EU leaders are starting to lay the foundations for a more resilient and self-reliant Europe, one that can look both the USA and China in the eye. There is the beginning of a “buy European” policy to protect “strategic sectors” of European industry. At a summit in Belgium, member states have been discussing how to ensure the continent punches its proper weight in a more volatile global economy. There is already a programme to fund and manufacture more strategic defence equipment following the Ukraine war, but the focus is also moving to include AI and clean technology, and no doubt other sectors will follow.
Fears that America is no longer a trustworthy military partner under Donald Trump or JD Vance, and that China is becoming the dominant supplier in too many industries has forced EU leaders to look at more protectionist measures.
John Prescott used to talk of ‘tectonic plates’ shifting, and this is certainly happening on a global level now. Britain, isolated and alone, will be left behind unless it changes course and opts to take up its rightful position as a full member of the European Union. Time is not on our side. Strategic decisions are being made, and once again, Britain is not in the room.
None of this is good for us. Brexit was a bad idea in 2016, it looks far worse now. The ‘special relationship’ that successive UK prime ministers have tried to preserve for eighty years is no more. It was always a fantasy to think there was any benefit in getting closer to America. Trumpism has only revealed much of what has been known about American greed, racism, and increasing tendency to go backwards. It seems determined to return to a world that the US was created to escape from 250 years ago, ruled by a mad, authoritarian monarch.
Trump has repealed a keystone law that allowed the US government to regulate environmental matters:
Breaking News: The Trump administration repealed the bedrock scientific finding that greenhouse gases threaten human life and well being, meaning that the EPA can no longer regulate them. nyti.ms/4rSszQu— The New York Times (@nytimes.com) 12 February 2026 at 19:07
In Louisiana, they are talking seriously about banning and burning books!! Is this a country we should be tying ourselves to? I don't think so.
The EU is introducing its own, independent digital payment system designed to reduce reliance on US networks like Visa, Mastercard, PayPal, and tech giants like Apple/Google Pay. This effort is led by the European Payments Initiative (EPI), which has developed a digital wallet named Wero. It comes as a result of fears that an unfriendly America could pull the plug on European e-commerce if a wayward president wanted to.
Britain alone is in no position to fund or recreate the sort of defence-industrial complex that we had in 1939. We scraped through by the skin of our teeth in 1940-41. We struggled to retake the Falklands in 1982, and our presence in Iraq and Afghanistan after 9/11 was, as everybody knows, mainly to give cover to the Americans and buttress the belief that NATO was operating as a serious force. The Americans could probably have managed both conflicts quite easily on their own.
In 2022, Europe didn't have the capacity to resist or deter Russia's illegal invasion of Ukraine. Only America (and China) could hope to control Putin as things stood at the time. But, with the political will, the EU could and should have that capability. It has an economy five or six times that of Russia, but behaves as if it were a military weakling. That is now changing rapidly.
Britain is far less able to defend itself now than it was in 1939. It isn’t about to become a leading military power again or dominate the AI or clean tech spaces, and certainly couldn’t develop its own independent payment system. But it could make a decent contribution to all three.
Airbus is the model we should be looking at. Small European aircraft makers couldn’t handle Boeing in the 1950s and 1960s, but pooling resources and creating Airbus Industries in 1970 allowed an industry that was being crushed to become the world’s biggest and most successful passenger plane manufacturer. The same could be done with military equipment and most other key industries. Europe has the talent and resources to be far more self-sufficient.
We should also beware of those calling for deregulation as the way for the EU to become more competitive.
The European social model is too embedded in British life for that. There was once a feeling and a hope that America would one day stop exploiting its citizens and convert to a more people-oriented system, with paid holidays, proper employment rights and so on. But under Trump, the US is aligning itself with Russia and China. Europe shouldn’t respond by dismantling workers, consumers and environmental protections in a desperate attempt to compete. That is madness.
The US under Trump and the Republicans isn't going to defend democracy, human rights or the rule of law. China and Russia certainly won't. If the EU can't or isn't prepared to do so, nobody will, and we are all losers.
The EU needs to be strengthened and expanded. It is becoming imperative for Britain to rejoin and encourage others to pull together. Nothing would send a more powerful message to authoritarian regimes around the world that a united Europe is determined to lead the world out of despair and into a better, safer, cleaner, more sustainable future where human rights are inalienable for every person on the planet.
