“Trump and Vance Have Contempt for the Europeans”

Interview Conducted by Bernhard Zand in Chicago

DER SPIEGEL: Mr. Mearsheimer, will the beginning of Donald Trump’s second presidency go down in history as the turning point when the bond between America and Europe was broken?

Mearsheimer: I think the answer is yes. The Trump administration is bent on fundamentally changing America’s relations with its European allies and greatly reducing the U.S. role in NATO, if not pulling the U.S. out of NATO.

DER SPIEGEL: What does the behavior of Trump and Vice President JD Vance during Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s visit to the White House tell us about the future of the trans-Atlantic alliance?

Mearsheimer: Trump and Vance’s confrontation provides stark evidence that the trans-Atlantic alliance is in deep trouble. It shows that both Ukraine and Europe have a fundamentally different view than the Trump administration on how to end the Ukraine war and more generally how to deal with Russia. Trump wants to have good relations with Russia; Europe does not. It is hard to see how those two views can be reconciled.

DER SPIEGEL: Do you believe that Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty – the article of NATO’s founding agreement that holds that an attack on any alliance member is an attack on NATO as a whole – is currently valid? Would Trump deploy the U.S. military if Russia were to occupy part of Estonia, Latvia or Finland?

Mearsheimer: Article 5 never said that the United States would axiomatically use military force to come to the rescue of a fellow NATO country. But almost everyone believes that to be the case. It was essential to say just that during the Cold War. West Germany was the frontline state, and it had no nuclear weapons. The Germans were deeply concerned that the U.S. would not use its nuclear weapons to defend them if they were in dire straits. So, the U.S. emphasized Article 5 in a way that made it sound like we would automatically use nuclear weapons in such a case. In fact, both former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara said after they were out of office that they would not have used nuclear weapons to defend Germany. They did not say that while they were in office.

DER SPIEGEL: And you believe that the United States would not defend Estonia or Finland today?

Mearsheimer: That’s too strong. I think it’s likely that now, the United States would come to the defense of a Baltic state if it were attacked. But that commitment is eroding quickly. Five years from now, I’m not even sure there will be a meaningful Article 5 guarantee left.

DER SPIEGEL: Is the current U.S. administration merely “largely indifferent” to Europe, as German Chancellor-designate Friedrich Merz put it? Or is it now openly hostile towards Europe?

Mearsheimer: President Trump and Vice President Vance have contempt for the Europeans. When Trump was elected in 2016 and took office in 2017, he had two principal foreign policy goals. One was to abandon engagement and adopt a containment policy toward China – in other words make a 180-degree turn. The second goal was to fundamentally change relations with Russia and particularly with President Vladimir Putin. He was successful in changing our policy toward China. But he was unsuccessful regarding our policy toward Russia. He basically continued the policy on Ukraine and Russia that his predecessors had pursued. He’s going to do now – in his second term – what he was unable to do in the first.

“It was the presence of the United States, which provided security in the form of NATO that allowed the EU to flourish.”

DER SPIEGEL: On your website, you introduce yourself with an ironic self-portrait as an adherent of the philosopher and diplomat Niccolò Machiavelli – as an arch-realist who believes “that the great powers dominate the international system, and they constantly engage in security competition with each other.” Do you consider Europe to be a great power?

Mearsheimer: Europe is a constellation of states, even though we often talk about Europe as if it were a single country. Some European leaders once dreamed that they would eventually end up with a United States of Europe. That never happened and now it looks like the American pacifier is leaving Europe. As that happens, those powerful centrifugal forces that exist in Europe will begin to manifest themselves. It was the presence of the United States, which provided security in the form of NATO that allowed the EU to flourish. When the European Union won the Nobel Peace Prize, I considered this a fundamental mistake. NATO should have won the peace prize.

DER SPIEGEL: Under the protective umbrella of the United States, the EU has become one of the three major economic powers in the world. Is it at all conceivable that Europe could become a great power in your sense?

Mearsheimer: No. The EU member states have both conflicting interests and common interests. When the Europeans are operating in a world where the Americans are in charge, they basically do what the Americans want, and then it looks like Europe is a nation state of its own. But this is a mirage.

DER SPIEGEL: Friedrich Merz said that his “top priority” will be to “strengthen Europe so that we can gradually achieve independence from the United States.” Would Donald Trump mind if Germany weakened its ties to America?

