“Are We Still Friends?”: How Donald Trump Is Unraveling the Western Alliance

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European officials were bracing for a more adversarial America ahead of the Munich Security Conference, a diplomatic gathering that has traditionally been a showcase for the Western alliance. Still, they approached meetings this past weekend with a tentative hope of being able to to talk it out, face-to-face, with Donald Trump’s envoys, a kind of emergency couples therapy for a transatlantic marriage on the rocks.

But officials were left reckoning with a United States that appears to be disengaging from the continent—or perhaps, even worse, actively working against Europe in remaking the global order. Aleksandra Uznańska-Wiśniewska, a member of the Polish parliament, and head of its Polish-American group, spoke to me of “a sense that there are some seismic shifts of tectonic plates of the liberal world,” adding how “it actually felt like history is happening in front of our very eyes.”

Just a year ago, then vice president Kamala Harris went to Munich to reassure allies of the United States’ commitments. At the time, House Republicans were blocking Ukraine aid and Trump had just said at a campaign rally that he’d let Russia “do whatever the hell they want” to NATO members who he believed weren’t spending enough on defense. “In these unsettled times, it is clear America cannot retreat,” Harris said.

No one expected similar pronouncements from the US at this year’s conference given the current administration’s perspectives and priorities. Trump had already demanded NATO allies pay more for their defense, threatened a trade war against the continent, and talked up his desire for a deal with Russian president Vladimir Putin to end the war in Ukraine. Following a 90-minute conversation last week with Putin, Trump said the two had agreed to swiftly end the war. The US administration had sent mixed messages on its Ukraine stance, but top European officials largely saw a Trump administration ready to make concessions to Russia before talks even began.

Leaders descended on Munich seeking clarity about Ukraine, and hoped Vice President JD Vance might offer some in his much-anticipated address. Instead, Vance largely ignored Ukraine, and berated European governments for their free-speech policies, and suggested that German parties should end their firewall against working with the far-right Alternative for Deutschland.

Vance’s speech infuriated European leaders, especially those from Germany, with federal elections this weekend. Those who watched in person told me they noticed the absence of applause. On the big screen in the press center, cameras cut to leaders sitting stone-faced. In giving short shrift to NATO and Ukraine, as well as other topics that might come up at a European security conference ahead of the third anniversary of a war on the continent, Vance delivered a message that the US does not see Europe aligned with its ideological agenda anymore, and that may not be easy to overcome with defense-spending promises. “It was essentially rubbed in our face—the very idea that the sitting US administration lives in a different value set,” said Andreas Goldthau, public policy expert at the University of Erfurt, who attended the conference.

After Vance’s speech, “wake-up call” became the overused phrase, even as many conceded that it had not been the first. “We know there have been several wake-up calls,” said Natalia Pouzyreff, the secretary of the defense committee in France’s National Assembly, of Trump’s defense demands and differing priorities. But officials were still shocked: first, by the Putin call, and then, by the time they’d adapted to that, the “new shock” from Vance.

Before Vance spoke, officials mustered some buttoned-up criticisms of Washington—it’s a “new reality” or whatnot. Now, diplomats bargained in real time, shocked and smarting at the hypocrisy of it all. “It’s a bit rich to give us a lecture on freedom of speech,” said Martin Weiss, a former Austrian ambassador to the US, noting, as a few others did, that Russia might have warranted a shout out. “If you talk about freedom of speech in Russia, you fall out of a window. If you talk about freedom of speech in the United States, you work for AP,” Weiss said, in reference to the Trump administration punishing the Associated Press for not referring to the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America.

At the conference, European leaders committed to the continent’s defense, and recommitted to Ukraine. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy called for a European army, and Ukrainian politicians I spoke to also said that now was the time for Europe to step up. But a disconnect still prevailed, talk of a new world order forming amid the typical hobnobbing and regularly scheduled panel discussions. At least one European official I spoke to said they felt better about where the US stood after reassurances from American colleagues, offered both in private and in public, though the question is whether Americans were in a position to realistically offer those. “The American Senate is firmly in NATO’s camp,” Republican senator Lindsey Graham said during the conference.

But before the weekend was up, General Keith Kellogg, Trump’s special envoy to Ukraine and Russia, told the audience that Ukraine would be at the negotiating table, but Europe would not be, and French president Emmanuel Macron summoned European leaders to Paris for an emergency meeting on Ukraine.

The US’s erratic messaging in Munich is a symptom of a broader reimagining of the United States’ global role, which Trump is remaking radically and rapidly. In a month he has dismantled foreign aid and tariffed allies and adversaries alike. Now, Trump may realign America away from Europe, forcing Europe to question exactly what kind of marriage they are in. “All of that adds up to Europeans, of which I include the UK, thinking that, actually, the Article 5 guarantee of NATO—does that still work? Are we still friends?” said Mike Martin, a member of the British parliament, who served alongside US troops in Afghanistan, referring to the declaration that an attack against one member state is an attack against all. “Because that’s the core of the friendship.”

Yet few are willing to say outright that America is no longer a friend, because this really is a marriage, strained and difficult at times, but a nearly 80-year-long one. There will be no clean breaks—for Europe, or the United States. But for Europe it is more urgent, because there isn’t yet a backup plan and no one knows how much time is left to act on one. Aura Salla, a Finnish politician in the European Parliament, told me that the world order is changing, but too fast for Europe to have the capabilities or capacity to go it alone on Ukraine. “Meanwhile, sorry—we need the US.”

After European leaders met in Paris, the United Kingdom proposed leading a European peacekeeping force in Ukraine. But other European countries soon balked, and all concluded it could not work without the United States as the security guarantor. Europe reiterated its demands for a place at the negotiating table. But the US and its Russian counterparts met in Saudi Arabia this week, without them.

Even in these early days of talks, any progress looks impossibly bleak for Ukraine and Europe. Both the US and Russia have signaled that Moscow’s international isolation may end. Secretary of State Marco Rubio—who not so long ago called Putin a “war criminal” and introduced legislation that would prevent the US government from recognizing Ukranian territory annexed by Russia—told reporters Tuesday of “the incredible opportunities that exist to partner with the Russians” when the war concludes, though he did not expand on what those might be. In Washington, Trump is blaming Ukraine for initiating the war and calling Zelenskyy a dictator in a Truth Social post. “Zelenskyy better move fast or he is not going to have a Country left,” Trump warned.

The scenario many Europeans feared most at Munich is unfolding at a startling velocity. Europe is left with another Macron-led meeting, this time with more European leaders and Canada too. Europe is seeking a way to convince the United States to stay committed to Ukraine and this transatlantic partnership, even as it now urgently grasps for a hedge against Washington.

“We’re not going to go gently into the good night,” Uznańska-Wiśniewska, the Polish parliamentarian, said after the close of the conference. “We have to really try to fight against the dying of the light.”