How should we make sense of Europe’s seemingly self-destructive posture? Four interrelated dimensions can help explain its leaders’ stance: psychological, political, strategic and transatlantic
European leaders' resistance to diplomatic off-ramps in Ukraine isn’t just strategic blindness; it’s a survival instinct. Faced with economic decline and political fragmentation, they’ve latched onto the war as a justification for deeper centralization, rearmament, and authoritarian control.
That they fear peace more than prolonged conflict speaks volumes. It would expose their failures, end their narrative cover, and unravel the fragile legitimacy they’ve built on borrowed time and borrowed power. This isn’t about defending Europe. It’s about preserving a ruling class that no longer serves it.
Precisely. This is the only explanation that makes any sense. The idea that the European ruling class are all American Empire vassals not only relieves them of all agency here, but ignores their own interests (as they see them and told everyone openly), not to mention grossly distorts the situation and the developments that brought us to it.
Could Van Der Leyen win an election for Chancellor with the majority of votes? Could she even win an election for mayor of Berlin? Bærbock?
Could Starmer win a popular vote in any election in Britian?
Isnt Macron the guy who leads a minority governemnt and would lose if he faced a general election.
In Norway the ex-NATO PR guy Stoltenberg is now playing an interesting game where he plays a role the "bold independent" in the international media, telling them Europe has his own course....but at home his pitch to the domestic audience is that because of his NATO connections...he is close to both Trump and the US neocons. Right.
They are "leaders" in name only. They have little or no local power base. They serve purely a constituency of their handlers in Wash. DC and Langley, VA. And Tel Avic.
In other words these are lackeys with little or no agency.
Excellent article Mr. Fazi, fully in line with you and you will see it chimes well with what I have been writing on the economic part in several piece, of which one below:
European policies may be bad, even very bad, and stupid and dangerous, but they are not entirely irrational. Also, I am far from certain that European leaders follow the same strategy: different goals could take the same form for tactical reasons.
First of all, keeping the USA entangled in the war in the Ukraine have possibly many benificial, or at least gratifying, effects for some or all European countries. The USA prepared, then started the war when it was best suited to them, and now, again, they want to get out of the war when it best suits them: not so fast America. On top of that, right now a sincere peace proposal is the worst possible situation for Russia, which has not yet reached all its goals, and arguably for all Europe: an unresolved, even if temporarily pacified, conflict, ready to fiercily explode again in the near future, is a bigger hazard for the continent, than a hot conflict that is dying, slowly. Also, Europe needs a totally destroyed Ukraine: a Ukrainian rump state, that is a Nazi fiefdom armed to its teeth, is a future problem for European states; the smaller and more destroyed it is, the better. Not only that, the economic consequences of the war in the Ukraine are greatly overstated: Europe is suffering from its own bad policies, from US secondary sanctions against China, Iran etc., from the war in the Red Sea and so on. If keeping the USA at war in the Ukraine means that the USA are, for the moment, unable to engage a war against China and Chinese interests in SE Asia and beyond, well, that is a big deal for the European economy, much bigger than Russia and the Ukraine. Again, since much of the suffering felt by European economies is the result of their own policies, European politicians could use the war against Russia as an excuse to backtrack from many of those policies, e.g. the green policies, without losing their face.
In the end, among many irrational, even traitorous, policies by European leaders, keeping the war in the Ukraine going is the least irrational, even if deeply amoral. But it is not the only amoral policy by them.
As someone who hates the EU and everything it has become, I hope they DO go ahead and take on Russia. It will mean the end of the EU power grab much earlier than it would normally. The EU "elites" are behaving with the same obliviousness to reality as did the French aristocracy in 1788. And we all know how that ended up. Here's to a European future free of the EU.
That would be the end of US all. An invasion of Russia would almost certainly trigger an exchange of "tactical" battlefield nukes, quickly follwed by "stragegic" ones that wipe out entire countries. Like the one you live in, and all of Europe and Russia. And the US.
The US nuclear doctrine dictates that in the event of a nuclear exchange, it must take out even nonparticipants, so that in theory it should be the strongest surviving entity in a post-nuclear war. That means any nuclear exchange between NATO and Russia, will necessarily involve the US also nuking China, India, Pakistan, North Korea, probably Israel too. So they would all nuke the US, because they know the US nuclear doctrine means incoming nukes.
