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EU leaders echo de Gaulle, saying Europe must depend on no-one. But where should autonomy begin? Expert comment jon.wallace 28 January 2026 Leaders agree on the need to reduce dependencies in defence, technology, energy and trade. But what are the priorities? And can they overcome their fragmented politics? Speaking in May 1962, President Charles de Gaulle of France summarized his approach to European integration: ‘Europe must be organized so that it depends on no one’. History teaches that states rarely pursue strategic autonomy out of political preference. More often, they are driven to it. As an acute military strategist, de Gaulle believed that European independence was not so much an ideological ambition as a structural requirement of international politics dominated by greater power competition under the shadow of the nuclear threat. A Europe unable to decide for itself would not merely be constrained; it would be forced to align with others’ strategic interests, with no regard for its own.For much of the post-Cold War period, Gaullist foreign policy was often cast as French anti-Americanism. The stability of the transatlantic order, the expansion of global markets, and the assumption that interdependence was inherently benign masked the strategic implications of European reliance. Now, as power reasserts itself as the organizing principle of international affairs and interdependence has become increasingly weaponized, dependence has become as unaffordable to Europe as it is unsustainable. And de Gaulle’s perspective seems a sober reading of power politics: alliances are indispensable, but dependence on them is not.European strategic autonomy should therefore be understood not as an aspirational project, but as a response to structural geopolitical pressure. The question is no longer whether autonomy is desirable, but whether Europe – and the European Union (EU) in particular – can acquire sufficient capacity, coherence, and scale to preserve its freedom of action.Where autonomy is no longer optional: defenceNot all dependencies are strategically significant. The challenge lies in distinguishing tolerable interdependence from vulnerabilities.Security and defence remain the most consequential domain. Europe has increased defence spending since 2022. But it continues to rely on the US for critical military enablers, including intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, strategic lift, missile defence, space-based assets, and command-and-control. In the first year of the Russian war on Ukraine, approximately 78 per cent of defence procurement by EU member states was sourced from outside the EU, with around 63 per cent coming from US suppliers.Yet NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte recently dismissed both the idea of a European army and the relevance of a stronger European pillar within NATO. That reflects a persistent contradiction in the alliance: Europe is urged to spend more but discouraged from developing autonomous capacity. Europe’s leaders are increasingly pointing in another direction. At Davos, French President Emmanuel Macron reiterated that Europe must be able to decide for itself. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz argued that lasting security requires European capabilities commensurate with Europe’s exposure. And Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever framed strategic autonomy as a condition of freedom rather than an alternative to alliance. Without diversification and selective domestic capacity-building, Europe risks replacing one strategic dependency with another. Energy and critical raw materials form a second fault line. Europe’s rapid disengagement from Russian fossil fuels demonstrates that dependencies can be unwound under pressure – if at considerable economic cost. But new vulnerabilities are emerging in clean-energy supply chains. The International Energy Agency estimates that China controls around 70 per cent of global rare-earth processing and a majority of battery and solar manufacturing. Without diversification and selective domestic capacity-building, Europe risks replacing one strategic dependency with another.Digital and cloud infrastructure represents a quieter but deeper exposure. More than 70 per cent of Europe’s cloud market is controlled by US ‘hyperscalers’, all subject to US jurisdiction and the US CLOUD Act. This raises persistent questions about European data sovereignty and industrial confidentiality. Initiatives such as GAIA-X aim to establish trusted European cloud frameworks, but progress remains uneven. Europe does not need to replicate US hyperscalers. But it does need credible alternatives for sensitive public, defence, and industrial use cases.Financial sovereignty and sanctions exposure constitute a fourth often underestimated weakness. Europe’s reliance on the US dollar and US-controlled payment infrastructure constrains its foreign and economic policy autonomy. The extraterritorial application of US sanctions following Washington’s withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal in 2018 forced European firms and banks to exit Iran despite explicit EU opposition. Dollar clearing, correspondent banking relationships, and the threat of secondary sanctions have repeatedly overridden European political intent. Strengthening the international role of the euro, advancing the Capital Markets Union, and operationalizing the EU’s so-called ‘bazooka’, the Anti-Coercion Instrument, therefore address strategic exposure rather than technical inefficiency.Second-tier priorities and the discipline of strategic patienceBeyond immediate vulnerabilities lies a second tier of priorities that will shape Europe’s structural position over time.Export market diversification is central. The US and China together account for roughly one third of EU external trade in goods, amplifying the bloc’s exposure to trade disputes, sanctions spillovers, and political conditionality. Related work EU and India seek closer relations as Trump upends global order In this context, a new EU–India trade agreement is significant. The EU already accounts for around 11 per cent of India’s trade, while India remains a relatively small destination for EU exports – indicating considerable untapped potential. Structurally, this diversification dilutes Europe’s exposure to US–China bipolarity rather than attempting to offset it directly.Artificial intelligence is a second long-term priority. Europe lacks compute capacity, access to large-scale datasets, and capital-intensive deployment. Despite strengths in research and industrial applications, the EU remains dependent on non-European actors for foundational models and cloud-based compute. Strategic autonomy in AI will depend on creating sovereign compute infrastructure and industrial integration – rather than technological autarky.Health security is also vital. COVID-19 exposed Europe’s reliance on external suppliers for vaccines, active pharmaceutical ingredients, and essential medicines. A significant share of critical pharmaceutical inputs is sourced from a small number of third countries. Strategic autonomy in health requires redundancy and diversification rather than wholesale reshoring.From aspiration to structural adjustmentWhile the diagnosis for Europe is increasingly shared, delivering will be difficult.Political fragmentation within the EU is not an anomaly but a structural almost physiological condition. Countries have different threat perceptions and industrial interests, complicating efforts to create shared priorities. Underinvestment and fragmented capital markets limit scale. Regulation, while often necessary, is not always aligned with industrial capacity-building.Addressing these constraints requires discipline and political decisiveness rather than pontification. Defence spending should be treated as an innovation catalyst and growth driver. Competition policy should be interpreted through a strategic lens focusing on industrial capacity and less on consumer prices. And sustained public-private cooperation must be anchored in credible demand.Making what is possible happenEuropean strategic autonomy reflects an attempt to reconcile Europe’s material dependencies with its political ambitions – in an international system that increasingly rewards transactional coherence and penalises vulnerability.
Chatham House
Laut Trump wird so die Produktion in den USA attraktiver. Zugleich steigen aber auch die Zinsen für US-Staatsanleihen.
SRF Wirtschaft
University of Warwick has risen to 17th in the latest QS World University Rankings: Europe 2026. Read more about our success
University of Warwick
