Europe's Irrelevance: Update to "Europeans: Want Leaders Who Obey You and Not the US Government? Abolish the Welfare State"

A real foreign policy — a real sovereign state — requires soldiers, not social workers.

European leaders are tearing their hair out. Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin are negotiating an end to the Ukraine war (and other matters) and leaving the Europeans out of the talks — effectively, leaving them high and dry. Adding insult to injury, US Vice President J.D. Vance then delivered a scathing condemndation of those leaders for their narcissism and authoritarianism and for betraying only Ukraine, but the very western values (like free speech) that they claim to be upholding. Vance made it clear that Europe is no longer relevant to global politics, security, or much of anything else.

So European leaders like Emmanuel Macron and Keir Starmer and above all Ursula von der Leyen are ranting and raving and reviving old pipedreams like building a European defense force in order to support Ukraine on their own — and to consolidate power in Paris, London, and Brussels. Having obsequiously followed the Americans into the war, these toadies are stuck with it and unable to follow the Americans out. (Reminiscent of East European puppet rulers refusing to accept the end of the Cold War?)

Given these developments, I thought my piece from last summer worth reposting. Today we see the logical culmination of what I described then. Faster than we expected, the logic of Europe’s foolishness about not only the Ukraine war but almost everything else is leading to its impotence and marginalization from world affairs, if not its demise altogether.

But what is not being noticed is how Europe is making itself irrelevant by its continued addiction to that earliest of narcotics furnished by the gender warriors: the welfare state.

---

Europeans: Want Leaders Who Obey You and Not the US Government? Abolish the Welfare State

(20 July 2024)

Many Europeans nowadays complain that their governments are slavishly obedient to the Americans. As the Biden junta adopts one reckless policy after another — both at home and abroad — they can count on most European governments following their example and their instructions.

Throughout the Cold War, the Europeans (especially the British) saw their role as loyal but critical advisors to the Americans, supporting US foreign policy but moderating occasional unwise actions which might tempt the Americans.  But now European governments eerily resemble the old puppet governments of Eastern European satellite states, kowtowing to the United States as some of them once kowtowed to the Soviet Union. 

Whether it is Covid “vaccines”, open borders, forever wars, inflationary economic policies, deindustrialization, bankrupting family farms, or the rest, if the Americans sneeze, the Europeans catch cold. Moreover, these policies can be far more destructive to European societies than to the United States itself. Witness the deindustrialization of Europe’s most important economy: Germany.

The reason is simple: The US provides Europe’s military defense. If you want to have an independent foreign policy — and with it a sovereign country — you must have a strong and independent military.  Without a viable military you cannot have your own foreign policy and therefore your own sovereign nation. 

Many Europeans complain that their national sovereignties are undermined from within by the European Union (EU) and through immigration.  But their sovereignty is equally undermined from without by NATO, which dictates their foreign policy. The Europeans depend for their defense on the Americans, so when it comes to international affairs the Americans “call the shots.”  Here the American Empire shows its subtlety: It did not actively conquer Europe militarily, but it has in effect passively conquered it (also militarily), by providing protection.

The problem will not be solved by creating a “European” army. This goal has eluded the European Union from the start, because Europeans do not want to surrender their foreign policies to Brussels, which is what would happen. So instead they surrender it to Washington.

And why can’t European countries maintain their own independent militaries?  The culprit is the welfare state.  Europeans prefer to spend their money on cushy welfare services.¹ Europeans cannot wholly blame their governments for their sycophancy therefore; it is what much of the European population wants and expects.

This involves more than an economic trade-off. It represents a fundamental shift in the primary purpose of government itself: defending the realm versus caring for children, the elderly, the indigent, the infirm, all of us. A country with an army is a patriarchy, with strong men and women who respect them.  A country with a welfare state is a matriarchy, with domineering women and weak men whom the women despise. 

The choice is ours.

---

If you want to read more analysis that will push you to think “outside the box,” you will find it in my new book, Who Lost America? Why the United States Went "Communist” — and What to Do about It — available from Amazon.

Stephen Baskerville is Professor of Politics at the Collegium Intermarium in Warsaw. His books and recent articles are available at www.StephenBaskerville.com.

1. Foreign policy analyst Gilbert Doctorow, whose expertise lies elsewhere, nevertheless made this point backhandedly in a recent interview. But wisely perhaps, and like others who cannot avoid noticing, neither he nor his interviewer stopped to dwell on the implications.