In sum, there would be nothing left but cockroaches on the planet if the EU retards invaded Russia. So for all our sakes, they had better not do it.
The visceral hatred of the Europeans for Russia suggests that more is at stake than the usual greedy desire for conquest and power.
An ordinary man in 19th century England would have had no difficulty understanding V. Putin: honour, courage, truthfulness for the individual and pride of tradition, religion and dignity of the family for the country. All anathema to the EU elite whose own post Christian amorality would have bewildered our friend from the 19th century.
As the Russian Federation waxes and the EU wanes it will become clearer to the captive populations of Europe that they face the kind of collapse suffered by their Russian neighbours under communism. And then no amount of media manipulation will be enough to rescue the EU image.
The EU and UK cannot self-destruct fast enough. They are culturally and morally rotten and incredibly spoiled. They, along with israel, are now probably most likely to begin world war 3. I'm completely sick of their lying, whining shit.
Couldn't agree more. After all the analysis, historical data and the rest the bottom line is what you've just said, a Europe which is amoral, disgusting and loathsome. I'm glad Britain is not in the EU but Britain has its own foul-smelling leaders and problems which are akin to European and is headed in the same direction.
I liked the narrative but question you causal relationships: Are you certain that the US is dictating to Europe and not the UK dictating to the US dictating to Europe. The UK interest in destabilizing and breaking Russia goes back long before the US was ever involved in European affairs; also, the British seem to be even more involved in the Ukraine more than the US. UK foreign policy has long been based on destabilization of European state sovereignty. With UK military power at its absolute lowest level since before Elizabeth I, all they have remaining is MI5, MI6, and City of London, in the hands of Zionists. The guest post in Jan talks the history, but I believe that both UK and US are manipulated or controlled by City of London. All wars are ultimately bankers' wars.
I think UK carries out operations in the Ukr conflict which the US cannot consider the latter's position. You don't need a big army, you just need a crazed MI6 willing to test operations against Russians (like Krynki) using Ukrainians like cannonfoder...
It's also a complete lack of imagination by the European leadership, and I'd say that this extends across the nationalist right and identitarian left. They failed to see an independent path for their foreign or even national policy that didn’t completely rely on the Washington Consensus institutions. When past crises arose, they fit within the fairly easy politics of moving around piles of money or slightly modifying internal regulations and they declared the problem solved. In this case, they weren't able to imagine how to deal with parties that just refused to go along and expect actual diplomacy, the kind that requires courage and convincing citizens of its urgency. Now they're in a trap of their own making and I think violence may be the only way to cobble together an exit. That violence could be against their citizens, or against them. Either way, something has to give.
but it is not cognitive dissonance: the European leaders depend directly on the decisions of the financial elites that put them there. That is, the European people no longer have the opportunity to express themselves, any candidate who represents the choices of the European people is hindered, removed. Truly, parliaments, to paraphrase Marx, are now the business committees of financial capitalism. If capitalism is based and supported by wars, and without wars it would implode, (Thomas Piketty) financial capitalism needs continuous incessant wars, only through robbery and colonialism can it exist. The people do not want war, that is certain. But as in a technological neo-feudalism, the people cannot choose, indeed, the first perennial war that the financial elites are fighting is against the people and democracies. The war planned for years against Russia runs parallel to the war against the European people and democracy. So I wouldn't talk about the self-destruction of Europe, but the destruction of Europe.
Except for the transatlantic viewpoint, the other three factors cited by the author also can be comprehended from the NAZI Germany reaction after the Staligrad defeat. Before then, the German society still had quite some "slack". Some said even during the final stage of WW2, there were still half a million German women serving as housemaids. But after Stalingrad, NAZI Germany started to mobilize more like a "total war". If this part of history is of any guidance value, then there is little chance for grassroots rebellion to succeed in overthrowing the tyranny of the EU. Without an external force, the European people then cannot escape from an authoritarian regime. I hope I am wrong because there are sufficient amount of differences between EU today and NAZI Germany in 1943. However, the concerns of the leadership elites seemed to align better and better over time.
You are absolutely right, it was not until "after Stalingrad, NAZI Germany started to mobilize more like a "total war"." Like 1943, if you look at the war production. Most Germans lived fairly"normal" lives, unaffected by war, until then.
Are US troops moving in to Scandinavian military bases of newly recruited NATO countries? This while Vance scolded European countries for not being independent of the US?
