Overview
- French junior army minister Alice Rufo called the National Security Strategy an “extremely brutal clarification” and urged Europe to accelerate rearmament after language about EU “civilisation erasure” and “cultivating resistance.”
- The publicly released strategy rejects a perpetually expanding NATO and presses Europeans to shoulder far more of their own defense, unsettling Ukraine’s hopes and reshaping transatlantic expectations.
- A longer, unpublished version reviewed by reporters outlines plans to back nationalist parties and cultural figures in Europe and to work more closely with Austria, Hungary, Italy, and Poland to pull them away from the EU.
- The draft also floats a proposed Core 5 forum of the U.S., China, Russia, India, and Japan, with regular summits and an opening agenda focused on Middle East security and Israel–Saudi normalization.
- Kremlin figures, including spokesperson Dmitry Peskov, praised the shift as consistent with Russia’s vision, while President Trump publicly derided European leaders as “weak” and said he would keep backing favored candidates in European elections.