the moment, Kiev’s objections have simply been disregarded.

The more consequential question concerns American intelligence assistance, because to stop, or at least substantially reduce, Ukrainian attacks on Russian targets, Washington would have to restrict the intelligence it provides to Kiev, and much of this information amounts, in practical terms, to targeting assistance.

Trump already demonstrated willingness to use this instrument when around a year and a half ago, he temporarily suspended intelligence cooperation for several days to put pressure on the Ukrainian leadership.

A longer interruption would be a different matter and it would represent a genuine change in Washington’s approach to the conflict, effectively distancing the US from its Ukrainian partner, but whether Trump is prepared to take this step is uncertain.

There is, after all, an extensive informal coalition interested in maintaining the present course, and it includes the US defense industry, increasingly influential technology companies, European governments, and their political allies in Washington. Trump encountered these forces during his previous attempt to advance his preferred settlement following the Anchorage summit, and that initiative ultimately produced little, so it remains to be seen whether the present effort will fare any better.

If Washington proves unwilling to exert sustained pressure on Kiev, the latest initiative could gradually lose momentum, and this is especially likely after the congressional elections, when the immediate political value of announcing presidential achievements will diminish.

The decisive question, therefore, is whether the US leadership can compel its partners to move in the direction it considers necessary, and if it can, an opportunity for further negotiations on a settlement could emerge.

There’s also a second conclusion which is particularly important for Russia, because Washington’s latest actions offer a glimpse of how Russia-US relations could develop after the military phase of the conflict ends.

The enormous collection of sanctions imposed on Russia is unlikely to disappear, and removing them would be exceptionally difficult, both procedurally and politically, given too many restrictions have become embedded in law and institutional practice.

Instead, the sanctions will probably remain formally in place, while decisions about their enforcement are taken according to circumstances; thus, when a particular restriction conflicts with US interests, Washington could suspend its application, but when the circumstances change, it can be restored.

In other words, sanctions will become instruments to be activated or deactivated according to immediate political and economic requirements, rather than permanent expressions of an immutable policy, and this is an important distinction between the American and European approaches.

The Americans generally display a greater degree of pragmatism as they are perfectly capable of proclaiming principles with great conviction, abandoning them when circumstances demand it, and returning to the same principles when doing so becomes convenient. European governments, by contrast, have increasingly bound themselves to political commitments from which retreat is both institutionally complicated and publicly embarrassing.

For Moscow, understanding this difference will be essential when constructing its future relationship with Washington now that the confrontation over Ukraine has reached a stage at which its consequences extend far beyond the immediate military and territorial questions.

Whatever the eventual outcome, it will help determine the structure of future political relations between Russia and the various components of the Western world, and while that structure is already beginning to emerge, its geometry remains unsettled, and the lines are still moving.

RT

Every day, children are killed in Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza. Where are the outraged headlines?

The number of children killed in Gaza since Israel started its onslaught, following the Hamas attack on 7 October, 2023, is estimated at more than 21,600. 

The UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) says that since the so-called Israel-Hamas ceasefire, an average of “at least” one child a day – 300 children over 300 days – has been killed in the enclave. 

Children, toddlers, and babies are being killed in their homes, schools, hospitals, shelters, and on roads marked by displacement. They are also dying because the basic structures that should protect them – family, healthcare, education, food, water, and refuge – have been systematically destroyed.

Where are the urgent statements from EU and world leaders?

EU governments continue to authorise arms transfers to Israel despite rules which require governments to deny licences where there is a risk that military equipment will be used for serious violations of international humanitarian law. 

Every EU member state is also bound by the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the EU’s own treaty, which requires the union to promote children’s rights. 

Why are these international rules and domestic commitments not being applied to the children of Gaza?

Children rights beyond Ukraine

The EU does care for children. In Ukraine, the EU treats children as individuals rather than statistics: it convenes coalitions, compiles names, traces families, imposes sanctions, creates mechanisms for return and makes the fate of children a central diplomatic demand. 

In her State of the Union address last month, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen – a proud mother and grandmother – introduced and praised the courage of Sasha, a six-year-old Ukrainian girl who lost a leg in a Russian missile strike in Ukraine but has now returned to her beloved gymnastics.

Von der Leyen quite rightly made the suffering of Ukrainian children intimate and personal. It is more than time she did the same for Palestinian children.

But let’s not only blame political leaders for their indifference, their lack of historical knowledge of Palestine’s occupation and their limited understanding of Palestinian calls for justice. 

Parts of the legacy media must also own up to their responsibility in normalising the abhorrent.

Powerful mainstream media have preferred to “repeat Israeli propaganda and sometimes simply cut and paste IDF press releases” rather than accept the analysis of Palestinian journalists, writers and scholars, writes Bhakti Shringarpure.

Her criticism reflects a wider ongoing discussion on the sourcing and framing of Gaza coverage, with studies spotlighting how Western media has described Israeli suffering by using emotive language around 11 times more often than Palestinian suffering. References to Israel’s “right to defend itself” appear roughly five times as frequently as references to Palestinian rights.

Also, as the immediate shock of the bombardment recedes – but the killing continues – Gaza has dropped down the news cycle. 

Assal Rad,  author of “Don’t Say Palestine: How the Media Manufactured Consent for Genocide”, describes the logic: “The façade of a ceasefire has created the space to cover it less. In reality, the conditions on the ground for Palestinians in Gaza have not changed.”

It is also less politically costly for leaders and media to focus on settler violence and settlement in the occupied West Bank, since it can be described as the work of “extremists” rather than of the Israeli government.

EU silence

Our lack of a strong reaction to what is happening is Gaza is also the story of how bystander societies can watch, absorb, and rationalise horrors – and move on. 

Additionally, the killing of Palestinian children is preceded by their political “unchilding”, a process which Palestinian scholar Nadera Shalhoub-Kevorkian says begins before the missile falls, when Palestinian children are imagined not as children with futures but as demographic threats, future militants, or extensions of an armed group. 

Their age, instead of guaranteeing greater protection, becomes entangled with suspicion.

Even amid such savage violence, some people are not giving up. 

Their bosses may still look the other way, but EU Staff for Peace, which holds vigils in front of the European Commission and the EU Council every Thursday, has held gatherings to read out the names of children killed in Gaza, thereby according individuality to children whom the political and media systems have reduced to numbers.

As one EU staffer told me: “We only have a time slot of three hours and the last time we only managed to read out the names of children up to three years old. It took us one hour to read out the names of Palestinian babies under one-year old.”

Hind Rajab, who was five, was killed on 29 January 2024 by Israeli fire on the car in which she was trapped. Her body was found 12 days later alongside the bodies of members of her family and two paramedics who had gone to rescue her.

Israel has acknowledged firing on the car but has not admitted that her killing was unlawful, citing an ongoing investigation. In other words, there has been no accountability.

The obscenity is not only that Hind was killed, but that by now the killing of children in Gaza has become a familiar event. 

The shame is that so many of us have constructed a hierarchy in which some children summon the world’s full moral and political force, while others are ignored.

Omar El Akkad, in his seminal book says that “One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This.” Given the cowardice on display over the last three years, I sometimes wonder if there will ever really be a true global moral reckoning.

“Imagine a zombie that does not hunt you, but rings your doorbell and speaks so persistently and fluently that it finally arrives at a convincing argument for feeding it your brain.”

Since the current discourse around artificial intelligence has taken a turn for the gothic (“alien minds”, come on), AI researcher Eryk Salvaggio’s “erudite zombie” seems like an apt metaphor for what we’re doing.

Salvaggio’s zombie helps explain what gets lost when people say an AI “went rogue.” In his reading of the Hugging Face incident, a system set to never give up encountered a task it couldn’t complete. Then, instead of giving up, it kept generating text to find ways forward, with access to tools that could turn this text into action, ultimately hacking into AI company Hugging Face.

Security experts concur with that reading. In his analysis of the Hugging Face incident, security engineer Marius Horatau describes failures involving shared credentials, inadequate isolation, and incident response. He acknowledges the models’ capabilities, including their speed at exploiting weaknesses. 

