So, I recently found this Ștefan Popescu guy. I mean, I knew about him, but I used to find him off-putting. I only started taking him seriously a few days ago, and I even mentioned him in my previous post. Today I listened to him in a new talk, War in Europe!, and while I don’t agree with everything he says (maybe just 93%), the fact that he called some things by their name helped me describe a scenario I didn’t think could happen but now seems quite believable. I’m using many of his ideas and adding my own thoughts, hypotheses, and perspectives. I’m not a political analyst, I didn’t study at the Sorbonne like he did, but I see the world my own way, from my weary chair.

THE TRUE FACE OF THE UNITED STATES

Let’s be honest: Trump’s America doesn’t want a just and lasting peace in Ukraine—it wants a reset with Russia. Moreover, Trump’s America couldn’t care less about Europe, which it sees as a rival and an enemy, preferring instead to side with Russia against China’s global influence. It’s cynical, but it fits the nationalist, mercantile vision of the current administration.

Worse still, as Ștefan Popescu pointed out, if Trump slams the door in our European faces—catching our fingers in the process—a Harris administration would have politely turned us down too, still not siding with Europe. Two things seem to back this up: (1) under Biden, support for Ukraine was slow and hesitant, leading to a war of attrition instead of securing a victory against Russia; (2) right now, Democratic elites—Biden, Harris, Obama, the Clintons—are silent, neither challenging Trump’s absurd domestic measures nor his radical foreign policy shifts. Not that there’s much to work with: the Democratic Party’s a mess, with its far-left wing (AOC, Bernie) being useless.

The Trump-Putin new friendship remains a bit puzzling to me, given Trump’s random, often contradictory actions and utterances. Yet the convergence is clear, especially when you consider that Trump isn’t there alone or just thanks to MAGA. The techno-oligarchic complex (Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, Marc Andreessen, Nick Land), represented in the administration by JD Vance and Musk, has set the course for the New America—nationalist, mercantile, interventionist (think Denmark or Canada)—to which democracy is an impediment.

The Ukraine critical raw materials deal is a smokescreen, offering no security guarantees whatsoever. Most such deposits lie in Russian-occupied areas, suggesting Trump intends to negotiate with Putin a split of Ukraine, at least economically. Speculating further, after a peace deal in April, on Russia’s terms, new elections could install a Moscow-friendly regime in Kyiv. In the medium term, Putin’s dream—eastern Ukraine integrated into Russia, with the Dnieper River as the border— isn’t unthinkable. That said, the notion of western Ukraine being split among Poland, Hungary, and Romania, though once hinted at by Putin, seems rather unlikely.

Russia doesn’t oppose Ukraine (or what’s left of it) joining the EU, but it’s not a goodwill gesture. An EU expanded with Ukraine, Moldova, and the Western Balkans would become a multi-speed entity—fragmented, weak, and unable to defend its interests cohesively.

Despite EU-UK-Canada summits, Europe remains divided, lacking a shared strategic culture. The idea of a European army is met with a lack of enthusiasm by some—Germany cannot lead for historical reasons, France lacks trust from many (historical clichés again) despite being a not so bad choice, and while many would prefer a British leadership, I wouldn’t feel safe relying on a power at Europe’s edge, still clinging to its once-traditional special relationship with the US. I mentioned in the previous post the capabilities of the Europeans to produce weapons, fighter jets, tanks, and drones, but the dependence on American companies is a reality: Europe is not entirely sovereign (bar for the French nuclear arsenal), with some critical components coming from the US, and thus making a full break unrealistic. Ursula von der Leyen’s €800bn rearmament plan includes the purchase of American material. Macron is the only strong, firm voice in this European chorus, but his position at home is fragile. Without him, Europe risks becoming a doormat for Russia.

International institutions are obsolete and powerless, and the new world order is based on might more than it was in the 1930s. The EU’s many stupid errors—from the Green Deal to “wokism”—only pave the way for pro-Trump and pro-Putin extremists, already in power in Hungary and Slovakia, and soon perhaps everywhere else.

THE ROLE OF TURKEY

Turkey’s stance has intrigued me lately—and it’s not properly discussed. While Trump has Middle East interests (Gaza, Iran, the extension of the Abraham Accords to Saudi Arabia) that Turkey is said to be able to facilitate, I’m not convinced Erdoğan will fully align with him. Turkey is a bridge between the US and Russia but also aims to meddle in the EU (it wants to “intromission” the EU), probably aiming to become a regional business hub—a “New Ottoman Empire” focused on trade. That’s smart for them. Syria is another matter altogether.

