The new role of the EU, leading countries in rapid transformation

Undoubtedly, the performance staged in Washington on 18 August, with the five leaders of the major European countries, the president of the Commission and the secretary of NATO summoned to accompany Zelensky to Trump's court, constituted a humiliation for our pro-European sensibilities, recognising in it once again the US president's explicit desire not to give recognition to the European Union as an equal partner in dealing with this new phase of the global conflict that has opened in Ukraine.

However, we cannot attribute the advantage of surrendering to those who want to scuttle what remains of European unity; instead, we must look for opportunities for the next moves in that situation as well. The world is in fact much bigger than the Oval Office of the White House, and everything suggests that the game that has opened in recent days is in its early stages.

First of all, after the meeting with European leaders, Trump had to tighten the leash on Orban, inducing him to withdraw his veto on Ukraine's entry into the European Union, a fact that represents an indirect recognition of the EU in a post-war period that will be crucial above all for Europe itself. In fact, it is clear from Washington that the countries of the Old Continent will have to take responsibility not only for security but also for the reconstruction of Ukraine, following the end of the conflict, which, despite the words spoken in Alaska, still seems far away, but which must be prepared as of now.

Trump, on the other hand, has on his neck the heavy breath of the sovereignist ghosts he himself evoked, who in the name of America First are calling for no more national resources to be dispersed outside the borders of their homeland and therefore for Ukraine to be abandoned, entrusting its possible developments to the Europeans. In reality, this is the opportunity that opens up in front of the whole of Europe: after almost twenty years of stagnation, the European Union can take charge of a great project that, combining a long-term political vision, can reactivate the economy of the Continent, focusing its financial, technological and human resources towards a large-scale joint action.

In this sense, the investments needed for the possible reconstruction of Ukraine should be estimated right away, but also a European relaunch, which must certainly achieve autonomy in the area of military security - and here I recall that the first project of European unity was the European Defence Community in the early 1950s - but must have as its goal the strengthening of Europe's digital industry and its artificial intelligence developments, as already indicated in the Draghi Report and even earlier foreshadowed by the Letta Report.