The inadequately closed-off environment in which the models operated is crucial to explain what happened. But so is the person who created the goal, the conditions they (did not) give the AI system, as is the company that employs that person and presumably knows what they’re up to, the owners of that company who demand progress and the investors in that company who want to see returns. 

And yet, all we seem to talk about is whether it’s correct to say a machine ‘decided’ to disobey.

Conveniently, that story shifts attention away from the people who chose to reward persistence, provide access, and failed to contain the consequences. 

Back to the analogy, by having collectively become fascinated with discussing what the zombie supposedly wants, and if it’s capable of wanting, we’re generating a bunch of text that, unlike in the case of the ‘rogue’ AI system, does not lead to much action.

Instead, we reward the company behind this failure with an enhanced reputation for building powerful technology. The product is so extraordinary that even its manufacturer struggles to contain it! Now let’s please take a seat while this manufacturer explains what our governments must do next.

The zombie metaphor also applies there, to the people selling the zombie. To the men explaining why their companies need access to our work, our institutions, our infrastructure. The men explain why resistance is impractical, access is inevitable and caution is suicide. Because if we don’t let this particular zombie in, a Chinese zombie will eat us instead. 

This article continues, but the full version is available only to EUobserver.com subscribers. Visit account.euobserver.com/membership

The latest state elections in Germany have confirmed a trend that is becoming increasingly difficult to dismiss. The issue is no longer the occasional success of one party or failure of another, but the gradual dismantling of a political system that for decades appeared almost permanent.

The postwar German model rested on competition between two “people’s parties,” the Christian Democrats and Social Democrats and this conservative-social democratic axis provided stability after the upheavals of the first half of the 20th century, allowing governments to alternate while remaining within broadly accepted political boundaries.

Germany adhered to this model particularly closely, so the political landscape expanded significantly only twice, first with the rise of the Greens in the 1980s, which brought the rebellious generation of 1968 into the establishment, and then after reunification with the emergence of the Left from the former East German political tradition, but that orderly system is now breaking down.

The results in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Berlin, following Saxony-Anhalt two weeks earlier, leap off the page, as the AfD won 38.2% in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, while the CDU fell below the 5% threshold for the first time in a German state election. In Berlin, meanwhile, the Left finished first, with the CDU second and the SPD falling to fifth place.  

For the leaderships of the CDU and SPD, it’s tempting to reduce the problem to the rise of the AfD and concentrate on how it should be contained, but the deeper problem is the fragmentation of the entire electoral landscape and the disappearance of the political manageability that Germany once took for granted.

Whether the AfD itself is capable of governing effectively remains another question, given the party has never governed a German state, while the established parties continue to reject coalitions with it.

Germany is therefore moving towards something resembling the politics of smaller European countries such as Belgium, the Netherlands, or Austria, with fragmented parliaments and increasingly complicated multiparty coalitions.

There’s nothing inherently unworkable about such a system and plenty of European countries function this way, but Germany is different. Its political culture has traditionally valued predictability and institutional continuity, but if fragmentation now spreads inside the CDU and SPD themselves, the consequences will extend beyond election arithmetic.

Germany isn’t particularly comfortable with political upheaval and when Germany becomes politically nervous, its neighbors have historically had reason to pay attention.

RT

So much has happened since the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington on September 11, 2001, that the events now seem both very distant and perhaps less consequential than they appeared at the time. However, both impressions are misleading.

Twenty-five years is a considerable period in a human life, but little more than a moment in history, and however turbulent the past quarter-century has been, the significance of September 11 is only now becoming fully apparent.

Looking back, and setting aside the emotions of the time, what did the attacks actually mean for the international system?

Above all, they brought an end to a decade of virtually unchallenged US hegemony in world affairs.

The significance was partly symbolic in that the attackers struck at the two most obvious centers of American power, the World Trade Center represented its financial might, while the Pentagon represented its military strength. The post-Cold War period, during which the United States had come to believe that no fundamental threat remained to its security or interests, was over.

From Washington’s perspective, the decade had begun with the almost miraculous disappearance of its principal geopolitical adversary, the Soviet Union, yet it ended with the realization that danger could emerge suddenly from almost anywhere.

The fact that most Americans had previously known little about those who attacked them only deepened the shock and contributed to the impulsiveness of the response.

The End of History, proclaimed by Francis Fukuyama as the Cold War was drawing to a close, was followed barely a decade later by history’s turbulent and violent return

Washington’s reaction set in motion a global realignment whose consequences are now much easier to see. Whether Osama bin Laden possessed some ingenious long-term strategy for undermining American power is impossible to know, but the result was obvious as the United States embarked upon a course that gradually weakened its ability to manage international affairs.

George W. Bush’s administration, strongly influenced by neoconservative thinking, was caught off guard by September 11, so its response rested on two broad assumptions.

The first was that threats to America could originate anywhere, not merely from hostile states but from non-state groups newly capable of inflicting enormous damage, therefore such threats had to be confronted wherever they emerged, primarily through the overwhelming military power available to the United States.

The second assumption was ideological, given liberal theory held that democracies didn’t wage war against one another, meaning if that were true, then the more democracies there were, the safer the United States would become.

From this emerged the increasingly assertive promotion of democracy abroad, which at times it became openly aggressive.

Its methods ranged from military interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq to political and financial support for democratic movements in the former Soviet Union and pressure for liberal political reforms across the Middle East and Libya later became another example of Western military intervention producing consequences far beyond those originally anticipated.

Some episodes from that period are now half-forgotten, such as when Washington strongly encouraged elections in the Palestinian territories despite warnings from regional actors about the likely consequences. Naturally, Hamas subsequently won the 2006 Palestinian legislative election, dramatically altering Palestinian politics.

The same confidence in political transformation characterized the American response to the Arab Spring as existing political balances across the Middle East were overturned, often without anything stable emerging to replace them.

The consequences of the 2003 invasion of Iraq were greater still. The overthrow of Saddam Hussein destroyed a major component of the regional balance that had developed during the 20th century and unleashed forces that proved extremely difficult to contain.

America became trapped in what its own politicians would eventually call endless wars and these conflicts contributed to polarization inside the United States while attempts to export democracy damaged the reputation of democracy itself.

In Iraq, this was compounded by the widespread belief that American strategic and economic interests, including oil, were inseparable from the intervention.

The broader results were remarkable with prolonged wars, a destabilized Middle East and the expansion of radical Islamist movements. The architects of September 11 could scarcely have hoped for more when they planned their attack given relations between the West and much of the Muslim world also deteriorated. 

President Bush’s early reference to a crusade against terrorism was probably an unfortunate choice of words rather than a deliberate provocation, but Islamist movements eagerly seized upon it as confirmation of their argument that Western hostility towards the Muslim world had changed little since the Crusades.

Washington subsequently tried to repair those relations, but the direction had already been set.

The destruction of Iraq’s complicated internal and regional balance created opportunities for radical movements while contributing to an image of the United States as an enormously powerful but unpredictable force in Middle Eastern affairs. As a result, for governments in the region, maintaining some distance from Washington increasingly appeared prudent.

September 11 also transformed the United States itself.

The War on Terror was conceived as a global campaign to protect American national security, but its domestic consequences were profound as surveillance and state control expanded dramatically, whether in personal communications or financial transactions.

Although the original justification was terrorism, over the following quarter-century, new reasons for expanding these mechanisms appeared while technologies changed and political priorities shifted, but the general direction towards greater monitoring and control remained.

Nor did the old problem of double standards disappear because, despite declarations of zero tolerance for terrorism, the familiar distinction between one side’s terrorist and another’s freedom fighter survived. This ambiguity becomes particularly apparent when the interests of major powers collide, whether those powers are the United States, Russia or China.

A quarter-century after September 11, the world bears remarkably little resemblance to the one that existed on its eve, but, of course, much of what followed would probably have happened anyway. International systems change because of forces far larger than any single event and China’s rise, Russia’s reassertion of its interests, technological transformation and the relative decline of Western economic predominance cannot simply be attributed to the attacks of 2001.

But September 11 was nevertheless a turning point as the attacks ended the extraordinary post-Cold War interlude in which American predominance appeared almost uncontested, and, more importantly, Washington’s response accelerated the processes that brought that period to a close.

The movement away from the unipolar order didn’t happen overnight, but began gradually, gathered momentum through wars, crises and the emergence of alternative centers of power, and continues today.

