The days of Europe buying its energy from Russia, outsourcing its businesses to China, and relying on the United States for its security are over. The European Union is only mortal and could very well be vanquished at the hands of Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, Donald Trump or its own populist parties.

That was French President Emmanuel Macron’s warning at the Sorbonne University on 25 April. With great flair, and at great length, he issued a wake-up call to French citizens, and indeed to all Europeans. It is no exaggeration to say that Europe’s security, prosperity and culture are under threat.

With the zeal of a convert, Macron argues that the stakes in Ukraine include not only Ukrainians’ future but also the future of Europe: ‘The condition sine qua non for our security is that Russia does not win the war of aggression it is waging against Ukraine. This is imperative.’ Even though the US Congress has finally passed a supplemental aid bill for Ukraine (as well as Israel and Taiwan), Europeans must recognise that the United States has only two priorities: “America first, which is legitimate, and China.”

Macron warns that Europeans have entered a new world where raw materials face harder supply constraints, critical minerals are governed by geopolitics, the green transition is growing more urgent, and neither China nor America respects the rules of free trade. And on the political front, he deplores Europeans increasingly succumbing to imported culture wars. The more their politics are shaped by narratives produced elsewhere, the less equipped they will be to shape their own future.

True to form, Macron was not short on solutions. Europe’s security risks can be mitigated through a missile-defence initiative, long-range weapons and improved cyber capabilities, all backed by a war economy running on higher military and high-tech production, with financing from the European Investment Bank and mutualised EU debt vehicles. Similarly, Europe’s economic problems demand a new industrial policy, with production targets and buy-European preferences in strategic sectors such as defence, green tech, raw materials, semiconductors, digital technology and health care.

Macron’s political genius has always stemmed from his think-tank-like approach to big problems, and his analysis of what ails Europe is a trenchant one. But he suffers from a reverse-Midas curse: policies become more controversial by dint of him having embraced them. While the president’s team proudly points out that several of the ideas mentioned in his 2017 Sorbonne speech have since been implemented, Macron himself admits that Europe could have, and should have, gone much further. If he wants to look back in seven years and see a better conversion rate, he will have to adopt a new playbook.

First, Macron must begin to show, not just tell. Though his language on the Ukraine war has been striking, French military aid lags far behind Germany’s. If Macron had really wanted to demonstrate strategic resolve against Russia, he would already have sent French military personnel to assist Ukraine in a non-combatant capacity, as the United States and the Britain have done.

Second, Macron must get over his Jupiterian tendency to see himself as the main character in Europe’s drama. Ideally, he and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz would get along well enough to launch ideas in tandem, thus bolstering the idea of a Franco-German motor. But in the absence of a constructive bilateral relationship (for which Germany is equally to blame), Macron should make a greater effort to build coalitions with other leaders, such as Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez or Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.

Underlying all the problems that Macron identified in his speech is a crisis in European leadership. As an American official recently pointed out to me, Macron is like a (young) King Lear. With just a few years left in his term, and with no majority in parliament, he has come to a clear-eyed understanding of the world too late. Sometimes, Macron appears even to lean into the emptiness, crying into the void like Lear on the heath. It is always easier to be right than to do the hard work of bringing others along with you.

That said, the timing for a Macron moment has never been better. Not so long ago, the EU was fundamentally divided between eastern member states that were worried about Russia and looking to the US for protection, and western ones that weren’t. But since his damascene conversion on the road to Kyiv, Macron has proven to be a master at articulating eastern members’ anxieties. If there is anyone who can bridge the EU’s east-west divide, it is him.

Moreover, France’s own nuclear deterrent could be critical for providing reassurances to those countries spooked by the threat of an American withdrawal from Europe if Trump returns to the White House in January. While Macron’s right-wing opponent, Marine Le Pen, has been doing very well in the polls, her antagonistic relationship with the EU and her closeness to Russia have become more glaring weaknesses. If Macron can find a less imperious approach and put his money where his mouth is, he could create a truly durable political base for his ideas. The Macron of seven years ago scarcely could have dreamed of that.

The European Union’s spending rules and public-procurement processes are plainly inadequate to the threat posed by Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. If the World War II Allies had been subject to such strictures, they would have been unable to buy landing craft for the invasion of Normandy in 1944, equip General Charles de Gaulle’s Free French Army, or issue war bonds in time. The EU’s regulations undermine its capacity to mitigate the war’s effects on Europe itself, weaken its ability to protect itself from a broad range of hybrid attacks, and prolong Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine.

