Trump's world

European leaders met in Paris to prepare an answer to their apparent exclusion from the talks about Ukraine's future, the existential and all-encompassing question of how to influence an unchained US president occupied them all.

- Patrick Wintour

The Finnish president, Alexander Stubb, speaking at the Munich Security Conference, offered some advice. "We Finns in these situations are cool, calm and collected, so what we do first is have an ice bath and after that we go to the sauna and then we reflect." Faced with what he described as a "cacophony" of het-up diplomacy, he suggested: "We need to talk less and do more."

His Latvian counterpart, Edgars Rinkēvičs, admitted that discussions about Europe's relationship with the US resembled psychological counselling. He said he was worried that part of European culture just may not be attractive to modern Americans: "We try to reflect and look for the perfect solution. We are very process-oriented, and not results-oriented."

The new prime minister of Iceland, Kristrún Frostadóttir, urged Europe to try to calm things down. "There is a lot of hot air and not much clarity about what the US is saying and what it is expecting. Let's make sure we are not reacting to the wrong things," she said. "We cannot do without the Americans. They are throwing things a bit up in the air, but it is our responsibility to catch them, to bring them down and not to keep them in the air."

Easier said than done. When the US vice-president, JD Vance, visits Dachau concentration camp and then delivers a message that in effect endorses Alternative für Deutschland days before Germany goes to the polls, it is hard for most Germans to think the US is truly in listening mode, as its officials privately reassure.

The Breitbart-style portrait of Europe with kommissars, dissidents locked up, elections rigged and censorship rife appeared deluded to the security establishment in the audience. To be told Europe's true enemy lies within, and it is you, was - as the German defence minister, Boris Pistorius, said - well, unacceptable.