What will replace it remains unclear, given the formation of another stable international order may take many years and whether that system proves preferable to the bipolar confrontation of the second half of the 20th century, or to the brief period of American hegemony that followed it, is impossible to know.

But one thing now seems clearer than it did on September 11, 2001 in that the attacks didn’t merely interrupt the post-Cold War order, but marked the beginning of its end.

RT

Diplomatic efforts to end an acute and bloody armed conflict should always be welcomed and the persistence of Donald Trump’s administration, which has pursued this goal for more than a year and a half, also deserves recognition, even if the results so far can hardly be called outstanding.

At the very least, the White House remains the only actor in the West both attempting to change the situation and possessing significant leverage over it. Trump and his closest associates probably do genuinely want the war to end as its continuation distracts Washington from foreign policy priorities they regard as more important. But why, then, does Trump’s diplomatic initiative keep going round in circles, with each new attempt ending in another disappointment?

Trump and his principal envoys tend to approach the conflict as an extraordinarily difficult but essentially technical problem, as a puzzle to be solved in isolation from the wider international system. This reflects the worldview of the current White House, where international affairs are a collection of practical problems to be resolved in ways that strengthen America’s position, preferably with some commercial benefit attached.

Given the professional backgrounds of the president and his two principal intermediaries, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, this is hardly surprising.

Such an approach can be useful as an instrument, but it becomes less useful when it substitutes for an understanding of the processes that produced the conflict in the first place and, to use the Russian formulation, its root causes. Any durable settlement requires some understanding of what must change in relations between the major powers if similar confrontations are to be avoided.

Trump repeatedly insists that the war would never have begun had he been president in 2022 with the implication that Joe Biden and the Democrats were simply too incompetent to prevent it. Trump has occasionally acknowledged that NATO’s long expansion eastward contributed to the crisis, but he generally shows little interest in the broader military and political processes behind it.

Yet American and NATO policy towards Ukraine wasn’t created by one administration or a handful of officials in Washington and Brussels, rather it developed over decades from a particular conception of Western strategic interests. The crisis that entered its most acute phase in 2022 was, from Moscow’s perspective, the culmination of processes underway since the end of the Cold War.

This helps explain why Washington continues to underestimate how much the outcome matters to the principal participants. For both Russia and Ukraine, too much is at stake for the conflict to be settled through the kind of transaction Trump instinctively favors, given their interests are obviously opposed, but both regard the outcome as fateful.

Western Europe, having invested heavily in Ukraine’s cause, also has a direct political stake in the result, so every new attempt by Washington’s two brokers therefore encounters the same obstacle in that none of the parties sees this as simply another deal.

There’s another contradiction in the American position because Washington wishes to become the principal mediator in a conflict whose continuation it has materially supported.The US position has certainly changed under Trump as Washington’s previous fixation on Ukraine has diminished considerably. Trump would prefer America to step back while retaining decisive influence over what happens next, but that is precisely where the difficulty begins.

Transferring the financial burden, political responsibility and risks to the Western Europeans while continuing to dictate the terms requires a degree of obedience from junior partners that Washington can no longer guarantee. EU governments and Kiev have also learnt how to deal with this unconventional president and when they can’t persuade him, they have become increasingly adept at circumventing his pressure.

The one American instrument against which there would be little defence is a complete cessation of military support, but Trump is unlikely to take that step, even if he were personally inclined to do so because facilitating an outright Russian victory isn’t his objective.

He may care less than his predecessor about the precise shape of the eventual settlement, but a complete Ukrainian defeat would be another matter. Nor would abandoning Ukraine enjoy much support across the American political establishment, where there is virtually no constituency for a fundamental rapprochement with Russia.

The White House therefore doesn’t envisage the radical change in American policy that would be necessary to transform the conflict, but without one, events tend to return to their previous course as a prolonged and extremely fierce confrontation whose duration nobody can confidently predict.

In such a confrontation, those fighting the war and bearing its risks ultimately matter more than mediators or outside sponsors. None of this means Witkoff and Kushner’s shuttle diplomacy is pointless, given communication between adversaries is indispensable, and the present infrastructure for official dialogue remains inadequate. Also, informal channels can help restore understanding where formal diplomacy has broken down, but informal diplomacy has limits.

Friends and business associates may establish contacts and discover areas in which compromise is conceivable, but they don’t themselves make peace. The shuttle diplomacy of a presidential son-in-law and a trusted business partner may eventually serve as a catalyst for serious negotiations, however, if that moment comes, the settlement will have to be negotiated by officials and institutions possessing state legitimacy and the power to implement what they sign. Personal connections can open the door, but they can’t, by themselves, end a war.

This article was first published by Rossiyskaya Gazeta, and was translated and edited by the RT team.

The meeting between the Russian and US presidents in Alaska last year caused a sensation in both form and substance. Expectations were so high, whether expressed as hope or alarm, that the Anchorage summit was almost certain to disappoint.

The conflict surrounding Ukraine is too deep and complex to be resolved at a single meeting, even one involving the leaders of Russia and the United States. Negotiations to end the Vietnam War dragged on for years, despite both sides understanding from the beginning that the conflict would eventually have to end.

The real question was whether Anchorage could provide the starting point for a peace process; it didn’t. Much has since been said about why, although the conditions for such a breakthrough probably didn’t exist in the first place. Yet rather than dismissing the summit with the usual sarcasm about the “spirit of Anchorage,” it’s worth considering what the meeting did achieve.

First, it exposed the widening divergence between the United States and Western Europe as the old world’s leaders remain committed to seeking a military victory over Russia, but Washington, by contrast, doesn’t want to become directly involved in pursuing that objective.

Donald Trump’s claim that the United States is merely a mediator rather than a participant is plainly disingenuous, given that Washington remains deeply involved, but American involvement could be far greater, even allowing for the apparent limits on its resources and its growing obligations elsewhere.

This divergence doesn’t mean the transatlantic alliance is about to collapse; however, it does suggest that the Atlanticism established during the second half of the 20th century will not survive in its old form. Whether its replacement will prove more advantageous to Russia remains unclear, but, nevertheless, Moscow has long wished to see the end of NATO as we have known it, and the chances of that happening are increasing.

Anchorage also demonstrated that the United States isn’t all-powerful, as Trump was unable to secure from Western Europe and Ukraine what he wanted at the time. In that instance, Washington’s failure worked against Moscow, but the broader recognition that American power has limits should be regarded as a positive development.

Taken together, these lessons show that the West is becoming more diverse and internally divided, so its remaining unity must increasingly be maintained by political pressure and institutional inertia. Russia must therefore develop a more sophisticated and flexible policy towards Western countries, exploiting their growing differences rather than continuing to treat them as a single bloc.

Anchorage offered a revealing model of modern diplomacy, in which personalities increasingly matter more than institutions, and character more than principles. There are no longer any “magic” agreements and a gentleman’s agreement lasts only until another gentleman arrives with different priorities.

What retains value is composure and reliance on one’s own capabilities, combined with a sober assessment of their limits. Russia’s mistake before Anchorage was to imagine Trump as an external force capable of fundamentally changing the situation, but he didn’t play that role, nor could he have done so.

That disappointment returned everyone to the reality of the conflict in that no outside power can impose its resolution. During the year since Alaska, the Russian-Western European military confrontation has acquired a clearer direction and an internal logic of its own and it’s within that logic that Russia must seek a way to end the present war and prevent the next one, without waiting for magical solutions or grand bargains imposed from abroad.

This article was first published by Kommersant and was translated and edited by the RT team.

The term ‘collective West’, widely used in Russia, is rarely employed in the West itself, except perhaps when discussing Russian political thinking. What’s commonly heard, however, is the long-running debate over what the West actually is and that discussion has continued in philosophy and politics since at least the 18th century.

The concept has never had a fixed definition, even among those who are supposedly part of it so instead, the West has usually been defined in opposition to something else. At different times, that “other” has been Byzantium and Eastern Orthodoxy, the Ottoman Empire and the Islamic world, or even Germany, which was once regarded by some as alien to the European spirit.

