Outgunned Europe accepts the least-worst US trade deal

In the end, Europe found it lacked the leverage to pull Donald J. Trump’s America into a trade pact on its terms and so has signed up to a deal it can just about stomach — albeit one that is clearly skewed in the US’ favor.

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As such, Sunday’s agreement on a blanket 15% tariff after a months-long standoff is a reality check on the aspirations of the 27-country European Union (EU) to become an economic power able to stand up to the likes of the United States or China.

The cold shower is all the more bracing given that the EU has long portrayed itself as an export superpower and champion of rules-based commerce for the benefit both of its own soft power and the global economy as a whole.

For sure, the new tariff that will now be applied is a lot more digestible than the 30% “reciprocal” tariff which Mr. Trump threatened to invoke in a few days.

While it should ensure Europe avoids recession, it will likely keep its economy in the doldrums: it sits somewhere between two tariff scenarios the European Central Bank last month forecast would mean 0.5-0.9% economic growth this year compared to just over 1% in a trade tension-free environment.

But this is nonetheless a landing point that would have been scarcely imaginable only months ago in the pre-Trump 2.0 era, when the EU along with much of the world could count on US tariffs averaging out at around 1.5%.