Mearsheimer: He’d be enthusiastic. Trump wants European states like Germany to be responsible for their own security. His basic view is: I’m going to work out a deal with Putin to shut down the war in Ukraine. If the Europeans and Ukrainians don’t like that, we’ll leave. Then you Europeans can work out an arrangement with the Russians yourselves. Good luck with that. It’s quite clear that the Trump administration wants a divorce. And I think the new German chancellor understands that.

DER SPIEGEL: Is it ultimately in vain, therefore, when European politicians such as French President Emmanuel Macron, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and soon Friedrich Merz make pilgrimages to Washington?

Mearsheimer: This breakup is going to take time. The Europeans want to gauge, face to face, exactly what Trump thinks about relations with the EU, about his relationship with Russia and about how to settle the war in Ukraine. From their point of view, this makes perfect sense. But I bet they know that there’s no way to change Trump’s mind and to repair this relationship.

DER SPIEGEL: Trump declared NATO “obsolete” as early as 2016. But in the end, he didn’t withdraw any significant number of troops from Europe. Could the same thing happen again?

Mearsheimer: I thought this was a possibility – until February 12. On that day, President Trump announced that he had had a phone conversation with President Putin, and then Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth gave a remarkably revealing speech in Brussels …

DER SPIEGEL: … in which he said that the United States would no longer be the primary guarantor of security in Europe.

Mearsheimer: Yes, and two days later, JD Vance gave his famous speech at the Munich Security Conference. After that, it was clear that Trump was pursuing a radical policy toward Europe. This was all carefully crafted, and it was designed to humiliate the Europeans and put them in their place. I’m sure that Vance was a key player here. He has long been committed to ending the war in Ukraine and to greatly reducing the U.S. footprint in Europe.

DER SPIEGEL: In the early 1990s, you warned that if Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons, it would become a victim of Russian aggression. And you raised the question of whether Germany could one day become a nuclear power. Should Germany aspire to nuclear status?

Mearsheimer: What I said at the time was that if the Soviets pulled out of Eastern Europe and the United States pulled out of Western Europe, then Germany was likely to develop nuclear weapons. We ultimately stayed in Europe after 1989 because our fear was that if we pulled out, the Germans might go down that road. We’re now hypothesizing a situation where the United States is likely to leave Europe…

DER SPIEGEL: … which could lead to the very scenario you wrote about over 30 years ago. So should the Germans acquire their own nuclear weapons?

Mearsheimer: That would be largely a function of how they assess the Russian threat. Given that the Germans have convinced themselves – erroneously, I would add – that the Russian army is poised to overrun Europe, there’s a high likelihood that they’ll get nuclear weapons. If you are interested in facts and logic and look in a cold and calculating way at Russia’s capabilities, however, you see that there’s no serious threat to Germany from Russia. Therefore, a good case can be made that there’ll be no need for Germany to acquire nuclear weapons in the near or medium term.

“When you think about Putin, you want to ask two questions. One, what are his intentions? And two, what are his capabilities?”

DER SPIEGEL: Would it make sense to create a European nuclear umbrella together with the British and the French?

Mearsheimer: If you’re Germany and you feel that you need nuclear deterrence – can you depend on the French and the British?

DER SPIEGEL: You mean if people like the right-wing populists Marine Le Pen or Nigel Farage come to power in France or in the United Kingdom one day?

Mearsheimer: If I were the German chancellor facing a serious threat, I would get my own nuclear weapons. Not because I’m interested in being aggressive or using those nuclear weapons for coercive purposes. It’s because nuclear weapons are the ultimate deterrent.

DER SPIEGEL: Other U.S. allies such as South Korea and Japan are also considering acquiring nuclear weapons. In South Korea, 70 percent of the population are in favor of it, according to surveys.

Mearsheimer: South Korea and Japan both face two serious threats – from North Korea and China. If I were in Tokyo or Seoul, I’d be deeply concerned about whether the American nuclear umbrella provides sufficient security. Germany’s present situation cannot be compared to this.

DER SPIEGEL: Yet unlike China and North Korea, Russia has already invaded other countries, not only Ukraine, but also Georgia in 2008. Aren’t you underestimating the danger that Putin poses?

Mearsheimer: When you think about Putin, you want to ask two questions. One, what are his intentions? And two, what are his capabilities? As for his intentions, we have no evidence that he is an imperialist who wants to conquer all of Ukraine and create a Greater Russia, let alone additional territories in Eastern Europe.

DER SPIEGEL: Didn’t his troops attack Kyiv, Bucha and Irpin in 2022? Isn’t he still bombing targets throughout Ukraine, even in Lviv, fewer than 60 kilometers from the Polish border? Isn’t that a threat?