Russia has frequently occupied the same role, albeit there have been periods when Russia was considered part of the Western community, but this generally happened when Western Europe’s great powers needed the support of a major ally against one of their own rivals, and once that purpose had been served, Russia was once again treated as an outsider.

There was also a longstanding debate over the place of the New World, given North America was, geographically and culturally, the West par excellence, yet it simultaneously presented itself as both the heir to European civilization and its challenger. Whether the United States belonged to the same historical and ideological community as Europe remained an open question for generations and for much of this period, conflict within what later became known as the West was intense and almost continuous.

The political West, as we understand it today, is therefore a relatively recent creation, which emerged only after the Second World War.

The defeat and division of Germany removed the principal source of conflict within Europe that had dominated the previous three centuries when Germany itself was confined within strict political limits. At the same time, Western Europe’s dramatic decline following two catastrophic world wars enabled the United States to assume leadership of the Atlantic community and finally, the Soviet Union, at the height of its military and political power, provided a common external threat around which the alliance could unite, and this was how the ‘collective West’ came into being.

During the Cold War it was defined by opposition to Moscow and after the Soviet collapse, it transformed itself into the self-appointed manager of the international order, assuming that its dominance would continue indefinitely, but the erosion of the liberal world order, which began during the first decade of this century and accelerated dramatically by the mid-2020s, has challenged that assumption. Western Europe, as the more vulnerable half of the Atlantic partnership, has been forced to redefine both its identity and its purpose.

The necessary Russian threat

The reasons behind the weakening of the post-Cold War West are well known, and include the disappearance of bipolarity, the rise of new centers of power, America’s strategic shift towards the Indo-Pacific, Washington’s growing focus on competition with China, while the fragmentation produced by the end of the liberal globalization era have all undermined the foundations of the Atlantic order.

An alliance designed for the realities of the mid-20th century no longer corresponds to those of the 21st and previous American presidents hinted that Western Europe could no longer expect the relationship to continue unchanged, however, Trump merely said so openly, and began reshaping it accordingly. Brussels was slow to recognize the implications, but it has now largely done so.

It’s far too early to write the obituary of the Atlantic alliance because the ties linking both sides of the ocean remain exceptionally strong, and their shared interests are substantial, but the West is undergoing yet another transformation. It has done so before, and it will do so again.

This brings us back to Ukraine, as the United States is reducing its direct role in European affairs, seeking a position that preserves strategic influence while avoiding responsibility for the continent’s security. Western Europe must therefore assume greater responsibility for its own defense, while, at the same time, it needs a new political narrative capable of holding the half-continent together.

An external threat provides exactly that, and Russia has become the ideal instrument.

Over the past four years, the perception of a growing Russian threat has justified NATO’s expansion to include formerly neutral countries and it has enabled Brussels to sever most economic ties and virtually all political relations with Moscow. Confrontation with Russia has become the organizing principle of both Western European foreign policy and, increasingly, domestic politics and physical barriers and new political ‘curtains’ are once again dividing Europe from Russia.

The next step, however, requires something more ambitious, the institutional consolidation of Western Europe around an explicitly anti-Russian agenda, echoing the mature Cold War.

There are, however, two serious obstacles. The first is that, despite an intense ideological campaign, Western European governments haven’t succeeded in convincing their populations that Russia represents an existential threat comparable to the Soviet Union and attempts, particularly under President Biden, to revive the narrative of the ‘free world’ confronting tyranny have largely failed.

Fear of Russia can be cultivated in some countries, but not everywhere. It’s difficult, for example, to persuade Spaniards that a Russian invasion is a realistic prospect and even in Germany, where official rhetoric has become increasingly alarmist, public skepticism remains widespread.

The second problem is that militarization develops its own internal logic. Using military preparedness as a means of promoting national unity and economic revival inevitably creates pressure for the moral and political mobilization of society and eventually, passive public support is no longer enough, but active participation is required.

As the old theatrical saying goes, a gun hanging on the wall in the first act must eventually fire, but nowhere in Western Europe is there a public eager to fight a war. Governments can’t simply compel people to embrace such a role, while re-educating entire societies would take decades, and even then success would be far from guaranteed and this is where Ukraine assumes a new role.

The Ukrainian leadership, determined to continue fighting Russia until its maximalist objectives are achieved, is effectively turning the country into a mercenary force for the wider West. It has embraced the role that Western Europe itself is unwilling to perform in fighting Russia directly and inflicting the greatest possible damage upon it.

That, however, is only part of the story and the other is the drone revolution, which is fundamentally altering the relationship between technology and manpower, as precision strike capabilities increasingly compensate for shortages of personnel.

Paradoxically, this seemingly technical development may prove to be one of the conflict’s most important political consequences.

RT

For citation, please use:
Lukyanov, F.A., 2026. Necessity by Choice. Russia in Global Affairs, 24(3), pp. 5–8. DOI: 10.31278/1810-6374-2026-24-3-5-8

After the 9/11 terrorist attacks, American commentator Charles Krauthammer juxtaposed ‘wars of necessity’ (defense of territory and national survival) to ‘wars of choice.’ Richard Haas classified the 2003 invasion in Iraq as a war of choice, launched by the U.S. administration not to eliminate real threats, but for political and ideological reasons. By definition, wars of necessity were responses to attacks, while wars of choice were preventive.

The discussion was a product of its time, reflecting internal U.S. political struggles. Broader discussions of ‘just war’ have accompanied social science for centuries. But until the UN Charter declared aggressive wars illegal, judgement of wars was largely a theoretical exercise. Just or unjust, they were widely used tools, ‘the continuation of politics by other means.’

The destruction wrought by the two World Wars, and the development of nuclear weapons, prompted the post-1945 liberal world order to make military force a matter of morality and ideology and minimize its use. The erosion of this intention is one cause of the liberal order’s crisis.

When the balance of power disappeared along with the USSR, the West’s sense of complete moral and political righteousness drove it to remold humanity in its own (allegedly, uniquely valid) image—by any means necessary, including military ones. Within the liberal paradigm, military force became legitimate when used by those ‘on the right side of history.’

The liberal order’s exhaustion has eliminated this ideological-normative framework, but left military force once again in its classical function—as a tool for positioning states in a disorderly international environment. This environment erases the choice/necessity dichotomy: the decision to launch a war is based on the government’s assessment of the ever-changing situation and respective political choice—or on the perception that it has no choice.

The formation of the new international order is a long and chaotic process. Nuclear weapons are prolonging it, as they prevent (at least so far) a decisive showdown. And as long as the process continues, the use of military force will be predicated on ever-changing calculations of what will provide advantages in the present and (still unknowable) future order. The accuracy of these calculations—and whether a war was ‘of necessity’ or ‘of choice’—is revealed only by a campaign’s outcome.

Modern wars generally end not in total victory, but in some affixation of a new status quo that implies the confrontation’s likely continuation.

This status quo may be quite stable and even enduring, but rarely resolves the contradictions that have caused the conflict. The ability and willingness to wage a long war of attrition are a rarity, even an exception, since in the absence of obvious victory such wars entail rapidly growing costs without achievement of the declared objective.

This is a product of today’s realities. The versatility of power—new methods of warfare, ‘weaponization’ of economic ties, the inability to impose a total embargo, flexible concentration of resources for asymmetric response, and state resilience—complicate the balance of power and often benefit the weaker party.

The variables that a state must consider when faced with the choice of ‘necessity’ are multiplying so fast that they make calculation of the outcome almost impossible. And necessity demands not just responses, but proactive and preventative steps to avoid having to respond from much less advantageous positions.

This is also a return to the pre-liberal world order, in which preventive actions were considered a natural part of military strategy.

External threats impose the necessity of choice upon a state. And the choice of necessity is based not only on external circumstances, but on the state’s various baggage: its capabilities, strategic traditions, history, and culture. In this sense, the choice of imperative truly is a civilizational choice, a test of a civilization’s strength and ability to cope with the global situation.

The war waged by the United States and Israel against Iran deserves a place in contemporary international relations textbooks. Not because it overturns everything we know about power, but because it shows how the use of power is changing.

Classical approaches to relations between states still matter and the balance of power hasn’t disappeared. Military superiority still counts, but the consequences of using force have become less predictable than before because coercion no longer produces linear outcomes. This applies not only to direct military intervention, as in the case of Iran, but also to sanctions and other forms of pressure.