I think by 2035 war of some type will be a feature of international relations and the main justification for continuity in government, esp in parliamentary or faux-parliamentary systems (EU and its member states plus UK).
The question may be what kind of war, domestic or foreign. I could see supranational entities pushing for foreign entanglements like Ukraine and probably Iran; the US will go for this too (read the WSJ lately?).
Then there is the war against one’s own people. The EU countries plus UK are full-on in that regard, from what I’ve seen. The US came within an inch or so with the attempt on Trump (which had indicia of a false flag or at least created opps for that stuff); the unleashed immigration under Biden was another tactic in what may have been a multigenerational effort to minimize the variability of democratic consent.
I think we will see more control, less wealth generally, and perhaps a reordering of the global economy—not by tariffs, but by Russia having shown others how real assets can move profitably outside the dollar system.
I think you are overlooking far simpler drivers at play here.
Fist of all these are not really leaders. Stooges is more like it. Most are clearly directed from Langley, VA or Tel Aviv, or both.
There are several models of these stooges.
One model is a failed disgraced politician that is appointed to a an unelected position. Examples are Von der Leyen and Rutte. They are failed policitians disgraced by scandal and with no where to go. Already proven to be corruptible or with bad judgement, the US inserts them in high jobs when in fact they have no alternatives. They do what they are told. Von der Leyen expecially. If you examine her background she has spent some rather unexplained time living in the US. I would guess indoctrination would have been part of the activties there.
Another model is long term agents, like Kier Starmer, seeded a lot time ago, brought up through the ranks, doing dirty work such as the false indictments of Assange and so on, and then later on having proven their willingness to serve the master, they are inserted into positions (head of labour party, after Jeremy Corbyn was clearly targeted for removal) where they will end up as high officials. If Corbyn had been in office, British policy would be VERY different than it is today under Starmer.
You also have another model which is nepo-babies like Stoltenberg and Kallas. 2nd generation ideologloically brainwashed heirs of European political party insder status. These are just robots, they were brainwashed from birth in reactionary ideologies in which the US is god and Russia is the "communist enemy" and anyone in Europe with leftist principles is a traitor. If you look at Stoltenberg for example his father was a Norwegian govermnment minister and ambassodor who was also subservient to the USA. Stoltemberg spent many years basically pretending to be in the socialist yoth left, but as Sy Hersh revealed, was spying on what were supposed to be his friends and colleagues. As prime minster of Norway he pursued a zealously neoliberal path, leading to high inequality and alienation and the rise of the extremist neonazi right in Norway exemplified by the terrorist Anders Breivik. Stoltenberg claimed to be against these extremists....but he more than any one else has led the European movement to fund and arm neonazis in Ukraine, and to flood Europe with neonazi "refugees". He has been selling out Europe for decades now.
There are other models but you will find many like this.
They didnt just happen to get in power and do the stupid things they are doing: these are people handpicked a groomed to do these kind og things for many decades. Like some sort of human bot army/borg. T
Great synopsis, Thomas. This helps put together the motivation for Europe's continued demonization of Russia and supporting the certain-to-fail Ukraine war effort.
It appears the the EU aims to use the "threat" of war with Russia to increase/consolidate power over the EU states. When faced with a choice, a government always chooses the path that leads to more power for itself.
That hundreds of thousands of Slavs have lost their lives due to these political machinations in the name of power is a moral outrage.
thanks! your last paragraph is outstanding and bears repeating -
"In this context, Europe’s actions are not simply misguided; they are symptomatic of a deeper dysfunction at the heart of the EU project itself. The militarisation of society, the erosion of democratic norms, the consolidation of technocratic power and the suppression of dissent are not temporary wartime measures — they are the contours of a new political paradigm, one born of fear, dependency and institutional inertia. Cloaked in the language of security and values, Europe’s leaders are not defending the continent — they are entrenching its subordination, both to Washington’s fading hegemony and to their own failing regimes."
European leaders' resistance to diplomatic off-ramps in Ukraine isn’t just strategic blindness; it’s a survival instinct. Faced with economic decline and political fragmentation, they’ve latched onto the war as a justification for deeper centralization, rearmament, and authoritarian control.
