Sitting beside President Donald Trump in the White House Tuesday, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz looked the part of the dutiful ally. Just days before, Mr. Merz had offered some of the strongest words in defense of the American and Israeli attacks on Iran.
“This is not the moment to read our partners and allies,” he said. “Dismiss our reservations, we share many of their objectives.”
In truth, he embodies Europe’s predicament. He needs to be playing for time.
Why We Wrote This
More than 20 years ago, Europe followed the United States into war in Iraq, indicating a lockstep defense strategy between the two. Today, that lockstep has been broken, as European nations draw lines against being pulled into the US war in Iran.
Around Europe, many leaders are looking with some envy at Spain, where Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has blocked the United States from using its air bases. On Wednesday, he delivered to a national address in which he called the Iranian airstrikes a “breakdown of international law.”
Yet Germany and Spain are, in many ways, playing the same game. Europe is now determined to free itself from reliance on the US for security. But that will take years. What should it do in the meantime? Spain and Germany show two different approaches, yet the goal is broadly similar: managing the difficult relations with the US until Europe can stand on its own.
In Spain and the United Kingdom, the shadow of the Iraq War, launched in 2003, plays a crucial role. Both paid a significant political price for joining the US war, and both are drawing lines now to try to prevent that from happening again. But everywhere, there are signs small and large that Europe is no longer the dutiful all it once was, even if it seems that way in front of the klieg lights.
“How do we become more independent without having Trump cut us off?” asks Kristina Kausch, deputy managing director of the German Marshall Fund’s South and Wider Europe program.
In some ways, the best measure of Europe’s changing security mindset this week came in a development that had nothing to do with Iran. France announced that it was expanding its nuclear arsenal, and it would use its nuclear capabilities to defend several other European nations, including Germany and Poland.
It provides a different, and perhaps more accurate, view of Mr. Merz’s priorities, says Ms. Kausch. While he is publicly trying to prevent a rupture with the US, he is working behind the scenes to wean the country off its reliance on the US for protection.
In this case, France is stepping up as the only EU nation with nuclear weapons. “France can protect its vital interests, and European security is French security,” says Camille Lons of the European Council on Foreign Relations. “So if an EU partner gets attacked, it can fall under what we consider sufficient reason for using a nuclear weapon.”
Spain and the UK have made more headlines by drawing their own lines on the Iranian airstrikes.
Yiannis Kourtoglou/Reuters
Spain has particular reasons to be the only major European power to openly criticize the US and Israel. Some of it is internal politics, with a left-leaning socialist party in power. But through its connections to Latin America and Africa, Spain also has “a privileged relationship with the Global South,” says José-Ignacio Torreblanca, senior adviser to the Madrid office of the European Council on Foreign Relations.
That makes it sensitive to anything with a scent of big-power interventionism. Spain has been an outspoken critic of Israel on Gaza, and it condemned the US operation in Venezuela.
Echoes of the Iraq War also linger. Support for the US-led invasion led to the fall of Spain’s ruling party after the war. While the current government allowed the US to use Spanish bases for limited airstrikes against Iran last year, the open-ended nature of the new conflict played on old fears.
There was a strong sense that “we cannot be dragged into this again,” says Dr. Torreblanca.
The UK has tried to walk the same line, though more daintily. It denied the US access to its bases for the initial strike. But Iranian counterattacks, including one on a British base in Cyprus, persuaded the UK to make its bases available for “defensive” operations.
© House of Commons/Reuters
The Iraq War is never far from the discussion. “We’ve learned the lessons from Iraq,” said Darren Jones, the prime minister’s chief secretary, to LBC Radio. “We don’t want to go back into war in the Middle East where there is no clear plan and no legal basis to do so.”
To some, Europe’s reaction doesn’t amount to much. “Simply spineless,” says Douglas Webber, an emeritus political scientist at INSEAD in Paris.
Europe will face much more of the blowback than the US – in the form of higher prices on energy and goods and potentially an influx of people migrating to Europe to escape violence, he says. “The EU is condemned to their role of helpless bystanders,” adds Dr. Webber.
Others see more nuance. “It’s a divorce, and the weakest partner doesn’t have the resources to leave the house,” says Dr. Torreblanca of the ECFR.
But Iran has made something else plain: The US needs Europe and its bases for security, too. The responses of Spain and the UK, and the French nuclear deal, point to a Europe trying new things, probing the boundaries of a complicated and evolving relationship.
“That is not limited to the Iranian situation,” says Ms. Kausch of the GMF. “There is a broader context. Europe is finding its voice.”