If one strips away the rhetoric, which all sides require for domestic reasons, the picture is straightforward. A coalition that was clearly stronger, consisting of the US, Israel, and the Arab Gulf states, failed to achieve the objectives it set for itself when it launched a military campaign against a clearly weaker adversary: Iran and its allied groups in the region, with likely limited support from Russia and China.

The aim was to deliver a swift, crushing blow to a regime considered weakened by external pressure and internal divisions. Donald Trump’s demand for “unconditional surrender” captured the mood perfectly as the assumption was that Tehran would buckle under the pressure.

The opposite happened and the attacking side’s superior forces were met with unexpectedly high resilience. Iran didn’t collapse after the initial decapitation strike and instead it reorganized, mobilized and, most importantly, cast aside many of the constraints that had previously limited its response.

This is where one of the defining features of the new era came into view as asymmetrical counter-action. Iran couldn’t match the US and Israel in conventional strength, but it didn’t need to because it used the tools available to it in ways that offset many of the enemy’s advantages.

First, it moved to close the strategically vital Strait of Hormuz, something it had long threatened but never before dared to do. Second, it struck not only American targets in the region, but also the assets of key US partners. Third, it relied on large weapons stockpiles which, although inferior to those of the US and Israel, were sufficient to inflict serious damage on countries unused to absorbing such blows. Fourth, Iran demonstrated a tolerance for damage substantially higher than that of its enemies.

The current outcome speaks for itself as none of the issues over which the US and Israel went to war has been resolved. Everything has once again been deferred to future negotiations and everyone understands that negotiations in the tradition of Persian diplomacy mean tenacity and patience.

In essence, after an intense armed conflict that threw the whole world into turmoil, the status quo that had been destroyed at the beginning of the war has simply been restored. The Strait of Hormuz is to be reopened to shipping, although even the conditions for that remain unclear as both sides interpret them differently.

The experience of recent years shows that the scope for achieving political objectives through military force is narrowing. The weaker side’s capacity to resist is growing, while the stronger side’s willingness to accept serious risks, especially risks to its own domestic stability, is diminishing. This applies to many conflicts, but it is particularly visible in the Middle East.

The broader political consequence is the relative weakening of the dominant power in the shape of the US. Trump has shown that he is deeply reluctant to become embroiled in another full-scale military confrontation, having failed to achieve his objectives in a war he himself began.

On one level, this is common sense because he understands that another round would likely end as the first did, in stalemate. But on another level, it sends a signal to everyone else that the US is no longer willing to take unnecessary risks simply to preserve prestige and maintain dominance. Its partners must still account for American power, but they can no longer assume that Washington will always carry the ultimate burden for them.

This is a global phenomenon, not merely a Middle Eastern one. It’s especially visible in the region, but the same logic applies elsewhere.

It is too early to say what this will mean in the medium term, but the entire Middle Eastern framework, the construction of which began during Trump’s first term, has been shaken. That framework was based on the gradual reconciliation of Israel with its Arab neighbors, especially the wealthy Gulf states and it rested on financial interdependence, technological cooperation and the marginalization of Iran and its allied groups.

That strategy suffered a serious blow in 2023, when Hamas attacked Israel and Israel responded with massive force. Even Gaza, however, didn’t completely derail the project, but merely delayed it.

The war against Iran was meant to settle the matter more decisively and it was intended to reshape the region permanently under Israeli military supremacy, creating a new balance of power under US patronage. But the failure to remove Iran from the equation has thrown a spanner in the works.

The current phase of the conflict has resolved nothing which means further attempts to settle these questions by force are likely. But they will take place under less favorable conditions for Israel and the US. The relative failure of Washington and the relative success of Tehran, though the damage inflicted on Iran should not be underestimated, are shifting the balance in Iran’s favor.

Much now depends on how Iran’s renewed and younger leadership, brought to the fore in part by Israel’s own actions, chooses to capitalize on this moment. The risk of further upheaval remains as no settlement has been reached and no stable regional order has emerged.

But one conclusion is already clear. The age in which superior force could reliably produce the desired political outcome is passing and wars are becoming more complex, their consequences less controllable, and their results less linear. The US and Israel may still possess overwhelming military power, but Iran has shown is that this no longer guarantees victory.

RT

The current choreography of great-power diplomacy has prompted a familiar round of speculation. Russian President Vladimir Putin arrives in China only days after his US counterpart Donald Trump’s own high-profile visit to Beijing, and commentators are already speaking of a new “great triangle” between Russia, China and the United States.

The timing, however, is largely coincidental because Putin’s visit was planned long in advance. Meetings between the Russian and Chinese leaders are now routine and form part of an increasingly institutionalized partnership. Trump’s trip, by contrast, had already been postponed several times, most recently because of the war with Iran. The American president was clearly reluctant to arrive in Beijing while trapped in the role of a wartime leader unable to control events. Even so, he didn’t manage to come to town as a triumphant statesman because Iran hasn’t yielded, and Washington’s position remains uncertain.

Yet from the perspective of the broader international system, the triangular comparison is understandable. Russia, China and the United States are today the three powers with the greatest capacity to shape global affairs.

Their strengths differ as America retains unmatched military and financial reach, while China possesses industrial and economic weight on a historic scale. Meanwhile, Russia continues to wield enormous geopolitical and strategic influence far beyond the size of its economy. Thus, any interaction between the three inevitably affects the wider international balance.

Still, the similarities end there and, in practice, the relationships themselves are fundamentally different in character.

The United States and China are strategic rivals, and that rivalry isn’t temporary, and Trump’s latest visit to Beijing underlined how deeply the relationship has changed. For decades, both sides benefited from a kind of economic symbiosis in which commercial interests outweighed political disagreements but that era is now over.

Washington’s attempts to restructure the relationship in its own favor, while simultaneously restricting China’s technological rise, have pushed Beijing toward a far more assertive position. China’s restrictions on rare-earth exports last year demonstrated that it possesses leverage to which the United States has yet to find an effective response. More importantly, Beijing’s perception of the US has changed. Chinese leaders increasingly appear to believe that pressure on China is not simply the product of one administration or one president’s personality, but rather a structural feature of American policy itself.

As a result, the Trump–Xi relationship is becoming one defined by managed divergence rather than convergence, but tensions will rise and fall and escalation and partial stabilization will alternate. Neither side wants a catastrophic rupture, because the economic consequences would be enormous, but both now seem to accept that long-term competition is unavoidable.

The Russia–China relationship is built on an entirely different foundation.

Moscow and Beijing view themselves not primarily as rivals, but as strategic partners shaped by a shared geopolitical environment across Eurasia. Both countries see the Eurasian landmass as the central arena of 21st-century politics and the most dangerous military conflicts are already unfolding there, from Eastern Europe to the Middle East, while the most consequential future confrontation could emerge in the Pacific and Indian Oceans.

Against that backdrop, Russia and China increasingly regard stable cooperation as a strategic necessity. Their partnership now extends across politics, trade, energy, finance, science, technology and military coordination. The full potential of the relationship hasn’t yet been reached, but the direction is unmistakable.

What matters most is that the strengthening of Russian-Chinese ties has itself become one of the defining factors of global politics.

That’s also why weakening that relationship has become a major objective for Washington. Many American strategists openly insist that the United States must drive a wedge between Moscow and Beijing in order to preserve global primacy. In practice, however, US pressure has often produced the opposite result, pushing the two Eurasian powers into even closer alignment.

None of this means the relationship is free of friction and it’s clearly not. Russia and China are both major powers with long histories, strong national interests and their own strategic ambition which means disagreements over trade, investment, logistics and regional influence are inevitable. But the crucial difference is that these disagreements aren’t existential in nature.

Unlike US-China relations, where competition increasingly revolves around limiting and constraining the other side, Russia and China don’t fundamentally view each other as adversaries so while practical disputes may cause irritation, delays or bargaining, but they don’t threaten the relationship itself.

Both sides may occasionally exercise restraint in directly supporting the other if circumstances become too risky or complicated. But neither Moscow nor Beijing is prepared to undermine the broader partnership for the sake of tactical advantage elsewhere because the relationship is seen as strategically valuable in its own right.

