National Review Online
Tuesday, February 17, 2026
Images of Marco Rubio, secretary of state, national
security adviser, and now-former national archivist, wearing a seemingly
endless variety of costumes have long since gone viral. Unfortunately, no one
had provided him with a tightrope walker’s outfit before he began his speech to the Munich Security Conference. Fortunately, he
made it to the other side nevertheless — to applause and sighs of relief. It
was an impressive performance. He had remained true to the orthodoxies of the
Trump administration but in a fashion sufficiently soothing to calm down at
least some of our European allies. That matters, above all, perhaps, because,
as Rubio put it, “the fate of Europe will never be irrelevant to our own.” He
did not specifically spell out — but he should not have had to — that if Europe
were to fall to or, more likely, be neutralized by a Beijing-backed Russia,
that would leave the U.S. in a much more vulnerable position.
As Rubio put it:
We do not want our allies to be
weak, because that makes us weaker. We want allies who can defend themselves so
that no adversary will ever be tempted to test our collective strength.
That test could come if the transition to a future where
Europe is more responsible for its own defense is botched, something that could
easily happen. The administration needs to accept that it will take time for
the Europeans to build up their defenses to the appropriate level, and both
sides need to avoid incessant acrimony. An abrupt divorce would be a clear win
for Xi and Putin, while a soured alliance would call into question the
essential understanding that an attack on one alliance member is an attack on
all.
On the American side, there should be no repeat of the
destructive Greenland misadventure or anything like it, and, of course, we
should avoid fighting trade wars with those we would like to keep as friends.
We should also remember that what we have looked for in our allies in the past
are shared interests and a mutually reinforcing ability to secure them. We have
never required that they be in ideological lockstep.
In his speech, Rubio sketched out his understanding of
our times, including the consequences of mass immigration, climate change
policy, and the “delusion” that history had come to an end. Europe’s ruling
class would do well to take such views more seriously than hitherto.
Rubio conceded that “we Americans may sometimes come off
as a little direct and urgent in our counsel,” adding that “is because we care
deeply. We care deeply about your future and ours.” Rubio acknowledged that
there are “disagreements,” but that appeared to be a reference to past and
present more than future. He should have also said that there will be
disagreements (indeed we should expect them; a stronger Europe will be a more
assertive Europe) but that we — and the Europeans — should learn to agree to disagree.
There is more that unites than divides us.
For their part, the Europeans must show that their
commitment to building up their defenses is serious and the date by which they
are capable, with the assistance of an American backstop, of defending
themselves is real rather than something as fluid as the completion date for a
Californian high-speed rail project. They should also commit to their defense
buildup taking place within NATO’s framework. Militarizing the EU, something
clearly on Brussels’s mind, is a recipe for confusion, obfuscation, and unnecessary
duplication and a pathway to a potential divorce in which both sides would be
left weaker. Speaking of which, they should remember that cozying up to China
as a sort of counterbalance to those wicked Americans will end in disaster.
And if we should ease up on trade wars, the EU should
stop abusing their laws to loot American high-tech companies.
Rubio went to Munich with an olive branch, albeit one
with a few thorns. Our European allies should accept it and, focusing more on
the speech’s tone than its details, concentrate on working jointly with the
U.S. on the necessary reshaping and overdue strengthening of a NATO capable of
facing the challenges of a dangerously changed world.
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