That is why some European leaders have increasingly called for the EU to put its economy on a war footing. French President Emmanuel Macron, for example, has rallied a coalition of countries to increase support for Ukraine. But while such a shift is urgently needed, efforts to this end have so far mostly been confined to the military sphere, leaving both Ukraine and the bloc vulnerable in other domains.

For example, the procedure for financing and building a new electricity interconnector to Ukraine—which might become increasingly essential as Russia intensifies its strikes on energy infrastructure—would probably not differ from the pre-war procedures. Now as then, a project that could be built in, say, one year, can easily take several more years, owing to bureaucratic barriers.

Consider that in autumn 2022, when Russia began destroying Ukraine’s electricity-generation capacity, Romania requested funds for an electricity interconnector to Moldova – which had started experiencing blackouts as well—from NextGenerationEU, the bloc’s pandemic-recovery program. After nine months of preliminary work, the EU reached the obvious conclusion that the project made little economic sense. While correct from the criteria for financing projects under the NextGenerationEU s and from a profit-maximising perspective, such an assessment ignores the broader risks of Russia’s brutal war on the EU and candidate countries.

Similar issues arise with other types of infrastructure spending. Today, if Poland or Estonia needs to build a road or bridge for security purposes—to boost its capacity to deploy military assets along the border or to some hard-to-reach border village, for example—it would be difficult to access or fast-track funding from international financial institutions, the EU’s Cohesion Fund, or NextGenerationEU, let alone the World Bank, the European Investment Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, or the Council of Europe Development Bank. But what may be fiscally unsound in normal times takes on new meaning in a war economy. Indeed, all member states would benefit from improving the ability of the EU’s frontier countries to move troops and defence equipment.

While diplomatically firm, Europe is still wobbly when it comes to committing resources. The situation is comparable to the first years of the multi-year eurozone debt crisis that began in 2009—at least until then-European Central Bank president Mario Draghi delivered his famous vow in 2012 that the ECB would ‘do whatever it takes’ to save the euro. The EU has yet to commit to do whatever it takes to deny Russia’s victory. The contrast between the bloc securing €750 billion ($1.2 trillion) for the pandemic-recovery fund and struggling to raise even €100 billion for Ukraine’s existential struggle in the continent’s largest war since 1945 reflects Europe’s aversion to common projects beyond the economic sphere.

The EU must change, and fast, to mitigate the Russian security threat. That means providing more aid to Ukraine, devising an emergency plan for ramping up domestic military production, and adopting a European Defense Production Act (DPA).

First, the EU should consider supporting Ukraine with a lend-lease program, similar to the one that the United States used to supply the Allies with military equipment, food, and other material resources before officially entering World War II. The US dispensed around $50 billion (roughly $800 billion today),worth of goods, deferring payment.

Most of these debts were repaid in joint action toward the creation of a liberalized economic order, but some were eventually reimbursed; the United Kingdom paid its final loan installment in 2006. The EU could use common borrowing to finance such a program, like the pandemic-recovery fund before it. The threat posed to the bloc by the Ukraine war is arguably greater than that of COVID-19.

Second, European policymakers must devise contingency plans for military emergencies, including the conversion of civilian factories into defense plants. After all, Ford began assembling B-24 bombers and Chrysler shifted to manufacturing tanks during World War II.

Lastly, a European DPA would help mitigate the effects of hybrid aggression against the EU by hostile powers, including on electricity infrastructure, gas supplies, and telecommunications equipment. It would also establish a robust framework for addressing military and security shortages, with guidelines for fast-tracking acquisitions, expanding industrial sites, managing contracts, introducing trade controls, and securing supply chains.

This new legislative framework should be modelled on the US DPA, which was enacted in 1950 and allows the president to expedite and expand the supply of materials and services needed to promote national defence, broadly defined, by regulating—or even commandeering —private industries. For example, during the COVID-19 crisis, companies were mandated under the DPA to assign the highest priority to government contracts for medical supplies and equipment. In addition to direct purchases and purchase commitments, the DPA authorises the use of other financial incentives, such as loans and guarantees, to enhance domestic preparedness, which includes funding research and development.

A European DPA would establish a framework for addressing hybrid, and possibly more conventional, threats by hostile powers acting and help fast-track processes for public procurement and spending, while still preserving institutional checks and balances. Adopting such legislation, together with a lend-lease program for Ukraine and contingency plans for military emergencies, would represent a credible commitment by the EU to its own defence and to its NATO commitment. Given the full-scale war next door, it is high time the bloc confronted reality: it must protect itself.