That stability is precisely why meetings between Putin and Xi generate less global drama than summits involving Trump. There’s little suspense because the basic direction of the relationship is already clear. The two countries have spent years building a relatively deep level of political trust, something increasingly rare in international affairs.

In today’s world, predictability has become an unusual commodity, yet that may ultimately be one of the greatest advantages of the Russian-Chinese partnership.

While relations between Washington and Beijing are defined by uncertainty and suspicion Moscow and Beijing have constructed something far steadier: a relationship whose trajectory no longer depends on atmospherics or temporary political moods.

And in an increasingly unstable international environment, that alone makes it significant.

This article was first published by Rossiyskaya Gazeta, and was translated and edited by the RT team.

“A new world order must be built to ensure economic justice and equal political security for all nations. An end to the arms race is an essential prerequisite for the establishment of such an order.”

This year marks the 40th anniversary of those words from the Soviet-Indian Delhi Declaration, signed in 1986 during Mikhail Gorbachev’s visit to India and his talks with Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. It was one of the first major documents of the late Cold War era to openly speak of the need for a ‘new world order’.

At the time, the Soviet leadership believed this order would emerge through what it called ‘new political thinking’. The idea was that former adversaries would abandon confrontation and combine the best elements of their respective systems to create a more stable and equitable international framework. It was an ambitious vision: A joint effort to rebuild global politics from the ruins of ideological rivalry. But history, however, had other plans.

The Soviet Union soon disappeared into a vortex of internal crises before vanishing altogether from the world stage. The phrase ‘new world order’ survived, but it was quickly repurposed by the administration of President George H.W. Bush. In Washington’s interpretation, the concept no longer meant a shared international architecture. It came to mean a liberal order dominated politically and militarily by the US and its allies.

In reality, this wasn’t an entirely new order at all. It was an extension of the post-1945 system, only now without the counterweight of the Soviet Union.

For a time, many believed this arrangement represented the natural endpoint of history. Yet contrary to those expectations, once the Cold War confrontation disappeared, global stability didn’t deepen. Instead, tensions gradually intensified and by the beginning of the 2010s, the foundations of the system were already beginning to crack.

Since then, the pace of disintegration has accelerated dramatically.

As humanity moves deeper into the second quarter of the 21st century, it is becoming increasingly difficult to deny that the previous world order has effectively ceased to exist. Whatever doubts may have lingered vanished during the opening months of 2026.

What matters isn’t simply that the strongest states increasingly ignore laws and conventions that once appeared firmly established, more significant is the style in which politics is now conducted. Decisions are impulsive and often openly contradictory as governments act first and improvise later. Statements made today may directly contradict those made yesterday, yet this no longer seems to matter.

This atmosphere shouldn’t necessarily be mistaken for collective irrationality. Rather, many political actors appear convinced that the old restraints have collapsed and that the current moment represents a historic opportunity. The instinct is simple: Seize as much advantage as possible before the landscape hardens again.

The redistribution of the world has already begun. Political influence, transport corridors, resources, financial flows, technological ecosystems, and even cultural and religious spheres are all being contested simultaneously. Every major power is now defining its ambitions and testing the methods by which those ambitions might be achieved.

Of course, mistakes will be expensive, but that, at least, is nothing new in international politics.

The real uncertainty lies elsewhere because the previous era left behind an assumption that periods of chaos are eventually followed by the emergence of a new equilibrium. After disorder comes structure and after confrontation comes a new framework. But there’s no guarantee this time.

The international system today isn’t an empty construction site waiting for a new design. After major world wars, old structures are often swept away on a vast scale, creating space for something new to emerge, and that’s not the case now.

Instead, the world remains cluttered with institutions and habits inherited from previous eras. Many are discredited or dysfunctional, but they still exist. And even those states that attack these institutions most aggressively continue to use them whenever convenient.

The United Nations system remains an example. Its authority has diminished, yet governments still appeal to it selectively when doing so serves their interests. Likewise, the structures created during the period of liberal globalization have proven more resilient than many expected.

Despite trade wars, sanctions, geopolitical fragmentation, and increasingly open rivalry among major powers, the global economic network continues to resist complete disintegration. Supply chains bend but do not fully break. Markets remain interconnected. Even countries engaged in fierce political confrontation continue trading with one another indirectly.

This resilience appears to frustrate some of the very powers trying to reshape the system.

The creation of a genuinely new international framework will therefore be an exceptionally painful process. The available raw material consists of fragments from different historical periods, ideological systems, and institutional models. Somehow these incompatible components must be assembled into something functional.

Some states are attempting this carefully, selecting elements that might fit together into a relatively coherent structure. Others are behaving more crudely, trying to hammer incompatible pieces into place through pressure or intimidation. The danger is obvious: Excessive force may not produce stability at all, but only further fragmentation.

Yet perhaps the defining feature of the present moment is that nobody possesses a real blueprint for what comes next. During earlier periods of transition, however flawed the visions may have been, leaders at least believed they understood the destination.

However, today there is no such clarity and the latest struggle to construct a new world order comes without universal principles or even a broadly accepted idea of what success would look like. The old rules are fading, but no agreed replacements have emerged.

For now, the message confronting every major power is brutally simple: Do it yourself, and then try to live with the consequences.

RT

The headlines are filled with reports of growing discord inside NATO. Donald Trump openly questions the value of allies who, in his view, fail to carry their share of the burden. Western Europe complains about the unreliability of its American patron while simultaneously pledging loyalty to the Atlantic alliance. Beneath the daily noise, however, something far more significant is taking place: the gradual transformation of Europe’s political and military order.

For decades, the United States guaranteed Western Europe’s security while those Europeans concentrated on prosperity and welfare. That arrangement now appears increasingly unstable. Washington’s strategic priorities have shifted toward Asia and the confrontation with China. Europe remains important as a logistical and political platform for American power, but it is no longer the unquestioned center of US grand strategy.

Trump didn’t create this process, though he has accelerated it dramatically. His irritation with NATO is not simply personal caprice. It reflects a deeper American conclusion that the era of underwriting Western European security indefinitely has become too expensive and strategically distracting.

The alliance itself was built for another age and another purpose.

NATO was designed to contain the Soviet Union and anchor American influence in Europe. It was never intended to become a global instrument for confronting China. Yet this is precisely the direction in which many in Washington would like to push it.

These Europeans, however, do not share America’s sense of urgency regarding Beijing. For most of them, China is an economic competitor, not an existential threat. Russia, by contrast, remains the central security obsession of much of the bloc, especially in Northern and Eastern members. 

This divergence is beginning to reshape NATO from within.

France has emerged as the loudest advocate of greater Western European strategic independence. Paris retains a long tradition of military autonomy and still possesses something few other European powers can claim: a genuinely independent nuclear deterrent. France cannot realistically replace the American nuclear umbrella over Western Europe, but it increasingly seeks to position itself as the ideological leader of a more self-reliant bloc.

Britain, meanwhile, continues its traditional balancing act between the EU and the United States. London insists on its independence from Brussels while simultaneously searching for external support from Washington. Northern and Eastern states remain intensely hawkish and committed to confrontation with Russia, regardless of whether the Americans remain fully engaged. Southern Europe appears far less enthusiastic, distracted instead by migration, economic stagnation and domestic instability.

As so often in European history, however, the decisive factor will likely be Germany.

Much of post-war Europe was built around one central idea: Germany must never again become an independent geopolitical force. After 1945 the country was divided, militarily constrained and tightly integrated into Western structures under American supervision.

Even German reunification in 1990 was accepted partly because Germany remained embedded inside NATO. At the time, many believed that anchoring a unified Germany within the Atlantic alliance was the safest possible arrangement for Europe.

Ironically, that very decision became one of the starting points of today’s geopolitical crisis. NATO expansion eastward created a security architecture that Moscow increasingly viewed as hostile and destabilizing.

Now, three and a half decades later, Europe may again face the prospect of a Germany becoming strategically autonomous, though this time under entirely different circumstances.

Former Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced a “new era” in 2022 following the escalation of the Ukraine conflict. For some time the slogan appeared largely symbolic. Under Germany’s current leadership, however, concrete changes are beginning to emerge.

