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Column: What Trump Gets Right About Europe

 
From left: German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, President Donald Trump, French President Emmanuel Macron, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, at the G-7 summit meeting in La Malbaie, Quebec, Canada, June 8, 2018. Trump has found himself isolated on the global stage for taking actions viewed by Americaâ\u0088\u009A¢â\u0080\u009A\u0082 \u0308â\u0080\u009A\u0084¢s closest allies as destructive and even illegal. (Doug Mills/The New York Times)  XNYT29
From left: German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, President Donald Trump, French President Emmanuel Macron, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, at the G-7 summit meeting in La Malbaie, Quebec, Canada, June 8, 2018. Trump has found himself isolated on the global stage for taking actions viewed by Americaâ\u0088\u009A¢â\u0080\u009A\u0082 \u0308â\u0080\u009A\u0084¢s closest allies as destructive and even illegal. (Doug Mills/The New York Times) XNYT29
Published June 21, 2018

Most people can agree that international affairs should not be conducted by tweet — especially when the tweeter in question is Donald Trump. Among other reasons, it's easy to dismiss the president's mercurial rage and flagrant insults as little more than temper tantrums.

But that's a mistake. Trump's anger at America's allies embodies, however unpleasantly, a not unreasonable point of view, and one that the rest of the world ignores at its peril: The global world order is unbalanced and inequitable. And unless something is done to correct it soon, it will collapse, with or without the president's tweets.

While the West happily built the liberal order over the past 70 years, with Europe at its center, the Americans had the continent's back. In turn, as it unravels, America feels this loss of balance the hardest — it has always spent the most money and manpower to keep the system working.

The Europeans have basically been free riders on the voyage, spending almost nothing on defense, and instead building vast social welfare systems at home and robust, well-protected export industries abroad. Rather than lash back at Trump, they would do better to ask how we got to this place, and how to get out.

Trump is not the first president to complain about the unfair burden sharing within NATO. He's merely the first president not just to talk tough, but to get tough.

Indeed, while his actions are shocking, the Europeans cannot say they are surprised. The warnings from the Obama administration that America's indulgence might eventually cease had been plenty. Yet Europeans didn't care much. All those German politicians who oppose raising military spending from a meager 1.3 percent of gross domestic product should try to explain to American students why their European peers enjoy free universities and health care, while they leave it up to others to cover for the West's military infrastructure.

Trump's tariffs against Europe are patently illegal, and Europe should retaliate. But simply punishing the makers of motorcycles, blue jeans and bourbon whiskey doesn't solve any of the problems festering beneath the skin of the liberal world order. Europe needs to understand what is driving Mr. Trump's anger and cooperate with Washington to fix the imbalances in the system.

That's easy to say in theory, but can Europe work with Mr. Trump in practice? Maybe not. But there's no real choice. And there's a good chance for success if Europe engages Trump by his New York tycoon soul — he needs to be convinced that he's getting a good deal. And right now, it's easy to see why he thinks otherwise.

Jochen Bittner is a political editor for the weekly newspaper Die Zeit.

© 2018 New York Times