Can the European Union facilitate a more stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific? Brussels believes so. Josep Borrell, high representative of the EU for foreign affairs, says the EU intends to counter the deteriorating regional security environment with cooperative multilateralist approaches. 

But this belief is misplaced. The cooperative measures proposed by Brussels cannot redress the deteriorating environment, and the options for fostering viable multilateralism all exceed the EU’s capabilities. Correspondingly, without an effective and autonomous path forward, Brussels should throw its weight behind the like-minded initiative led by the US to build a free and open Indo-Pacific.  

Intensifying Sino-US rivalry has largely driven the deterioration of the Indo-Pacific security environment. China’s meteoric rise not only emboldened a revisionist Beijing but also eroded the longstanding cornerstone of Indo-Pacific stability, US regional primacy. Since neither Beijing nor Washington have incentives to give way, their struggle for regional mastery has been marked by ever-increasing levels of assertiveness and pushback. The ongoing deterioration has even hardened many secondary powers against meaningful cooperation, with Australia, Japan, South Korea, and the Philippines all recently adopting more adverse policies towards China. 

Rather than ameliorating these tensions, EU plans for Indo-Pacific cooperation predominantly target lesser powers, such as Pacific island countries, and lower political issues, such as green transitions. Taking this approach inherently precludes Brussels from realizing its stated aim, but in the current geopolitical climate, exploiting low-hanging opportunities is about all that cooperative multilateralist approaches can hope to achieve.  

 Theoretically, if the EU wished to foster viable multilateralism, there are three ways in which it could rewrite the rules of Indo-Pacific politics to do so. First, it could impose new rules by leveraging its material dominance—much like how European colonial powers displaced China’s waning influence in East Asia during the mid-1800s. Second, it could institutionalise new rules by forming a preponderant coalition, like the EU in postwar Europe. Third, it could cultivate informal rules by outlining guidelines in a similar style to the principle of non-interference that characterises relations among members of the Association of South East Asian Nations. 

 None of these options are within the reach of Brussels, however. The EU doesn’t enjoy the material dominance needed to impose multilateralism on the Indo-Pacific. Despite recent increases, its defense budget remains a paltry $3 billion, equivalent to Myanmar’s. Moreover, Brussels has no military wherewithal of its own, and recent proposals for forming an EU army died on arrival. The EU’s greatest asset, its single market, also falls comparatively short against China and the US—ranking third both in size and expected long-term growth. 

 Nor can the EU draw the necessary strength from its members. Common foreign and defense policy requires unanimous consent, and that is rarely available for Indo-Pacific operations. Members have approved only two actions on the region’s periphery against non-state threats to global shipping. Moreover, the members currently remain focused on European security, and those with the capacity for extra-regional operations, such as France and Germany, have sent only smaller deployments to the Indo-Pacific. 

 Brussels also lacks the influence to bring together a preponderant multilateralist coalition. Neither Washington nor Beijing has the incentive to join an EU-led bloc that advocates for constraining its interests, and they already have their own security ties in the region. For instance, China and Russia enjoy a ‘no limits partnership’, while Australia, Japan and South Korea regard their alliances with the US as the cornerstones of their defence strategies. 

 The EU does have a strategic partnership with ASEAN, but that group’s members have little weight in the region, accounting for just 15.9% of the Indo-Pacific population and 10.4% of the regional GDP. Moreover, these states generally abide by the geopolitical mantra of ‘don’t make us choose’—to the extent that seven of the 10 ASEAN members maintain security ties with both China and the US.   

Neither can Brussels leverage its economic heft for diplomatic gain. The EU has a smaller share of regional imports and exports than China or the US. It’s also less valuable as a trading partner for most of the Indo-Pacific states (including six of the 10 largest regional economies).  

Lastly, there is too much at stake for the US and China in the Indo-Pacific for the EU to introduce effective multilateralism. Both the US and China are uncompromising in their quest to be the dominant influence in the region and in their strategies over key matters such as Taiwan, and will cooperate only on less sensitive issues, such as climate change. 

