But behind Washington’s repeated call for Europe to “do more” usually came a second one: “Not like that.”

This is right on the nose. The US wants the EU to pay its own way, but also continue doing exactly everything the US wants.

That whole “the French are cowardly” trope in the Anglosphere was born and stoked entirely not from France’s actual war record, but in response to France’s post-war reluctance to toe the US line; first by de Gaulle ejecting US nuclear bases from the country, and then again decades later when they refused to join the US’s Middle East misadventures.

Not just defence but so many aspects of the modern world primarily disproportionately benefit the US.

The rest of the world at-least-vaguely recognized this for a while, but inertia made this an impossible proposition. America had an incredibly good thing going for them, but thanks to greed and ignorance it still wasn’t enough.

Their loss is our gain, as the inertia is broken and we now have impetus to make the changes we’ve needed to do for quite some time. We will sever dependence on the US for defence and finance and trade, and be better off for it.

Probably, given their leverage. Either way, Trump doesn’t think long term. He just thinks about his terms.

But our good friend the Russian Dictator said we’d be so much happier without NATO!

Say what you will about accelerationists but they are actually getting what they asked for. The American soft power hegemony is crumbling and I don’t (want to) believe it can make hard power work.