Wimpy Europe

With the United States unhinged, China increasingly authoritarian, and Russia in full Dr. Evil mode, the world desperately needs a good guy to believe in. There is only one candidate for the job: Europe. No other country or region is free, prosperous, endowed with the right values — and large enough to be an example to the world.

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But it is not enough for good guys to be good. They also must be strong and determined. And that, I am afraid, is where Europe falls short. Right now, Europe looks anything but strong. It looks wimpy.

First came the so-called trade deal with the US. As my London School of Economics colleague Luis Garicano wrote, it was “not a deal, but a surrender.” Europe made a number of concessions, including acceptance of 15% tariffs on its key exports, in exchange for nothing.

Then came the August 18 gathering of European leaders in the White House. If there is one art President Donald Trump practices to perfection, it is scene-setting. He sat in his big reclining chair, behind his big desk, while the leaders of Germany, France, Italy, Finland, Ukraine, and the United Kingdom, plus the president of the European Commission and the secretary-general of NATO, cowered on the other side like supplicants hoping to land a job on his old reality TV show The Apprentice. No picture could better convey the stark asymmetry in gall - and in real power.

But there is no reason why Europe is condemned to genuflect before a rogue US president. Europe has a much larger population than the US, and the combined GDP of the European Union, the UK, and other rich non-EU countries, like Norway and Switzerland, comes close.