Europe's humiliation is a comms strategy – and that's the problem
The EU-US trade deal announced last week has received an icy reception across the continent. French Prime Minister Bayrou decried a " submission" and many commentators lamented a humiliation for Europe.
But much like the promises of 5% of defence spending at June's NATO summit, the humiliation has more to do with the performative concessions of European leaders. These embarrassing exhibitions of self-debasement allow Trump to trumpet his victories, but they sting less under closer inspection.
Viewed side by side, the NATO summit and the EU-US trade demonstrate a strategic communication of subservience. At NATO, Secretary General Mark Rutte was unabashed in his deference , with texts to Trump that the American president later publicised . 'Europe is going to pay in a BIG way, as they should, and it will be your win,' Rutte fawned .
The whole summit was designed around Trump's notoriously short attention span. It ended with the pledge from member states to spend 3.5% of GDP on defence, topped up with 1.5% on defence-related spending – an invitation for creative accounting that gave Trump the 5% he so desired.
But eyebrow-raising numbers aside, the announcements at the NATO summit will build a stronger European defence. The European increases in defence spending will end up boosting national defence spending. So long as this is done wisely , this will lay the ground for Europe to assert greater control over its defence.
In addition, much of the 1.5% top-up will pay for infrastructure investments that were planned anyway. Contrary to the presentation as a gift to Trump, European investment in European defence could significantly reduce the dependence on the US, at least for conventional deterrence.
The strategy of subservience was even more obnoxious with Sunday's trade deal. Whilst America's military might is integral to European security, the EU prides itself on its strength as a global economic power, with the EU27's common trade policy conducted by the EU Commission.
But over months of tariff threats from Trump, with ever-changing deadlines, the EU – at the behest of its member states – chose to delay retaliation again and again. The Union has now not only accepted a deal that sees tariffs rise to 15% on many goods (without equivalent rises of EU tariffs for the US), but also made investment promises to the tune of €550bn into the US, pledged to ramp up purchases of US fossil energy, and acquiesced to buy defence equipment and AI chips for more than €700bn in the next three years.
No reciprocal engagements have been made from the US side. And yet in public, the EU is following Trump's line that the deal is a big win. For Trump, it is surely that. But for the EU, it looks like a capitulation.
Not quite. What we see is the same comms strategy that lets Trump show he got big wins by presenting big numbers.
Look more closely and these performative concessions consist either of investments Europeans already planned (e.g. AI chips, LNG, defence equipment), and/or lofty, non-binding promises that the EU cannot enforce as the choices must be taken by private companies.
Even with the higher tariffs on cars, trade expert Sam Lowe argues , production in Europe is more attractive than in North America when the higher input costs from Trump's tariffs on steel and aluminium are taken into account. But rather than hi l ghlight the President's bluster, European leaders – both national and in the EU – are actively choosing to let Trump have his win.
This ostentatious humiliation may well bring Europe some breathing space in the short term. It has already avoided the worst-case scenarios: by keeping the US on board with NATO and preventing the 30% tariffs Trump had been ready to deploy. And the costs are not as high as the public wins for Trump suggest.
Yet the political price may be steep: Europe has signalled to its citizens and the world that it is willing to bow to Trump's pressure. This unappealing strategy will only be worthwhile if European leaders use the breathing space it gives them to effectively and jointly reduce dependency on the US. Failure to do so will be a resounding catastrophe.
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