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Comment by joduplessis | Hacker News Reader

I wish Europe would just push back. More than what they are currently. There is so much potential there, but somehow the EU all look at the US as some form of idealogical father figure. Excuse the hyperbolic-talk.

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I don't think it is true. It's like saying "I wish those kids didn't let the bigger one bully them". The reason the bully is bullying is because he is in a position to do it.

The EU is being careful because the US are more powerful.

Trump has repeatedly backed off when he's challenged. It's happened time and time again. It's the reason TACO is a thing. The best strategy against him is to be relentless about pushing back, even if on paper the US is more powerful.

It seems you can also just lie to help him save face, like Canada did when it agreed it would adopt very strict border control policies to stop "drugs coming into the USA," and listed out steps that all were just existent Canadian laws and policies.

Yeah, another strategy is to just give him something he can claim as a W even if it's bullshit, or to glaze him enough. He's so hyperfixated on owning Greenland though, that I'm not sure those will work this time.

The problem that US generals have right now is that Trump has gotten the idea that the US (viz., he himself, in his mind) ought to literally own Greenland and he does know how real estate works. Treaties, mineral deals, guarantees for additional military bases that would mean de facto control over Greenland would work with a rational person. However, they won't work with someone who insists on buying or annexing a country to own its territory.

Large fractions inside the EP have already said that they won't sign the new US-EU trade deal next week:

https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-us-trade-deal-on-hold-aft...

This effectively means the end of the 0 percent tariff on US products. There are also already calls in the EP to activate the Anti-Coercion Instrument:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Coercion_Instrument

The EU is the more reasonable actor here. Making a reactionary move, even one that would feel good, wouldn't be the best move.

The USA is in the process of systematically demolishing it's soft power around the world.

The EU is like a super tanker that takes a long time turning and, make no mistake, it is turning away from the USA.

The push back will be felt for years and decades.

they can't back down on this one

if the moron continues, we will go to the brink

The problem is NATO, a lot of the EU is reluctant to push back because at the end of the day the US guarantees that Russia cannot pursue the type of landgrab it is currently trying to do in Ukraine against other states. The risk that the US runs into when trying to take Greenland is that this argument loses weight instantly, so the expectation is that the EU will be much more willing to use its anti coercion tools if Trump tries to make it a reality.

Russia already fails in Ukraine where they are fighting with our old junk, and the other EU States are kicking their defense industry in full gear. What makes you think they could win a full scale war against the EU

Russia don't have to be able to win a full-scale war against the EU for such a war to break out, it suffices that deterrence breaks down sufficiently that Russia get the idea they can get away with some land grab, e.g. in one of the Baltic countries.

The war in Ukraine illustrates very well the difference between perception and reality. Perception counts for deterrence.

The Baltics are protected under the EU defence clause, NATO or not they will be assisted by the EU.

It's already quite clear the US has virtually left NATO, at this point they wouldn't assist at all with a landgrab in the Baltics so I'm glad the EU defence treaty is more forceful about the level of aid/assistance than Article 5.

NATO at this point is virtually dead, there's no trust in the USA and the rhetoric about Greenland has cemented it. Hope the Canucks can join a defence pact with the EU, the Trump admin and its Project 2025 achieved what they wanted.

I don't think they could win at all, but Putin has proven that he can convince himself otherwise so an invasion might still happen.

Old junk? Drones are old junk? Do you even understand what a full scale war with Russia entails? Total annihilation of Europe for starters.

I guess your position is that Russia is not at "full scale war" with Ukraine then.

Currently that entails "large drone attacks" that kill two and injure dozens.

That's a little short of the full scale war Russia could wield in WWI and WWII.

You might want to check some reliable sources about how the war is going for Ukraine, because it seems like you think they are kicking some Russian bootie, which is simply not the case. Take the US (and risk of mutual worldwide nuclear contamination) out of the equation and Ukraine would be in even worse shape.

> because it seems like you think they are kicking some Russian bootie,

This seems like quite the assumption.

It is generally a mistake to attempt telepathy/IP.

Russia not doing nearly as well as one might expect for an aging out core of a former superpower is not an equivilance with their target is kicking their arse.

The grind Russia is having to go through against Ukraine is an indicator of how it might fare against a full NATO (sans the US).

For a supposed superpower they are doing very badly

".. because at the end of the day the US guarantees that Russia cannot pursue the type of landgrab it is currently trying to do in Ukraine against other states"

I am sorry to say that we (Europeans) increasingly do not believe that the US would help us.

It's like when every liberal scoffs at leftists opposing US imperialism, nothing about the power balance has changed. Europe was always a vassal of the empire. This is the liberal international order, this is what that means, not what they tell you it means, but what it actually means.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_international_order

That's why they can kidnap Maduro, have the BBC censor the word "kidnapped" in their reporting on it. Have every European politician applaud it, point to Maduros case against him at the ICC and have Netanyahu fly over France. You can't do anything about Greenland, the same way you can't do anything when he comes for Norways state-owned extraction industry next. Liberals can scream hypocrisy tears all they want, this is the world they built. The empire is coming home.