That they fear peace more than prolonged conflict speaks volumes. It would expose their failures, end their narrative cover, and unravel the fragile legitimacy they’ve built on borrowed time and borrowed power. This isn’t about defending Europe. It’s about preserving a ruling class that no longer serves it.
Yes, that's exactly one of my arguments :)
Precisely. This is the only explanation that makes any sense. The idea that the European ruling class are all American Empire vassals not only relieves them of all agency here, but ignores their own interests (as they see them and told everyone openly), not to mention grossly distorts the situation and the developments that brought us to it.
That's exactly one of my arguments :)
Question: what power base do these people have?
Could Van Der Leyen win an election for Chancellor with the majority of votes? Could she even win an election for mayor of Berlin? Bærbock?
Could Starmer win a popular vote in any election in Britian?
Isnt Macron the guy who leads a minority governemnt and would lose if he faced a general election.
In Norway the ex-NATO PR guy Stoltenberg is now playing an interesting game where he plays a role the "bold independent" in the international media, telling them Europe has his own course....but at home his pitch to the domestic audience is that because of his NATO connections...he is close to both Trump and the US neocons. Right.
They are "leaders" in name only. They have little or no local power base. They serve purely a constituency of their handlers in Wash. DC and Langley, VA. And Tel Avic.
In other words these are lackeys with little or no agency.
Excellent article Mr. Fazi, fully in line with you and you will see it chimes well with what I have been writing on the economic part in several piece, of which one below:
The EU Elite Also Wants Access to Private Savings
https://finnandreen.substack.com/p/the-eu-elite-also-wants-access-to
European policies may be bad, even very bad, and stupid and dangerous, but they are not entirely irrational. Also, I am far from certain that European leaders follow the same strategy: different goals could take the same form for tactical reasons.
First of all, keeping the USA entangled in the war in the Ukraine have possibly many benificial, or at least gratifying, effects for some or all European countries. The USA prepared, then started the war when it was best suited to them, and now, again, they want to get out of the war when it best suits them: not so fast America. On top of that, right now a sincere peace proposal is the worst possible situation for Russia, which has not yet reached all its goals, and arguably for all Europe: an unresolved, even if temporarily pacified, conflict, ready to fiercily explode again in the near future, is a bigger hazard for the continent, than a hot conflict that is dying, slowly. Also, Europe needs a totally destroyed Ukraine: a Ukrainian rump state, that is a Nazi fiefdom armed to its teeth, is a future problem for European states; the smaller and more destroyed it is, the better. Not only that, the economic consequences of the war in the Ukraine are greatly overstated: Europe is suffering from its own bad policies, from US secondary sanctions against China, Iran etc., from the war in the Red Sea and so on. If keeping the USA at war in the Ukraine means that the USA are, for the moment, unable to engage a war against China and Chinese interests in SE Asia and beyond, well, that is a big deal for the European economy, much bigger than Russia and the Ukraine. Again, since much of the suffering felt by European economies is the result of their own policies, European politicians could use the war against Russia as an excuse to backtrack from many of those policies, e.g. the green policies, without losing their face.
In the end, among many irrational, even traitorous, policies by European leaders, keeping the war in the Ukraine going is the least irrational, even if deeply amoral. But it is not the only amoral policy by them.
As someone who hates the EU and everything it has become, I hope they DO go ahead and take on Russia. It will mean the end of the EU power grab much earlier than it would normally. The EU "elites" are behaving with the same obliviousness to reality as did the French aristocracy in 1788. And we all know how that ended up. Here's to a European future free of the EU.
That would be the end of US all. An invasion of Russia would almost certainly trigger an exchange of "tactical" battlefield nukes, quickly follwed by "stragegic" ones that wipe out entire countries. Like the one you live in, and all of Europe and Russia. And the US.
The US nuclear doctrine dictates that in the event of a nuclear exchange, it must take out even nonparticipants, so that in theory it should be the strongest surviving entity in a post-nuclear war. That means any nuclear exchange between NATO and Russia, will necessarily involve the US also nuking China, India, Pakistan, North Korea, probably Israel too. So they would all nuke the US, because they know the US nuclear doctrine means incoming nukes.
In sum, there would be nothing left but cockroaches on the planet if the EU retards invaded Russia. So for all our sakes, they had better not do it.
The visceral hatred of the Europeans for Russia suggests that more is at stake than the usual greedy desire for conquest and power.
