European Unity Questioned: Old Rules Gone
By Donald K. Hepburn, Skytop Contributor / September 30th, 2022
Mr. Hepburn is a decorated intelligence veteran and US national security expert. Serving nearly thirty years with the Department of State, Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), retiring at the rank of Senior Intelligence Service Officer. His foreign field deployments included multiple command positions as CIA Chief of Station and Chief of Bases. In CIA Headquarters he served as Task Force Chief and Chief of a Middle East Group. In the FBI he served as the Deputy Assistant Director of the International Operations Division.
Currently, Mr. Hepburn is President of Boanerges Solutions LLC serving as a confidential advisor/consultant to US and foreign companies in the area of security/intelligence and business operations. Clients include satellite integration, advanced security services, drone and counter-drone technology, bio-medical, software engineering, material sciences, AI data-analytics, academic research communities, energy, and global logistics. He also served as a Senior Advisor to the United States Institute of Peace, Washington D.C. and is a certified member of InfraGard.
Mr. Hepburn obtained his BA from the University of Southern California, Los Angeles and his MA from Columbia University, New York. He received extensive specialized training in the CIA. He is the recipient of the CIA Director’s Award, the Distinguished Career Intelligence Medal and the CIA Meritorious Unit Citation for Intelligence.
A Daunting Standard
This August I attended the Bled Strategic Forum (BSF) in Slovenia. The timing was apropos given I was mulling over topics for my debut article on Skytop Strategies’ portal. To be honest, you’re probably not the easiest of audiences. Quite the opposite. You’re a group of well informed and voracious data miners seeking high quality information that would not otherwise be found in the American mainstream media, a daunting standard, but it’s a worthy one.
A Journey in Critical Thinking
Rather than try to address in one article the myriad of issues currently unfolding in Europe, I’ll start with a broader, though possibly less dramatic, piece to be followed by more in-depth ones. This is more of a journey in critical thinking about Europe, a journey that purposely ignores the overwhelming, fast breaking and intemperate data overflows in favor of a more deliberate and reasoned conversation.
These articles are not intended to simply inform, but hopefully they will shape the framework used to evaluate how these events might impact your business ecosystems, and possibly, given the direction we are heading, your lives.
American Isolationism and Involvement
Since the moment America was discovered (use whatever date of discovery you prefer), there has been a long and often bitter debate between the concepts of American isolationism and American involvement.
In addition to the enormous sacrifices paid with American lives in two world wars, there were also the “precursors” of Americans who volunteered, crossed the pond and took up arms. Lafayette Escadrille of 1914 was a squadron of American airmen who fought for the French against Germany a year before the United States entered WWI. The Kosciuszko Squadron of 1919 was an all American pilot squadron that volunteered for the Polish Air Forces against the Soviets.
Then there was The Lincoln Battalion in the Spanish Civil War when Americans fought to defeat Spanish Fascists.
Following in these footsteps, there were three Eagle Squadrons in The Battle of Britain when American pilots flew combat missions long before the United States officially joined in. And finally, prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, there is also the US’ military ground and air action in the Balkans.
Clearly, there’s no shortage of evidence to demonstrate that at some level American willingness to serve will always be found on the front lines of Europe’s wars. But, there’s also the anti-interventionist groups on both sides of the pond. More on that in a separate message.
Uncharted Territory
Despite this history, today’s situation is qualitatively different from the past. The painful reality that this is essentially a NATO + conflict with Russia has yet to sink in. While Europe’s response has surpassed many expectations, including their own, it’s an open secret here that without America’s direct military support to Ukraine, Russia would be winning this war.
Most Europeans view this conflict as a “them vs. them” scenario. While they support Ukraine and have worked, albeit individually, to provide material help, they are struggling with the actual enormity of this event and that it’s really as much about them as it is about Russia’s desire to reacquire a former territory. In times such as these, geography is everything.
The Europeans are not oblivious to the threat posed by Russia. They are keenly aware that Europe is in uncharted territory. However, Europe as a whole is facing a multitude of strategic threats, militarily, political, economic, energy, migration and the impact of climate change.
Emerging International Order
Back to the Slovenian forum. The theme was clear. How does the European Union (EU) respond to an emerging international order that doesn’t resemble the one it grew up in?
There could not have been a more timely gathering of European seniors both from government and non-government elements to address the premise “The Power of Rules or The Rule of Power.” As noted by the forum’s organizers, according to the European Commission’s vision, if the EU is to wield geopolitical clout, it will have to increase its capacity to address these key global challenges. Unity of action is the EU’s only strength. Without it they are merely a collection of countries that individually can do little to stem Russia’s ambition to dismantle NATO + and the EU’s economic power.
Just because they call it a “Union” doesn’t actually make it one.
While EU members generally share all the same challenges, the differing order of priority each member attaches to these make a unified response all the more unlikely resulting in a failure to attain the geopolitical clout they seek and certainly need. For the record, just because the United States calls itself “United” doesn’t make it that either.
Swerve to the Hard-Right
The wear and tear of Russian attacks, tactical and strategic, in Ukraine will take its toll.
More importantly and most recently, the fear and anxiety of what appears to be a new and asymmetric undertaking to rock the EU economies is assuredly underway.
When news images of cold, elderly Europeans suffering from major economic downturns along with concurrent illegal immigration flows and climatic change (too hot or too cold) begin to take hold, Europe’s swerve to the hard-right will likely accelerate. Arguably it already has with the recent trends observed in Hungry, Italy, Spain, Poland and Sweden. Putin may sense his time to win a “victory” is limited but he knows that come winter (starting about now) the clock on the EU’s political unity will begin to run out. Like beauty, time is more often in the eye of the beholder and Putin probably believes he has enough of it to survive. He now just has to hold on until the EU cracks.
Europe’s Perplexing Status
Herein we find the crux of Europe’s perplexing status. How to maintain unity in a world that is no longer playing by the old rules?
It seems that just when there’s a powerful purpose for such unified action, to demonstrate that rare clout, the continent is t-boned by other rather complex and expensive troubles. Some argue that at the center of these challenges is the inability to secure a stable, affordable supply of energy.
Others claim that it’s the economy, stupid.
Yet a growing number of voters will sarcastically note that nothing else really matters when faced with the end of the world as we know it, due to climate change. And all agree, secretly or openly, that the unregulated flow of immigrants from Africa, the Middle East and Asia are a source of major concern that threaten the very essence of what it means to be European.
In the end it is all forgoing. It’s a question of priority and timing.