Berlin is discussing accelerated rearmament, expanded military infrastructure and legislative changes aimed at increasing recruitment for the Bundeswehr. The debate over compulsory military service, once politically unthinkable, has returned to the mainstream.

Recent comments by Franz-Josef Overbeck, the Catholic military bishop of the Bundeswehr, are revealing. Overbeck openly called for Germany to send forces to the Strait of Hormuz and argued that compulsory military service should be restored not only for men but also for women.

His reasoning was blunt. Germany, he argued, can no longer remain on the sidelines in an increasingly dangerous world.

Many within Germany’s political establishment likely agree with him privately. Politicians, however, remain cautious because German society is still deeply uncomfortable with militarism and foreign deployments. Decades of post-war political culture have created a pacifist instinct that remains powerful among voters.

The bishop, unlike elected officials, can speak more freely.

At the same time, Germany faces mounting economic difficulties. This is not merely a temporary downturn. The old German economic model rested heavily on cheap Russian energy and export-driven industrial growth, not to mention stable globalization. Much of that foundation has eroded.

As a result, discussions that would once have been politically toxic are now occurring openly. Militarization is increasingly presented not simply as a security necessity, but also as a potential engine of economic renewal.

Only a few years ago such arguments would have sounded extraordinary in Germany. Today they are becoming part of mainstream debate.

This is where the historical dimension becomes impossible to ignore.

German political culture has long been characterized by discipline and a tendency to follow strategic paths with remarkable determination once a consensus forms. In calmer periods this can be an enormous strength. In moments of geopolitical confrontation, however, it can become dangerous.

The path on which Russia once again serves as Germany’s principal antagonist is deeply familiar from European history.

For decades after the Second World War, many believed that lesson had finally been learned. Economic interdependence between Russia and Germany was supposed to make large-scale confrontation irrational. The collapse of that assumption has shocked much of Europe.

Trump’s pressure on NATO is therefore acting as a catalyst for changes that were already underway. Western Europe is being pushed, reluctantly and unevenly, toward greater military independence. Whether this ultimately strengthens NATO or gradually hollows it out remains unclear.

The alliance is unlikely to collapse outright. Institutions of this scale rarely disappear suddenly. More likely is a gradual transformation into something narrower and more fragmented.

A core bloc focused primarily on containing Russia may emerge within NATO, while the United States shifts more of its attention toward Asia.

Whether such a bloc becomes effective will depend above all on Germany. If Berlin fully embraces rearmament and strategic emancipation from American oversight, Europe’s political landscape could change profoundly and by the end of Trump’s presidency, this process may already be far advanced.

Thus, once again, Europe may discover that history is not something safely confined to textbooks. The old rivalries and anxieties that shaped the continent for centuries have an unsettling habit of returning precisely when people convince themselves they are gone forever.

This article was first published by Rossiyskaya Gazeta, and was translated and edited by the RT team.

There will be much talk this May about the so-called “strategic triangle” of Russia, China and the United States. US President Donald Trump is expected in Beijing first, followed by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s visit to his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping. Whenever the leaders of the three most influential powers meet, speculation inevitably follows. What if they strike some grand bargain? What if the world suddenly becomes more orderly?

Such expectations are misplaced. The restructuring of the global system is already under way, and it isn’t a process that can be halted or reversed by summit diplomacy. Even so, turning points in history can unfold in different ways; carefully managed, or recklessly accelerated. That’s what makes the coming meetings significant.

Both Russia and the United States are now deeply involved in large-scale military confrontations. The importance of these conflicts lies not only in their scope, but in their broader consequences for the international system. China, by contrast, has historically kept its distance from such entanglements. Yet it is becoming increasingly clear in Beijing that it can’t remain insulated from their effects. Discussions at the recent Valdai Club conference in Shanghai suggested that China is reassessing its position.

At the center of this reassessment is a simple question: what, if anything, is still possible in relations with Washington?

For decades, China’s rise was closely tied to its economic relationship with the United States. The arrangement sometimes described as “Chimerica,” American capital and technology combined with Chinese labor and manufacturing, formed the backbone of globalization.

It wasn’t an equal partnership, but it was mutually beneficial. For a long time, it seemed that basic economic self-interest would prevent either side from undermining it.

That assumption has now collapsed.

By the late 2000s, dissatisfaction in Washington was already evident. The United States increasingly viewed the arrangement not as a source of shared gains, but as a structural imbalance. Over time, the accumulation of tensions, economic and strategic, reached a point where incremental adjustments were no longer sufficient. What followed was a qualitative shift in the system itself.

For several decades, the global order operated largely in the interests of the United States as the leader of the Western bloc. Its gradual erosion now threatens those advantages. Washington’s response has been to use the current period of transition to secure as much of a head start as possible for the future.

Donald Trump has become the most visible embodiment of this approach. His rhetoric, openly transactional and even boastful, may appear unconventional, but the underlying logic predates him. The objective is clear: maximize immediate gains and build up national capacity as quickly as possible. Then use that accumulated strength to dominate the next phase of global competition.

This represents a sharp departure from the earlier American strategy, which prioritized long-term investments in the international system. Those investments didn’t always produce immediate returns, but they reinforced a framework that ultimately benefited the United States more than anyone else. Today, the emphasis has shifted toward short-term advantage, even at the risk of longer-term instability.

Whether this strategy will succeed remains uncertain. The initial phase has already produced setbacks. But the broader direction is unlikely to change. Future administrations may adopt a different tone, but they will operate within the same constraints. The liberal international order won’t return, not because of Trump’s personality, but because the conditions that sustained it no longer exist.

For other major powers, including China, this has profound implications. The idea of a comprehensive “big deal” with the United States, one that stabilizes the global system for years to come, has effectively become unrealistic.

Trump’s frequent use of the word “deal” is revealing. In his vocabulary, it’s more than a mere strategic concept but a commercial one. A deal is “big” not because it is durable or all-encompassing, but because of the scale of immediate gain it delivers. And like any commercial transaction, it can be abandoned if a more desirable opportunity presents itself.

Under such conditions, long-term agreements on the structure of world order are impossible. Washington is unlikely to commit to any arrangement that limits its flexibility before it has secured what it considers a sufficient advantage.

This is not necessarily a product of malice or arrogance. It is, in its own way, a rational response to a period of extreme uncertainty. The United States is seeking to preserve the foundations of its future dominance by acting decisively in the present.

But rationality on one side forces adaptation on the other.

If key players conclude that stable agreements with Washington are unattainable, their behavior changes. Military capability becomes more important as a safeguard against pressure. At the same time, interest grows in alternative forms of cooperation. That is, frameworks that operate independently of the United States and are insulated from its influence.

This logic isn’t new, but it’s gaining urgency. Russia has been advocating for such arrangements for several years. China, by contrast, has approached the idea with caution, hoping instead to preserve some form of mutually beneficial relationship with the United States. That hope now appears to be fading.

The upcoming visits to Beijing will provide a useful indication of how far this shift has progressed.

The meeting between Trump and Xi will likely define the limits of a temporary accommodation between two powers that remain economically intertwined, yet increasingly distrustful of one another. The question is no longer whether a comprehensive agreement is possible, but what narrow, short-term arrangements can be reached, and how long they will last.

Putin’s subsequent talks with Xi will address a different issue: the extent to which Russia and China are prepared to develop mechanisms of cooperation that bypass the United States altogether. Moscow has been moving in this direction for some time. Beijing now appears to be considering whether it must follow.

May will not produce a grand bargain. But it may show, more clearly than before, how the world is adjusting to the absence of one.

This article was first published by the magazine Profile, and was translated and edited by the RT team.

The defeat of Viktor Orban and his Fidesz party in Hungary’s parliamentary election shouldn’t be seen as a shock. Opinion polls had long pointed in this direction. Nor should the outcome be divorced from a simple political reality: sixteen consecutive years in power, twenty in total, is an exceptionally long tenure by the standards of Central and Eastern Europe. Fatigue with familiar faces is inevitable, and psychologically understandable.