Mearsheimer: There’s no question about that. But the cause of these wars was NATO expansion – not Putin’s supposed imperialism. Besides, Putin is in no position to conquer the whole of Ukraine, nor other countries in Eastern Europe, and certainly not in Western Europe. His army has spent the past three years struggling to conquer the eastern fifth of Ukraine.

“I care greatly about Ukraine. I don’t want to see it destroyed.”

DER SPIEGEL: If a majority of people in Ukraine want their country to join the EU or NATO, what gives you the right to deny them that wish?

Mearsheimer: I understand the Ukrainian people’s desire. But Russia is a great power, and it has made clear that it would rather destroy Ukraine before it will let that happen. I care greatly about Ukraine. I don’t want to see it destroyed. That is precisely why my argument in the early 1990s was that Ukraine should keep its nuclear weapons and why I have argued for years that it should under no circumstances try to join NATO. If the Ukrainians had followed my advice, Ukraine would be intact today.

DER SPIEGEL: You have long warned against liberal “delusions” about the state of the world. Donald Trump is not interested in NATO, the UN or other international institutions many liberals cherish. Is he not the kind of politician you like?

Mearsheimer: No. Realists like institutions. The U.S. created many important institutions during the Cold War, including NATO, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. If you’re the United States and you must wage the Cold War or you want to run the world, you can’t do it without institutions. You need rules. I think Trump is making a mistake by trashing institutions, as well as treating allies with contempt.

“With NATO’s expansion and the resulting war in Ukraine, we have foolishly driven Russia into the arms of the Chinese.”

DER SPIEGEL: He is treating the leaders of the two nations that were most recently seen as America’s rivals relatively well at the moment – Putin and China’s leader Xi Jinping. Are these three men in the process of dividing the world into three spheres of influence?

Mearsheimer: That perspective applies to U.S.-Russian relations. Trump has no problem with Russia controlling a large slice of territory in Ukraine. But it’s a different story in East Asia. China is a peer competitor that wants to dominate East Asia. We are also in an intense competition with the Chinese in terms of developing artificial intelligence, supercomputers and quantum microchips. In recent years, the United States hasn’t been able to pay much attention to China and East Asia because we were pinned down in Ukraine and the Middle East, supporting Israel in its various wars. If we get out of Europe and the Ukraine conflict is settled, there is reason to believe that the intensity of the military competition between China and the United States will increase.

DER SPIEGEL: Do you see Trump’s turn towards Putin as an attempt to drive a wedge between Russia and China?

Mearsheimer: Trump wants to pull U.S. military forces out of Europe so he can pivot to Asia. And he wants the Russians on America’s side of the ledger and not on China’s. With NATO’s expansion and the resulting war in Ukraine, we have foolishly driven Russia into the arms of the Chinese. Trump is trying to at least get the Russians into a neutral position – or ideally get Russia lined up with us against China.

“Today it is quite clear that realism is alive and well.”

DER SPIEGEL: How should Europe behave in this constellation?

Mearsheimer: European countries should – and probably will – do what’s in their own interest. The Americans have made it clear that there were certain things that Europe should not do vis-a-vis China. Most importantly: not trade sophisticated technologies with the Chinese. If the Americans pull out of Europe, we will lose leverage with Europe on this very important issue.

DER SPIEGEL: How would the Trump administration react if the Europeans moved closer to China?

Mearsheimer: The smart thing for Trump to do would be to tell the Europeans that the U.S. will keep military forces in Europe as long as the Europeans don’t trade with China in ways which are detrimental to the United States, which mainly means helping China develop cutting-edge technologies. We had a similar problem during the Cold War, by the way. The Germans were keen to do business with the Soviets, which made the U.S. unhappy. Back then, though, we had a lot of influence; after all, we were ensuring Germany’s security.

DER SPIEGEL: Your theory of “offensive realism” is notorious for taking a particularly sober, almost cynical view of the world. Do you feel vindicated by current events?

Mearsheimer: I don’t want to sound like I’m full of myself. That wouldn’t be appropriate. But during the so-called Unipolar Moment, which ran from roughly 1991 when the Soviet Union collapsed until Trump’s first inauguration in 2017, many people argued that I was a dinosaur. My realist ideas, it was said at the time, were outdated, they were relevant in the 18th century, but they no longer applied. Today it is quite clear that realism is alive and well.

DER SPIEGEL: Mr. Mearsheimer, thank you for this interview.