US President Donald Trump announced that he intends to speak for “peace in Ukraine” with Russian President Vladimir Putin at a possible meeting in his head, Saudi Arabia. The two leaders’ meeting may result summit In Helsinki in 2018.

But what matters is that the Trump bomb for an advertisement was shipped in Europe about what to do with an increasingly reliable ally. The fact that the American president can think, not to mention the influence, a major geopolitical deal in Europe on European presidents that sent tremors to the bottom of the spine, as well as the possibility that they will leave alone to deal with aggressive and aggressive Russia.

Discussions on how to respond to this predicament seem to have been divided into two lines of thinking.

One assumes that the only realistic option is to embrace the United States more strictly hoping that strategic withdrawal will not occur. This means that he ignored Trump’s rhetorical strangeness, and if necessary, it flows on the ego the size of Siberia and meet some of the demands he requests.

To satisfy the US President, some suggested cutting the customs tariff on the United States’s cars or buying larger quantities of LNG from all over the Atlantic Ocean. Everyone agrees that European countries should spend more on defense, especially on US -made weapons. There is a passion for doing this, especially on the eastern side of the European Union; Poland, the Czech Republic and Romania have already joined the waiting list for the F-35, a modern fighter plane from the American defense manufacturer Lockheed Martin.

Ukraine is a proud member of this group as well. Ukrainian President Folodimir Zellinsky began flirting with Trump before winning the US elections in November. It seems that its stadium to grant the United States access to monetary minerals in Ukraine has appealed to “making America great again” (Maga) and the American president himself.

Zelenskyy is certainly not given heads about the US President’s call with Putin. Feeling of betrayal is real. At the Munich Security Conference earlier this week, the Ukrainian president called for European unity in a clear reprimand from the exciting speech of the Trump Vice President, JD Vance.

However, Zelenskyy will continue to pressure Trump mercury as well as Republicans at the old school of the American administration, such as Foreign Minister Marco Rubio and National Security Adviser Mike Walz, to form the American position. In Munich, the Ukrainian President met a group of Republican Senators, including Lindsay Graham, who called for the expansion of American support to the Ukrainian army.

It seems that the Kremlin crowd and Maga believe that the Ukrainians have little agency. But three years of war shows otherwise. In order to stop the shooting, Ukraine will need to buy and attend the table – a point that shows Zelenskyy in Munich.

However, it is unlikely to accommodate Trump Kyiv. Reducing support is the direction of the policy that it embraces and its vice to communicate with it.

This is why there is a second line of thinking in Europe calling for the end of European dependence on the United States. The long -standing supporter of this position is French President Emmanuel Macron. In a recent interview with Financial Times, Macron calls for strategic self -rule in critical fields, such as defense and technology. The Summit of Artificial Intelligence in Paris earlier this month, along with the European Union’s intention to provide severe resistance in a future tariff war with the United States, indicates that there is momentum in this direction.

Macron was also the first European leader to float the idea of ​​sending European forces to Ukraine. Although it is not believed that members of the European Union and the United Kingdom will be able to send up to 200,000, which is the number of Zelinski, the option, with regard to France, is on the table.

Macron believes that the Trump initiative is an opportunity for the Europeans “to become muscles” and become a security guarantor. Thus, Ukraine can become the path of Europe to global importance.

This vision certainly has a lot of possible weaknesses. Macron is locally weak, which he will succeed in the Elisi Palace is a suspended question. Germany, which is likely to be governed by the Christian Democratic Union in the center (CDU) after the February 23 elections, is almost not true. The populist challenge for the superpower of power Europe can also throw sand in the wheels.

European armies have no ability to overuse in the United States. The budgets are tense, also, raising the classic butter dilemma. Germany’s debt brakes, which seem to be reluctant to reconsider, do not make things better. Also add to the mix, long -term fears relate to the growth of productivity, innovation and technological development that is highlighted in a report issued by former European Central Bank Mario Drajhi. All of this should expect Europe to play in the same league as the United States and China.

While the European Union will fight to appear as a superpower on the global stage, its dependence on the United States is not sustainable. Trump’s “First America” ​​policy will inevitably continue to push the Europeans in Macron’s favorite direction. Ready -made meals from American communication to Putin is that the old rules and agreements governing the Atlantic relationships do not keep them.

Even for distinguished believers in a link with the United States, the hedge has become – a modest version of strategic self -rule, mainly – the only long -term option in the long term.

Instead of complete divorce and NATO, hedge involves paying behavior and adapting it as much as possible. Or simply follow an independent policy without looking at what Washington might think about issues such as China, trade or technology regulations.

We are likely to see more and more this move forward, even after Trump’s period.

The opinions expressed in this article are the author of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of the editorial island.