Once the Darling of Strong Alliances, Europe Implodes, Alienating Those Who Could Help It Most
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
—Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776 - Philadelphia
Dear Europe, we have seen better days, have we not?
We renewed our vows after World War II and our transatlantic future looked limitless.
The Marshall Plan and Bretton Woods provided a dowry any bride would be jealous of.
The clubs we built and frequented like NATO and eventually the European Union (EU) were the envy of the global commons.
Even the U.K. called the relationship special.
However, as so many relationships follow the tragic course of complacency, acrimony and eventually abuse, ours is a marriage that has tragically fallen on hard times — maybe even permanently.
It started out innocently enough. You mistook kindness for weakness when we promoted you to be in the lead of institutions we built and funded like NATO and the IMF.
We looked the other way as you used these vehicles to get footholds of influence into our politics, intelligence communities, banks, universities, industries and think tanks.
We mistakenly convinced ourselves that we shared the same values and that your success would be ours.
Having a common foe in the Soviet Union and the rising red scourge of communism made it easy to assuage ourselves that you would grow to love us.
Just as we were starting to notice with great concern, your Royal Institute of International Affairs (RIAA - Chatham House) was impacting U.S. Presidential politics, 9-11 occurred.
The twin towers fell so we turned the other cheek as you declared Article V at NATO and pledged solidarity in the GWOT, a war that took 20 years, costing much blood and treasure to reach a dead end to nowhere.
The bad behavior continued through it all. How much money did you make with your eager recruits in Washington D.C. and New York City?
By the 2016 U.S. presidential election, we Americans had resigned ourselves to the reality of the dysfunctional status quo.
No counseling necessary as we surrendered our tax money to you and all the non-governmental organizations (NGOs), to prop up your welfare states while you stiffed us for every check at Club NATO.
Then the unthinkable.
Trump and Team MAGA arrived to take up our case.
The idea of a non-RIAA endorsed President came as such an affront that your creepy MI6 types joined up with the deep state to concoct a narrative designed to paralyze outsiders.
All the while, your World Economic Forum (WEF)-anointed globalist leaders ushered in millions of illegals, taxed the citizenry to the moon and looked the other way as the Minsk accords were "just a ruse" to bide time for a war — in the words of Angela Merkel and Charles Hollande.
Look at you now.
Never the financially gifted of the two of us, you resisted every chance at diplomacy in the war you have your fingerprints all over (one million-plus dead and counting), you deindustrialized with silly climate schemes, and you have nearly bankrupted your people while championing the invaders you brought in.
When your people complain about rape gangs, they are the ones facing prison time.
We warned you.
Vice President JD Vance came to Munich to make sure you remembered common values were foundational to our initial vows along with security and prosperity.
You have destroyed all three.
Instead of listening, you continue to sabotage President Trump's efforts to bring peace to the valiant yet wounded Ukrainians.
And now you target our people here in America with threats of action lest they criticize you on social media. Are you really going to lock us up when we arrive in Paris for a "mean tweet?"
Perhaps, the last straw was your unelected President fining (€120 million) our champion of the public square, Elon Musk.
Your hubris overflowing and with no behavior change in sight, our president drew up the papers. It may be titled officially "The National Security Strategy of the United States," but after one read, surely you know that this really a divorce filing.
Did you gasp that we were shifting from the single guarantor of your security to prioritize other regions where our own security must and will come first?
The paragraph on Page 31 must have caught your eye.
U.S. policy for:
"Europe prioritizes Enabling Europe to stand on its own feet and operate as a group of aligned sovereign nations, including by taking primary responsibility for its own defense, without being dominated by any adversarial power."
It’s up to you now Europe, sign the papers, or explain how you will change.
Washington is hardly ignoring Europe's threats such as dumping trillion in U.S. debt or to sanction U.S. businesses and hold citizens criminally liable for critical speech.
Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, R-Fla., is introducing a bill to end U.S. participation in NATO.
Just peruse X.com. We are ready for the split and have had enough.
And this divorce may be skipping any form of mediation.
Perhaps current sentiments may also be well-expressed, with a short coda:
America burns the prenup . . .
Europe awakes alone . . .
Brig Gen (ret) Blaine Holt is a former Deputy Representative to NATO, lifetime member on the Council on Foreign Relations, tech entrepreneur, host of the Dangerous Intellectuals podcast and Newsmax Contributor. The views presented are those of the author and do not represent the views of the U.S. Government, Department of Defense, or its components. Read Gen. Holt's reports — More Here.
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