One may stand in Germany and ask, ‘What is the point of the SPD?’
The SPD, Germany's oldest political party, struggles to retain its working-class base and confronts challenges from rising protectionism and rival parties, leaving its future…
Back in the USSR
After a meeting of European leaders on Sunday, a spokesman for German Chancellor Merz voiced Europe’s readiness to take “the leading role in negotiations to end Russia’s…
Physical and fiscal reality mean EU ‘green steel’ programme is bonkers
The EU Commission’s proposal to triple data centre capacity over the next five to seven years is intended to help Europe catch up with China and America in the race to unlock…
Crises and capabilities: Neither has transformed the EU into a power on the world stage
Jean Monnet famously opined that the European project advances by crises.
Emperors lost in their Labyrinths, unwilling to listen to the common people
If one factor links the dire unpopularity of Chancellor Merz and President Macron, it is their political insularity.
‘Systematic discrimination’: China denounces EU’s industrial proposals
Is the European Union ready for neo-mercantilism? China certainly doesn’t think so.
Industrial policy or collective defence: Europe picks one
Another round of couples counseling last week failed to resolve the grinding Franco-Teuton dispute over the beleaguered Future Combat Air System (FCAS).
Nothing says net zero emissions like zero economic activity
Last month, EU leaders met to consider the impact of high energy prices on Europe’s industrial competitiveness.
Europe’s leaders and their failures over Iran: They are playing with fire
What is it about a campaign to remove the Islamic Republic’s chokehold on Europe’s energy supplies that appals Europe?
When the war is interested in you
German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier may not be interested in the war with Iran, but that war is certainly interested in Germany.
The EU sees a world that isn’t there
Twenty-five years ago, Europe stood poised to administer a world where all nations sought peace and prosperity.
Need more manure for energy but deplore its production? EU left with bullshit
Germany’s ruling coalition may be an awkward marriage of ideological rivals, but it does benefit from the absence of the Greens, who pushed many of the economically injurious…
One choice for Europe: Defend Ukraine with your own blood or appease Russia
This week’s acrimonious breakup of the latest ceasefire talks between Russia and Ukraine has for the moment forestalled Europe’s quaking nightmare: That the US may broker…
Is there any hope Europe can learn the Art of the Deal against China?
The horror with which foreign ministries across Europe greeted President Trump’s desire to acquire Greenland shows us how far European diplomats are from understanding,…
Lost causes: Losers carry on and voters be damned
Those of us who grew up in the American South are familiar with the Lost Cause, a profound nostalgia for the defeated Confederacy among our elders, many of whom (like my own…
Mercosur is the public humiliation of France
In the wake of the Trump tariffs, European leaders have loudly proclaimed the merits of free trade, often pointing to the stupendous increase in general prosperity that came…
Putin and EU, watch and learn: How to take Venezuela in two hours
The raid on Caracas that landed Nicolas Maduro and his wife in Brooklyn’s Metropolitan Detention Centre has surely focused minds in the Kremlin.
‘Shut up’, they explained
The Brussels Effect is the hopeful notion that the EU would become the “regulatory superpower” by creating new governance structures for the world, which would be induced…
Once Kyiv burns through its €90bn, will EU float another loan to keep it in fight?
Hallelujah, we have an agreement to keep Ukraine solvent!
EU climate regulations show it can’t compete in ‘pugnacious new world’
The recently completed COP-30 in Brazil begat no roadmap for a fossil fuel phaseout, disappointing an EU delegation that had hoped to rope the rest of the world into an approximation…
China’s climate envoy humiliates the EU
The European Union came to COP 30 in Belem confident that it could supplant the absent Americans and lead the world with the example of its own plans to achieve Net Zero by…
Immigration: Is Germany still a serious country?
One of the fundamental obligations of public service in a liberal democracy is the requirement to set aside one’s personal opinions and fulfil the programmes of elected…
Human welfare or lower emissions? Pick one
The recent deviation of Bill Gates from strict green orthodoxy must have come as a shock to Europe's eco-elites.
Corporate sustainability and the EU’s muddled energy mire
The economist Thomas Sowell once observed that there are no policies, only tradeoffs.
Does Europe deserve a seat at the Gaza peace plan table?
Like many leaders facing dire straits domestically, French President Macron hoped his control of foreign policy might allow him to claw back some of his lost prestige.
Can Merz survive the (latest) coalition from Hell?
The serial travails of the dying Macron presidency may be dominating the headlines, but the profound dysfunction of Germany’s coalition government holds its own perils for…
No markets: EU steel industry with 300,000 workers stands at the brink
Robert Conquest once observed that everyone is conservative about what they know best.
More EU defence, but where is the money?
The European Union’s schoolmarm in chief, Ursula von der Leyen, has called her unruly charges together this week in Copenhagen, where she will rap knuckles and extract commitments…
Renewed euro crisis? French debt at €3.3 trillion must be focusing minds in Frankfurt
Engineers know that system stability requires a capacity to manage unexpected accidents.
EU elites, watch and learn: Cracker Barrel populism comes for Europe
The odd saga of the Cracker Barrel logo redesign was likely mysterious to many Europeans, should they have noticed the story at all.