Leftists can go eat shit. They spent over a year convincing people not to vote for Kamala. Their preferred candidate won!

Leftists wanted her to not be a dog shit politician in order for her to win, they were screaming for her to embrace real substantive policy positions and not business as usual, corrupt, liberal elitism. The same leftists are now in the street protecting communities from the gastapo, while liberals debate about which words they can say. It were those exact liberal politics that lost Hillary the election too, and then you were screaming too about how it was all Bernie's fault. For christ sake, Trump was able to sell himself as the PEACE CANDIDATE, how can you fuck this up so badly?

I just don't understand the perspective that Trump is a historical threat and therefore we can't accept business as usual. I have a number of disagreements with the status quo myself, but I'm not going to pursue them until Trump is out of power, because I want to absolutely minimize the number of people who feel they have to choose between supporting Trump and abandoning some principle of theirs. To me, any other strategy seems tantamount to saying that Trump isn't so bad.

But your lukewarm candidates lost twice, Hillary lost, Kamala lost. The point we are making is that they lost, because they are lukewarm. There is a reason Trump won in the first place you are ignoring, you are ignoring the times of unprecedented grievances that people have, people want real change. Trump represents that change to people, a fascist lie and scapegoating of course, but you are representing the comfortable elite under whom nothing will ever change for the better for anyone. All you have is complain about leftists, we didn't loose, you lost twice. Dems are more unpopular than ever, even now under fucking Trump, your politics are dogshit and you don't have anybody else to blame for it.

I don't represent or subscribe to what you think! I agree that both of them were weak candidates who lost where a better candidate could have won, and I myself have been growing away from the Democratic party ever since the 2016 primary.

What I cannot agree with, what I find completely unacceptable, is the idea that any dispute over candidate quality can justify splintering the anti-Trump coalition. If Bernie were the 2024 candidate, I assure you I would have even harsher words for any business types who ran around complaining about him.

How long till you abandon the pathetic Democratic party? It's been 10 years since 2016. Or are you simply reduced to an anti-Trumper?

Two party system is such a mess. I blame two party system more than anything. When you reduce everything to two party, its so reductive and this is the mess you are gonna have to face because of it.

A key point is that it's an electoral system from hundreds of years past that was never intended to be a two party system, one set up by founders who in the large wre not even fans of party politics (one, two, or more).

It is a system that by it's design is more or less doomed to iterate into a Hotelling's law quagmire of two nose to nose opposing sides neither of which represents any kind of majority or popular view.

The US electoral system is well past due for a revamp, as recommended by it's founders who judged it "good enough" for a while ... until a despot appeared.

I agree but trust me when I say this, its not gonna happen.

I see people so entrenched in American politics who cant believe that there can be independents atleast in how the current voting works

They probably need better voting mechanisms... but for which they are gonna have to vote and no republican or democrat is gonna propose this ( i really don't think so) and the people can probably only vote for republican or democrat (independents very few) in the current system...

So its doomed and this is the reason why. A lot of American politics in the end feels like this or that, not knowing the nuances and polarization (in some sense) from both parties while still bieng the same (corruption stemming from lobbyists)

It's just really sad to see because to me its like not just Trump being a hostile takeover (which he is) but rather that both parties and the system failed the people so that someone like trump could spin up in the first place and now this is even happening.

If I were to tell you even 2 years ago all the things happening in America, you would believe we are in a black mirror episode or Its a bad dream but its reality now & we (non Americans) just gotta deal with America impeaching on other countries sovereignity trying to buy things outright and all escalations and the final one remaining is war and they haven't put it off the table as well

Like, I just want to take a moment here man

Like what the fuck is happening.

As a non American you have a semi reasonable chance of being to sit back, take a beat, and watch (maybe) Trump implode and self destruct within the US system and maybe some following rebuilding of the system "as intended" with better safeguards.

  Trump’s triumphant narrative is not working at home, either. A new CNN poll released Friday shows that fifty-eight percent of Americans believe that Trump’s first year in office has been a failure. Americans worry most about the economy, but concerns about democracy come in second. The numbers beyond that continue to be bad for Trump. Sixty-six percent of Americans think Trump doesn’t care about people like them. Fifty-three percent think he doesn’t have the stamina and sharpness to serve effectively as president.

  Sixty-five percent of Americans say Trump is not someone they are proud to have as president.

~ Jan 17th, 2026 - https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/january-17-2026

One of the issues I have with this is that a Weaker America does mean a better China and the reasons I have been vocal is that this doesn't have to do much with America itself but rather the fact that we need a multi polarized world in first place with (I think) policies of non alighnment because Europe aligned itself to US for the most part, its coming so much as a shock-wave in the first place.

A stronger China does mean more micro-agressions towards Asean countries in general (japan,south korea,India) and QUAD members (minus the united states) so it would be beneficial if the EU block could align itself with the members of Asean who still align with democratic ideals and similar.

This is probably why most countries officials (or people interested in geopolitics) are on the edge of their seats

A better China, or stronger China, would likely look like China as a trading powerhouse dominating Atlas of Economic Complexity rankings globally, exerting greater control over the bottleneck of China Sea through which almost all its inbound and outbound goods traverse.

