This weekend, Donald Trump took to Truth Social to demand that European NATO members stop buying Russian oil and impose sweeping tariffs “between 50% and 100%” on all Chinese and Russian goods until the war in Ukraine ends. He then declared that the war “is not TRUMP’S WAR (it would never have started if I was President!), it is Biden’s and Zelenskyy’s WAR.”
Ending Europe’s dependence on Russian energy is already a shared strategic goal, and, though sometimes too-slow, has been advanced through painstaking sanctions and diversification efforts. Blanket tariffs on Chinese products, however, would be far more difficult for European policymakers to implement and serve little strategic purpose. There is no reason for Europe to participate in Trump’s reckless trade war. When European leaders inevitably balk, Trump will seize the opportunity to brand them as freeloaders and use their refusal as a pretext to abandon both the Ukraine peace process and European security commitments.
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