For more than three years, Ukraine has been ravaged by the bloodiest conflict on the European continent since the Second World War. The outcome of this war will have significant ramifications for the security of all Europeans, yet we are not even at the negotiating table. We are relegated to the status of helpless bystanders, as others decide our future.
The slow exit of European nations from the centre stage of history is not new. In the mid-1990s, we were unable to prevent mass killings and the construction of concentration camps in the former Yugoslavia. More recently, during the Syrian crisis – which destabilised all European societies due to migration and terrorism – where were we? Russians, Americans, Turks and Iranians decided the fate of a crisis for which we have not yet finished paying the price. And what about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? While Europeans speak and gesticulate, the rest of the world thinks of Europe as Donald Trump remarked of Emmanuel Macron: ‘What he says doesn’t matter.’
And disappearing from history does not mean becoming an island of prosperity in a world beset by turbulence. In a geopolitical chessboard where brute force now prevails over the rule of law, abdicating the will and the ability to be an actor – rather than simply a spectator – means embarking on a path of long decline. It means that our interests and our identity are attacked day after day by third powers. It means that we are condemned to vassalage and humiliation.
Writing history is not the capricious desire of Europeans nostalgic for a glorious past. It is the very condition of our survival and our ability to pass on to future generations what, from London to Warsaw and from Lisbon to Helsinki, makes us the heirs of a unique European civilisation. To be able to do so, Europe has no choice but to build the foundations of a truly European diplomacy, rooted in new European strategic thinking.
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