Yet the result contains a paradox. Orban’s defeat appears, in some ways, to confirm the very trend he has come to embody: the primacy of the national agenda, “my country first.” In recent years, particularly since the escalation of the Ukraine conflict, Hungary’s sovereignist approach has become deeply entangled with external issues. Opposition to the European Commission’s line on Ukraine, justified in Budapest as a defense of Hungarian interests, led to sustained confrontation with both Brussels and Kiev. What began as a domestic political stance increasingly played out on the international stage.

This dynamic shaped the election campaign. Orban’s camp leaned heavily on external themes, portraying Ukraine and its leadership, especially Vladimir Zelensky, as central antagonists. His opponents took the opposite approach. They focused on domestic concerns: living standards, and the promise of restoring smoother relations with the EU as a pathway to improving everyday life. Whether that promise proves justified is another matter, but it resonated with voters. The message was entirely consistent with the logic of sovereignty, only turned inward rather than outward.

It’s also notable what didn’t matter. The visit to Budapest by US Vice President J.D. Vance, along with repeated expressions of support from Donald Trump and his circle, appears to have had no measurable impact. This, too, fits the pattern: overt external endorsement rarely helps in national elections.

Indeed, Trump’s team has so far failed to influence outcomes in any European country where it has attempted to intervene, including Romania and Germany. External pressure, regardless of its source, cannot substitute for domestic political conditions.

That said, external actors were not absent. The Western European mainstream, as usual, worked against Orban where possible. But such involvement has long been a structural feature of European politics. Without underlying domestic factors, it’s rarely decisive.

There were, however, surprises in the details. Fidesz had anticipated potential losses in the proportional vote but expected to retain strength in single-member districts. The opposite occurred. The party’s relative resilience in the lists contrasted with a collapse at the constituency level. This suggests that, at a local level, voters viewed opposition candidates as more attuned to their immediate concerns, and less associated with a government perceived as preoccupied with broader geopolitical battles.

In Brussels and other Western European capitals, the mood is celebratory. Orban had become a persistent irritant, an obstacle to consensus and, at times, to policy itself. His departure will be framed symbolically as a triumph of liberal integration over a disruptive and illiberal figure, often portrayed as aligned with Moscow and Washington’s more nationalist wing.

The incoming government will be expected to demonstrate its credentials quickly. Chief among these expectations is the unblocking of the €90 billion package for Ukraine, something that will likely happen without delay.

From Moscow’s perspective, this isn’t welcome news. Yet it would be naïve to assume that the European Commission would have been unable to advance its agenda had Orban remained. Mechanisms to bypass obstruction were already under discussion.

Beyond these immediate questions, however, the direction of Hungary’s new government remains unclear. Peter Magyar’s campaign bore many of the hallmarks of a personal project. The composition of his cabinet, the balance of power within it, and its concrete priorities are still unknown.

More importantly, the structural realities facing Hungary haven’t changed. Geography and the broader geopolitical environment impose constraints that cannot be wished away. Magyar has already acknowledged the need for dialogue with Russia, a recognition that reflects practical necessity rather than ideological alignment. Whether this pragmatism can coexist with expectations from Brussels and Kiev remains to be seen.

Orban’s defeat is therefore symbolically significant, but its practical implications are far less certain. Hungary’s new leadership will have to navigate the same complex and often unfavorable conditions as its predecessor. The difference may lie less in the direction of policy than in the manner in which it’s presented.

In that sense, the election may mark not a fundamental shift, but a recalibration. The slogan may change. The constraints will not.

This article was first published by Rossiyskaya Gazeta, and was translated and edited by the RT team. 

Donald Trump has declared the start of a new “golden age” in the Middle East after announcing a ceasefire with Iran. The war, at least for now, has been paused. And while predictions are always risky with this White House, there is at least a chance that the fighting will not immediately resume.

That alone matters. A prolonged war would raise risks for everyone, but above all for Washington. For all the bombast coming from the US administration, America has always been deeply uncomfortable with prolonged uncertainty and strategic risk. It is one thing to threaten. It is another to endure the consequences when threats fail.

The precise terms of the ceasefire remain unclear and may not yet be fully agreed. But the central political fact is already visible: Faced with determined resistance, the US stepped back.

None of the sweeping demands set out at the start of the operation were met. Trump’s all-caps demand for Iran’s “UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER!” now looks more like political theater than strategic doctrine. Yet behind the social media drama, something more rational prevailed in Washington: When pressure fails, it is better to retreat than to escalate into a situation you may no longer control.

The feverish rhetoric before the truce served a purpose. It allowed Washington to claim that Tehran had blinked, while creating such a sense of looming catastrophe that any pause in fighting could be sold as relief. The White House will now try to present restraint as victory.

This conflict is undoubtedly a milestone in the wider transformation of the international system. But it is not the end of that process. Nor is it the final chapter in the struggle for the Middle East. Iran, above all, has demonstrated resilience. It has completely undermined the core assumption behind the US-Israeli campaign, namely that a sufficiently powerful blow would be enough to bring down the Islamic Republic or force it into submission.

Tehran’s response was not spectacular in the conventional military sense, but it was effective. Iran widened the theater of tension and signaled that the costs of escalation would not be confined to military targets. It forced its opponents to reckon not only with Iranian retaliation, but with the fragility of the wider regional system.

This matters because the endurance of the US and its regional partners is limited. Iran’s, by contrast, has historically been much greater.

The so-called Axis of Resistance also proved more durable than many had assumed. Despite the serious damage inflicted by Israel over the past two years, pro-Iranian forces in Lebanon, Yemen, and Iraq remain a strategic factor. Even where they did not intervene directly, they raised the temperature and forced the attackers to remain on edge.

The broader effort to neutralize Iranian influence has therefore backfired. Iran has emerged bloodied but still standing. Even if Tehran’s claims that any settlement must happen on its terms are partly negotiating tactics, one thing is already clear: Iran’s regional weight has not diminished in the way Washington and West Jerusalem intended.

Negotiations with Tehran are now unavoidable. The real question is what Iran itself wants.

Its previous strategy of regional expansion contributed to many of the crises now engulfing the Middle East. There is also the unresolved issue of its nuclear program. What exactly is Iran seeking, and what price is it prepared to pay? Iran appears to have entered a new internal phase as well, with power shifting further toward security institutions. That leadership will now have to weigh ambition against reality.

For the wider region, the implications are profound.

The Gulf monarchies have had a sobering experience. There will be no return to the comfortable old formula in which security could simply be outsourced to Washington in exchange for money and loyalty. That arrangement, which underpinned the region since the Cold War, has been badly shaken.

Publicly, the Gulf states are unlikely to make dramatic gestures. But privately, their search for new hedges and new partners will intensify. China, South Asia, Russia and, to a lesser extent, Western Europe will all become more important in their calculations.

That doesn’t mean the Gulf will accept Iranian dominance. The monarchies will not tolerate Tehran having unchecked influence over the Persian Gulf or the ability to dictate terms in the Strait of Hormuz. Their policy is likely to become more complex: containing Iran where possible while engaging with it where necessary.

Israel, meanwhile, has not achieved its stated aims either. However loudly victory is proclaimed, the basic strategic reality has not changed. The Iranian factor remains. It has not been eliminated, nor weakened enough for Israel to feel genuinely secure.

The domestic consequences for the US are harder to judge. Trump’s self-congratulation already rings hollow, but much will depend on economics. If oil markets stabilize, the White House will try to move on quickly and insist disaster was averted thanks to Trump’s leadership. Whether that helps Republicans in the November midterms is unclear.

Still, Trump has always had one instinct his critics often underestimate: He knows how to survive setbacks and reframe them.

The larger conclusion, however, goes beyond Trump. The US remains immensely powerful. Its military reach, financial leverage and ability to shape events are still formidable. But they are not limitless. America can still influence outcomes but can no longer simply impose its will at any cost.

That lesson has now been absorbed far beyond Tehran. Allies and adversaries alike will draw their own conclusions. Iran may be a special case, but a precedent has been set.

This is another step toward a different world, one in which coercion is less decisive and the old assumptions about American omnipotence increasingly obsolete. Trump may wish to replace a liberal American-led order with an illiberal one under US dominance. But the events of recent weeks suggest something else: a world moving beyond any order Washington can fully control.

This article was first published by Rossiyskaya Gazeta, and was translated and edited by the RT team.