An ordinary man in 19th century England would have had no difficulty understanding V. Putin: honour, courage, truthfulness for the individual and pride of tradition, religion and dignity of the family for the country. All anathema to the EU elite whose own post Christian amorality would have bewildered our friend from the 19th century.
As the Russian Federation waxes and the EU wanes it will become clearer to the captive populations of Europe that they face the kind of collapse suffered by their Russian neighbours under communism. And then no amount of media manipulation will be enough to rescue the EU image.
The EU and UK cannot self-destruct fast enough. They are culturally and morally rotten and incredibly spoiled. They, along with israel, are now probably most likely to begin world war 3. I'm completely sick of their lying, whining shit.
Couldn't agree more. After all the analysis, historical data and the rest the bottom line is what you've just said, a Europe which is amoral, disgusting and loathsome. I'm glad Britain is not in the EU but Britain has its own foul-smelling leaders and problems which are akin to European and is headed in the same direction.
I liked the narrative but question you causal relationships: Are you certain that the US is dictating to Europe and not the UK dictating to the US dictating to Europe. The UK interest in destabilizing and breaking Russia goes back long before the US was ever involved in European affairs; also, the British seem to be even more involved in the Ukraine more than the US. UK foreign policy has long been based on destabilization of European state sovereignty. With UK military power at its absolute lowest level since before Elizabeth I, all they have remaining is MI5, MI6, and City of London, in the hands of Zionists. The guest post in Jan talks the history, but I believe that both UK and US are manipulated or controlled by City of London. All wars are ultimately bankers' wars.
Probably everything is manipulated by the City of London it is a big money laundering operation for every criminal in the world.
I think UK carries out operations in the Ukr conflict which the US cannot consider the latter's position. You don't need a big army, you just need a crazed MI6 willing to test operations against Russians (like Krynki) using Ukrainians like cannonfoder...
It's also a complete lack of imagination by the European leadership, and I'd say that this extends across the nationalist right and identitarian left. They failed to see an independent path for their foreign or even national policy that didn’t completely rely on the Washington Consensus institutions. When past crises arose, they fit within the fairly easy politics of moving around piles of money or slightly modifying internal regulations and they declared the problem solved. In this case, they weren't able to imagine how to deal with parties that just refused to go along and expect actual diplomacy, the kind that requires courage and convincing citizens of its urgency. Now they're in a trap of their own making and I think violence may be the only way to cobble together an exit. That violence could be against their citizens, or against them. Either way, something has to give.
but it is not cognitive dissonance: the European leaders depend directly on the decisions of the financial elites that put them there. That is, the European people no longer have the opportunity to express themselves, any candidate who represents the choices of the European people is hindered, removed. Truly, parliaments, to paraphrase Marx, are now the business committees of financial capitalism. If capitalism is based and supported by wars, and without wars it would implode, (Thomas Piketty) financial capitalism needs continuous incessant wars, only through robbery and colonialism can it exist. The people do not want war, that is certain. But as in a technological neo-feudalism, the people cannot choose, indeed, the first perennial war that the financial elites are fighting is against the people and democracies. The war planned for years against Russia runs parallel to the war against the European people and democracy. So I wouldn't talk about the self-destruction of Europe, but the destruction of Europe.
Except for the transatlantic viewpoint, the other three factors cited by the author also can be comprehended from the NAZI Germany reaction after the Staligrad defeat. Before then, the German society still had quite some "slack". Some said even during the final stage of WW2, there were still half a million German women serving as housemaids. But after Stalingrad, NAZI Germany started to mobilize more like a "total war". If this part of history is of any guidance value, then there is little chance for grassroots rebellion to succeed in overthrowing the tyranny of the EU. Without an external force, the European people then cannot escape from an authoritarian regime. I hope I am wrong because there are sufficient amount of differences between EU today and NAZI Germany in 1943. However, the concerns of the leadership elites seemed to align better and better over time.
You are absolutely right, it was not until "after Stalingrad, NAZI Germany started to mobilize more like a "total war"." Like 1943, if you look at the war production. Most Germans lived fairly"normal" lives, unaffected by war, until then.
Are US troops moving in to Scandinavian military bases of newly recruited NATO countries? This while Vance scolded European countries for not being independent of the US?
