According to a recent POLITICO news report, during the 2020 World Economic Forum in Davos, then US President Donald Trump told European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, in a private meeting, the following: “you need to understand that if Europe is under attack we will never come to help you and to support you, and by the way NATO is dead, and we will leave, we will quit NATO.” Trump said so according to Europe’s Internal Market Commissioner Thierry Breton, who was also there, with von der Leyen and former European Commissioner for Trade Phil Hogan. Breton is quoted as adding: “it was the president of the United States of America — he may come back. That was a big wakeup call … So now more than ever, we know that we are on our own, of course.” The context of such a story is Thierry Breton pitching vast investments for the European defense industry – after all, he reasons, the clock is ticking and, referring to Trump, “the potential candidates remind us that we must take care of EU’s defense by ourselves.”

Breton, who is also responsible for the European Union’s defense industry, wants to increase the European Defense Investment Program (EDIP) to €3 billion – €1,5 billion have already been earmarked. Such is expected to be proposed alongside the European Defense Industry Strategy (EDIS). In the long-term, however, Breton aims for a huge €100B defense fund.

Breton favors such vast investments to increase the EU’s defense industry production capacity in order to de-risk their investments, in the context of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine. The “bad news” (to some) is that the current confrontation might end sooner than expected, with top figures in the Western Establishment calling for a “land-for-peace deal”, while Russian and Ukrainian generals are reportedly........

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