A New Approach to Europe? U.S. Interests, Nationalist Movements, and the European Union: Relationship Impact of Trump Election, Populist Movements, Brexit, Euro-skeptics, Putin and Russia Threat

This unique report has been professionally converted for accurate flowing-text e-book format reproduction. Kyle Parker introduced this hearing with these remarks: "Here at the Helsinki Commission we have the luxury of looking a little further ahead, going a little deeper on some of the questions that occupy the minds of the legislative branch as well as general national security questions that are confronting the United States. And one of the things, of course, in the past year or two is—there's a tension in transatlantic relations. Something has clearly changed. I think it's fair enough to say that the relationship is in flux, maybe even strained. Look at many things that characterize this moment—the populist movements, the strong euro-skeptic threat in Europe, Brexit, fairly robust pro-NATO sentiment, real concern in the east about Moscow's intentions, concerns on Europe's southern flank with immigration, and a number of policy questions that surround that. At the same time, I think it's fair to say that a lot remains the same, in that the United States' national security goal post-war, of a Europe that's whole, free, and at peace, remains. And so there's a question of how will we use the institutions that we participate in—namely NATO and the OSCE—to advance those goals in this context? And where does that place us vis-a-vis the EU, which, of course, we are not members of. So in our discussion today we have a solid panel who will bring divergent viewpoints to this and hopefully raise some provocative questions. I'd just like to lay out three questions we should shed some light on. And the first one is the question of patriotism, national identity. How much does the lack of what we here in the United States would consider not simply a benign but a positive, even essential, flag-waving patriotism—how much does the lack of that in Europe contribute to the unwillingness of populaces in many of the countries to spend what is necessary to defend their own state, and meet its obvious defense needs, and also to meet their collective security obligations?"

This compilation includes a reproduction of the 2019 Worldwide Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community.

1. Kyle Parker, Chief of Staff, Commission for Security and Cooperation in Europe * 2. Alex Tiersky, Senior Policy Advisor, Commission for Security and Cooperation in Europe * 3. Dr. Ted R. Bromund, Senior Research Fellow in Anglo-American Relations, Margaret Thatcher Center for Freedom, The Heritage Foundation * 4. Dr. Paul Coyer, Research Professor, The Institute of World Politics * 5. Jeffrey Rathke, President, American Institute for Contemporary German Studies, Johns Hopkins University