It's unlikely (but possible) to see it flex as a global military powerhouse in the same manner as other great empires have done in the past - but it is probable that china will continue to extract "water resources" as food from Africa and elsewhere as it, the Saudi's, and others already do .. in China's case with the backing of its own mercanaries and with US mercanaries (they were hiring Erik Prince and Blackwater not so long ago).

This is a pattern the world has seen before - great powers come and go, meridans and global financial centres have moved before and will move again.

Yes, there has been an uneasy peace of sorts for 75 years or so, do be aware of and prepared for transitions.

Not sure if its the number of parties that is the primary issue. Corporate lobbying, campaign finance, bribery, and cultural distractions (intended to posit groups against each other) are some areas that concern me more.

Because when you have a brain you understand that a more center oriented candidate with Luke warm opinions in policies has more chances of being acceptable to a larger audience than a candidate with more "substantive" policies.

Having Biden running at the start was the real issue.

A vassal of who's empire?

The EU has a huge strategic problem because they let their own defenses and industry rot for decades and can't functionally stand alone against Russia, US pressure, and Chinese economic infiltration / industrial replacement at the same time. At least, not without great sacrifices the population isn't willing to make, like pension reform.

So they are playing gentle with the US because it's the least bad choice right now.

> can't functionally stand alone against Russia, US pressure, and Chinese economic infiltration / industrial replacement at the same time.

No country in the world can do that. That's not a consequence of 'they let their own defenses and industry rot for decades'.

The EU is 450 million people! It's the size of the entire continent of south america! It was the richest part of the world for centuries! They absolutely should be able to function as an independent block with international trade for convenience and not survival.

Great, but standing against Russia, the US and China at the same time? Come on.

That may actually be an advantage: position Europe as a neutral block that trades with everybody, and it may actually be valuable enough as a neutral that anytime one of those three has designs on it, the other two would naturally have to combine to thwart them.

FWIW I don't think they need to stand against China.

Not even the US can stand against China by itself...

The EU still has a large military industrial base getting revitalised as we speak, it didn't rot, it simply didn't need to pump out massive amounts of gear until this point.

Poland, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Sweden, Finland, Czechia, etc. all have different kinds of weapons manufacturers. You can even include the UK, and Norway in the mix even though they aren't in the EU.

No, the EU obviously did need to pump out massive amounts of gear, and failed to, and that's why four years into a war, Ukraine is still suffering under the yoke of a country with 1/10th the GDP of the EU.

If the EU had taken their responsibilities seriously given the MASSIVE THREAT next door, Ukraine would have had massive ordinance dumped on it in March 2022 and been free of Russians by Christmas.

It failed for political reasons. Political leaders being afraid to get involved in the war. Also do not rule out right wing political parties that are often anti-Ukraine and pro-Russia due to being sponsord by Russia.

The USA also has had it share of preventing the EU from getting involved.

China has a population of 1.4B people yet they import huge quantities of fuel and food and we can't pretend that they lacked investments in core industries.

> The EU has a huge strategic problem because they let their own defenses and industry rot for decades

They also have a long history of being able to ramp it up quickly if necessary.

The fact is that there is no potential there. Europe has no leverage over the US. It is not holding back anything, it has nothing.

Somehow when the US went to war with Russia, it ended up completing the conquest of Europe. Europe used to just be stagnant. Now it is stagnant and isolated from everywhere except the US, and the US treats it accordingly.

Europe has, in no particular order:

- ASML

- Nukes

- Large proportion of US bonds

- One of the wealthiest and most profitable markets in the world

- The world's largest trade network - currently aggressively expanding into LatAm with the Mercosur deal despite Trump's Monroe 2.0 ambitions.

Just a few off the the top of my head. There's plenty leverage there.

> ASML

Who's the customer base of ASML? Are they predominantly based in Europe?

They are predominantly Taiwan, and South Korea.

ASML is also hostage as well.

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/techland/asml-gives-europe...

Although the articles also claims that "ASML has already started to reduce its dependence on American technology".

> ASML relies on the United States for several of its components, and it’s this very reliance that has allowed the United States to use the Foreign Direct Product Rule and impose export controls on ASML products. However, there are signs of a shift. ASML has already started to reduce its dependence on American technology, aligning with the EU’s goal of strategic autonomy. Earlier this month, ASML announced a major investment in Mistral, France’s flagship AI startup. The Dutch firm invested $1.5 billion in Mistral, becoming the company’s largest shareholder. The deal was widely seen by policymakers as a move that strengthens European ‘digital sovereignty.’ In a sector dominated by American tech giants, ASML’s Mistral investment represents a growing realization from Europe: cooperation within the bloc is necessary for the EU to stay competitive in the AI race.

---

I don't follow, how exactly does the investment into a French AI startup reduce ASML's "dependence on American technology"? Is it a supply-chain dependence, or a revenue-making dependence?

You can add the Swift payment system and the Euroclear and Clearstream clearing houses.

Also FATCA compliance.

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