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\u201cMy last call to colleagues: Be more united, take decisions quicker. Events won\u2019t wait for you,\u201d was the advice of the EU\u2019s chief of foreign policy, Josep Borrell, at the last Foreign Affairs Council that he chaired. This distilled his experience over the past five years, which saw Europe struggling to cope with a world changing abruptly and unpredictably, with the pandemic and Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine, with war in the Middle East, an energy crisis, high prices and problems in production and supply chains, with the strengthening of groups within Europe and outside it undermining the project of Union.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Now the EU will have to deal also with a very different America. Donald Trump\u2019s first presidency tested US-EU ties, but the president was held within the tracks of this strong alliance. He returns with his hands untied, free of the establishment figures around him who limited his actions in the past, with the Supreme Court having ruled that he has impunity for any actions conducted as president. If Trump\u2019s policies strengthen Vladimir Putin and Benjamin Netanyahu further, the EU\u2019s problems will multiply. The Europeans are already expecting less military cooperation with the US and the likely imposition of tariffs on their largest trade partnership. And all this is happening while Germany slides towards national elections in February and France\u2019s minority government depends on the support of Marine Le Pen\u2019s anti-EU, extreme-right party.<\/p>\n
With the two largest countries in Europe otherwise engaged, who will form the EU\u2019s \u201cdirectorate\u201d? Will it be Poland, which is taking on the Union\u2019s rotating presidency in January (after Hungary, which has acted largely autonomously under its prime minister, who has good relations with Putin and Trump)? Can Italy take charge, with its many domestic problems? Or any of the smaller countries? It is not only the larger ones that can propose strategy and common solutions, but we don\u2019t see any attempting this. Two former Italian prime ministers, Enrico Letta and Mario Draghi, have presented valuable analyses of the problems and proposals for strengthening the EU. But the reforms affecting the Union\u2019s internal functioning, its adaptation to a changing world and its further enlargement are making slow progress. (Among the proposals is the scrapping of the veto in some important decisions.) According to the schedule, the member-states\u2019 leaders will discuss these issues next June. By then, the EU\u2019s actions will not be quicker, nor will it display greater unity. In any case, whoever governs Germany and France, it is imperative that they agree quickly on crucial issues.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n