 Despite the confidence of Brussels, the EU cannot provide a multilateralist alternative for stabilizing the Indo-Pacific: it doesn’t have a plausible strategy for ameliorating the core tensions; and it is too weak and peripheral to instil multilateralist rules within the region. Instead, Brussels should back the US’s initiative to build a free and open Indo-Pacific, which espouses similar rules-based preferences to the EU’s own Indo-Pacific strategy.

Not for the first time, the central figure at this year’s Munich Security Conference was someone not in attendance. This year was Donald Trump’s turn.

Like most participants at this annual ‘Davos of Defence’, I desperately hope that the presumptive Republican candidate will forever remain a former president. This is not merely out of sympathy for my American friends, who see him as a danger to the future of their republic, but also because I fear what he would do to the global order. As a European, though, I am somewhat grateful for Trump’s existence. Even if he loses the election this November, he could end up becoming the European project’s unwitting saviour. He has forced Europeans finally to rethink the core assumptions that have hamstrung them with regard to the war in Ukraine, Europe’s own defence, and European political unity.

As the war in Ukraine nears the end of its second year with no end in sight, Trump’s candidacy is focusing European minds about what victory and defeat might entail. Everyone’s ideal outcome is for Ukraine to recover all its territory. Watching the Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny’s widow, Yulia Navalnaya, take the stage in Munich hours after learning of her husband’s death, it was impossible not to recoil at the thought of giving Vladimir Putin even one square inch of Ukraine. But as the war of attrition grinds on, it makes less and less sense to consider the matter only in territorial terms.

After all, an even bigger threat to Ukraine than territorial losses would be a Trump peace plan that both cedes territory and demilitarises the country, thus leaving it condemned to a perilous state of neutrality. Europeans are waking up to the fact that Ukraine can pursue its European and Western ambitions only through dual accession to NATO and the European Union. As Ivan Krastev argued recently, it may be time to start considering a ‘West German scenario.’

Trump has also unwittingly lent urgency to the ongoing European debate about defence and security. Just this week in Munich, Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen promised to hand over her country’s ‘entire artillery’ to the Ukrainians. More broadly, Europeans have already been contributing more aid (military and otherwise) to Ukraine than the United States has. Ahead of NATO’s summit in Washington in July, 20 of the 22 EU members of the alliance (including Germany) are on track to spend at least 2% of their GDP on defense.

True, most of this shift is the result of Putin’s revanchism. But Trump’s recent comments encouraging the Russians to ‘do whatever the hell they want’ with NATO members that refuse to ‘pay up’ have raised the ante. Europeans must not only invest more but also change how the money is spent, not least by overcoming the old psychological divisions between NATO and the EU.

But perhaps Trump’s biggest contribution has been to Europe’s political unity. After he was elected in 2016, many feared the rise of an ‘illiberal international’ that would have brought far-right populist parties in Europe into close alignment with Trump’s White House and Putin’s Kremlin. But if Trump is elected a second time, polling by the European Council on Foreign Relations (to be published soon) shows that he would not be welcomed enthusiastically in most European countries, including even Hungary.

One striking consequence of the war (and of Brexit) lies in the repositioning of many right-wing parties. Most notably, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has carefully moved away from her previous Euroskepticism and made a point of cutting all of Italy’s ties with Putin. In Poland, Donald Tusk’s return to the premiership has united a traditionally skeptical electorate behind the idea of a more cohesive geopolitical Europe. The European Parliament elections in June may well result in a sharp turn to the right; but in many countries, the Trump threat could mobilise voters and help candidates who are rallying behind European sovereignty.

Nor are these dynamics confined to the EU. The United Kingdom will probably elect a new government before the end of the year. In Munich, the Labour Party’s impressive shadow foreign secretary, David Lammy, made it clear that he would push hard for the closest possible relationship with Europeans on security and defence issues.

But nobody summed up the Trump effect better than (outgoing) Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, who implored Europeans to ‘stop whining and moaning about Trump’, and start focusing on getting their act together. Given the long-term trajectory of US domestic politics, Europeans would need to do this either way, regardless of who wins this November.

Should disaster be averted this time around, a second-term Biden administration could count on a much better partner in Europe. As many US watchers have noted, Trump is both the biggest threat to American democracy and the most powerful mobiliser of Democratic Party voters. It is a risky business, but there is a chance that the Trump effect could leave the transatlantic order stronger than it has been for a long time.

Even before Hamas’s barbaric attack on Israel catapulted the Middle East back to the forefront of global geopolitics, the European Union recognised the critical importance of Turkey as a bridgehead to the region. Yet the EU’s policy of engagement with Turkey has long been mostly on life support.