At the same time, Turkey (oh, sorry, Türkiye!) is a poisoned apple: helpful at face value, yet undermining. Europe has three enemies now: Russia, the US, and soon Turkey. If Putin and Erdoğan help Trump make a deal with Iran, the Deveselu base loses its official purpose. The US military presence in Europe, what with the new alliance with Russia, might become a threat. We might even ask them to leave, but Trump has nowhere to send them all: not entirely to the Philippines or Japan, and obviously back home they have nothing to do. Who’s to say they won’t be used to pressure Europe into bowing to Russia? Or that Russian and American intelligence won’t jointly install puppet governments, as the US used to do in Latin America decades ago? Russia’s election-rigging expertise is beyond doubt. The İncirlik base is starting to look like a threat to me!

THE ETERNAL CHINA

If Russia realizes its “limitless friendship” with China is circumstantial and that it’s exposed to Beijing (especially with a sparsely populated Far East and a weak economy), a Trump-Putin anti-Xi alliance could work. I’ve long argued that GDP metrics are flawed—China’s already the number one economic power in my view. It lacks some key tech, but has patience. It can’t invade Taiwan yet—TSMC’s “nuclear option” would cripple access to nanometer presses—but time’s on its side.

Europe, including Romania, will have to choose between Washington-Moscow (plus Turkey in my scenario) and Beijing. I’ve repeatedly said in the past that the West sealed its fate by deindustrializing and moving factories to China and other Far East countries. Quite suicidal, that one. The fascination of many Western CEOs with China’s model is chilling, and now New America adopts similar principles: forget democracy, free speech, and rights. But if there is a choice between a Russian-American dual authoritarianism and a Chinese singular one, it’s hard to say what’s the better option. I dare say that an alliance with China might be a smart choice for Europe, but how we’d benefit from it is so far unclear to me. China’s already bought up much of Europe (German factories, ports and airports, and more), so it’s not a savior, but just another colonial power.

BRICS is another factor that has not been analyzed as it should have been: Putin controls its smaller members, then Brazil and India, but China might split if it sees Russia as an enemy and an ally of the US. An EU-China alliance against a Russia-US axis is in my opinion possible, but we’d also need a plan: how exactly are we supposed to benefit from such an alliance?

I wish we had a plan. I wish we didn’t need to make such choices.

WHERE DOES ROMANIA STAND?

Romania’s situation sucks: always on the edge of empires, ignored and despised by this New America, and lacking the strategic weight of Poland or the Baltics. Its infrastructure is abysmal—Ukrainian railways outperformed ours in the war’s first two years (I’m not aware of the current situation). There was a steady decline in the last 20 years: the intellectual elite is poorly integrated with the West, there is no real public debate on anything that matters, and politicians are detached, incompetent, if not utterly cretins. Romania risks slipping into third-world status, borrowing traits from Serbia and current Hungary, and without Bulgaria’s affinity for Russia. Nothing to look forward to.

Regardless of Europe’s alliances, Romania will probably remain a buffer at the contact line with Russia. Militarily, I can not expect a couple of thousands of French soldiers to make any difference when US troops look the other way. Periphery remains peripheral and discardable.

A rosier future would require the impossible: regional cooperation with Poland, the Baltics, or even Ukraine (if it survives); massive infrastructure investment; better leaders; and some love from a superpower—something that isn’t going to happen.

I don’t dream in pink.

Oh, and the Chinese are already in Romania. A random exemple: Rolem Brașov, now NBHX Rolem, is owned by NBHX Automotive System GmbH, which is part of the NBHX Trim Group, belonging to Ningbo Huaxiang Electronic Co., Ltd., from Ningbo, Zhejiang Province, People’s Republic of China.

So when a Chinese buys a German that owns a Romanian subsidiary…

ARE WE DOOMED YET?

Fuck knows. Europe and Romania stand at a crossroads, and I don’t know if there’s any realistic hope or plan.

Funny fact: according to Decopy.ai, when I write in English on political matters, I’m only 27% human, 30% mixed, and 43% AI, and thus, by some strange arithmetics, the above text is with a 58% probability AI-generated. Go figure. Je dois être un LLM qui s’ignore.