ALL of Scandinavia:
https://www.newsinenglish.no/2025/05/23/norway-ends-ban-on-nato-exercises-in-finnmark/
https://www.rcinet.ca/eye-on-the-arctic/2025/05/22/norway-eases-self-imposed-restrictions-on-nato-training/
So these fools want to be "Ukrained" basically. Like they have learned nothing from how the US used Ukraine then stripped it of its assets.
I think by 2035 war of some type will be a feature of international relations and the main justification for continuity in government, esp in parliamentary or faux-parliamentary systems (EU and its member states plus UK).
The question may be what kind of war, domestic or foreign. I could see supranational entities pushing for foreign entanglements like Ukraine and probably Iran; the US will go for this too (read the WSJ lately?).
Then there is the war against one’s own people. The EU countries plus UK are full-on in that regard, from what I’ve seen. The US came within an inch or so with the attempt on Trump (which had indicia of a false flag or at least created opps for that stuff); the unleashed immigration under Biden was another tactic in what may have been a multigenerational effort to minimize the variability of democratic consent.
I think we will see more control, less wealth generally, and perhaps a reordering of the global economy—not by tariffs, but by Russia having shown others how real assets can move profitably outside the dollar system.
Oh well. At least it is sunny and pleasant today!
I think you are overlooking far simpler drivers at play here.
Fist of all these are not really leaders. Stooges is more like it. Most are clearly directed from Langley, VA or Tel Aviv, or both.
There are several models of these stooges.
One model is a failed disgraced politician that is appointed to a an unelected position. Examples are Von der Leyen and Rutte. They are failed policitians disgraced by scandal and with no where to go. Already proven to be corruptible or with bad judgement, the US inserts them in high jobs when in fact they have no alternatives. They do what they are told. Von der Leyen expecially. If you examine her background she has spent some rather unexplained time living in the US. I would guess indoctrination would have been part of the activties there.
Another model is long term agents, like Kier Starmer, seeded a lot time ago, brought up through the ranks, doing dirty work such as the false indictments of Assange and so on, and then later on having proven their willingness to serve the master, they are inserted into positions (head of labour party, after Jeremy Corbyn was clearly targeted for removal) where they will end up as high officials. If Corbyn had been in office, British policy would be VERY different than it is today under Starmer.
You also have another model which is nepo-babies like Stoltenberg and Kallas. 2nd generation ideologloically brainwashed heirs of European political party insder status. These are just robots, they were brainwashed from birth in reactionary ideologies in which the US is god and Russia is the "communist enemy" and anyone in Europe with leftist principles is a traitor. If you look at Stoltenberg for example his father was a Norwegian govermnment minister and ambassodor who was also subservient to the USA. Stoltemberg spent many years basically pretending to be in the socialist yoth left, but as Sy Hersh revealed, was spying on what were supposed to be his friends and colleagues. As prime minster of Norway he pursued a zealously neoliberal path, leading to high inequality and alienation and the rise of the extremist neonazi right in Norway exemplified by the terrorist Anders Breivik. Stoltenberg claimed to be against these extremists....but he more than any one else has led the European movement to fund and arm neonazis in Ukraine, and to flood Europe with neonazi "refugees". He has been selling out Europe for decades now.
There are other models but you will find many like this.
They didnt just happen to get in power and do the stupid things they are doing: these are people handpicked a groomed to do these kind og things for many decades. Like some sort of human bot army/borg. T
Thank you for this excellent analysis. Enjoy your first time trip to Russia and please report back!
Great synopsis, Thomas. This helps put together the motivation for Europe's continued demonization of Russia and supporting the certain-to-fail Ukraine war effort.
It appears the the EU aims to use the "threat" of war with Russia to increase/consolidate power over the EU states. When faced with a choice, a government always chooses the path that leads to more power for itself.
That hundreds of thousands of Slavs have lost their lives due to these political machinations in the name of power is a moral outrage.
thanks! your last paragraph is outstanding and bears repeating -
"In this context, Europe’s actions are not simply misguided; they are symptomatic of a deeper dysfunction at the heart of the EU project itself. The militarisation of society, the erosion of democratic norms, the consolidation of technocratic power and the suppression of dissent are not temporary wartime measures — they are the contours of a new political paradigm, one born of fear, dependency and institutional inertia. Cloaked in the language of security and values, Europe’s leaders are not defending the continent — they are entrenching its subordination, both to Washington’s fading hegemony and to their own failing regimes."