Europe’s extended neighbourhood seems to be entering a new era of chaos. A growing number of actors are willing to take major risks with little regard for potential consequences. With existing frameworks for engagement becoming increasingly obsolete, creative mediation and imaginative diplomacy are essential.

But whether Europe is up to the task is far from clear. The list of geopolitical challenges that the EU should be addressing is as long as it is neglected. The EU’s relative passivity amid coups in Africa, volatility in the Mediterranean, and violent flare-ups between Kosovo and Serbia in the Balkans—to name a few examples—is undermining the bloc’s credibility as a relevant geopolitical actor. Even with regard to the war on its doorstep in Ukraine, the EU often appears to be more bystander than powerbroker.

By contrast, Turkey has proven to be a decisive player on a host of issues falling squarely within the EU’s remit. For example, Turkey was integral to the Black Sea Grain Initiative, which facilitated the export of 32 million tonnes of Ukrainian agricultural exports before Russia terminated it.

Turkey has also played an important role in recent events in Nagorno-Karabakh. Though President Recep Tayyip Erdogan denies direct involvement in the 24-hour military operation that restored Azerbaijan’s control over the ethnic-Armenian enclave, Turkey hasn’t hesitated to deliver critical support—including military equipment and training—to Azerbaijan. With Azerbaijan and Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh having held their first direct peace talks last month, Erdogan’s assertiveness has clearly paid off. The same can’t be said for the mediation efforts of European Council President Charles Michel earlier this year.

Erdogan has leveraged Turkey’s strategic location and military capabilities to deepen its defence ties with the Gulf Cooperation Council countries (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia). These agreements signal a broadening of Turkey’s financial outreach and an increase in its geopolitical influence, even if they may limit its room for manoeuvre in theatres of active armed conflict. Turkey is undoubtedly watching the war between Hamas and Israel closely for opportunities to engage.

This is not to overstate the strength of Turkey’s hand. The country is engaged in a delicate dance with Russia, which Erdogan failed to dissuade from ending the grain deal. And its relations with its NATO allies are decidedly strained. But one cannot deny that Erdogan’s decision not to side with either Russia or the West has yielded geopolitical and economic benefits for Turkey.

The European Commission seems to recognise Turkey’s strategic importance, and there have been some positive developments in the EU–Turkey relationship. Europe provided €400 million in aid to Turkey following the devastating earthquakes there earlier this year, and Turkish–Greek relations have lately grown somewhat warmer. Last year, the EU launched its Turkey investment platform.

But numerous points of friction—most notably, regarding the rule of law in Turkey—remain. When Erdogan attempted to strongarm the EU into advancing Turkey’s long-stalled accession bid by holding Sweden’s application to join NATO hostage, the European Parliament issued a report lambasting Turkey’s rule-of-law record. Erdogan responded by threatening to ‘part ways’ with the EU. The European Commission’s annual progress report on Turkish accession talks, scheduled for release later this year, is likely to elicit a similar reaction.

The problem is that the prospect of Turkish accession is still the basis of the EU–Turkey relationship, and a substitute for it has yet to be found. Beyond a tense collaboration on refugee management, there’s little generating momentum towards deeper engagement. Given Turkey’s strategic importance, the EU needs to take more initiative.

Fortunately, Europe can pluck some low-hanging diplomatic fruit. Most obvious is the modernisation of the EU–Turkey customs union and the removal of trade obstacles—a move that could help to bring Turkey on side regarding sanctions against Russia. The customs union was always intended to be a first step towards EU accession. With Turkey’s accession barely on the table, the customs union merely binds the country to EU trade agreements that it has no say in designing.

To stimulate trade, the EU could also consider liberalising the visa regime for businesspeople and investors. This could be a first step towards eventual visa liberalisation for all Turkish citizens, assuming Turkey meets the relevant conditions.

For its part, Turkey must recognise that its economic interests lie with the EU more than with Russia or the Gulf. Moreover, its ability to exercise global influence depends, in no small measure, on its ability to maintain solid ties with its Western allies. A Turkey that is marginalised within NATO would be significantly less effective diplomatically.

Earlier this year, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan condemned the EU’s ‘strategic blindness’, declaring that it can’t truly be a ‘global actor’ without Turkey. While such comments do little to improve bilateral relations, they contain more than a grain of truth. What remains to be seen is whether the EU can balance its geopolitical ambitions with its core values and interests.