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MUNICH: The Munich Security Conference brought the fault lines between Europe and the US over Ukraine, the international order and the transatlantic relationship to the view of world leaders and political and security experts from the opening session of the conference on Friday. I was in the room to listen to the anticipated speech by US Vice President J.D. Vance and I saw the disbelief on people’s faces when he started speaking. The room was packed, with dozens of people standing on staircases and balconies to hear Vance in person for lack of seating availability. He did not disappoint in shocking them. When he was received with applause, he joked: “I hope this is not the only applause I get.” He predicted correctly, and received polite applause only a couple of times.
What shocked people most was not his lecturing them on democracy, especially free speech, and attacking them on immigration, but the fact that the American vice president’s speech in the foremost international security conference did not mention Ukraine even once, and did not talk about any security and foreign policy issue. He just put the Europeans on notice: There is a new sheriff in town. The Europeans were there for the message, and actually got it during their meetings with Vance before the opening of the conference. Their concern was evident in their speeches to the crowded halls of the conference venue.
All the speeches were indirect or direct comments on the state of America and how Europe and the world should confront the phenomena called Donald Trump. From the opening statement of the conference’s chairman, Ambassador Christoph Heusgen, which highlighted “the rule of law and not the law of the strongest,” to the strong messages in the speech of German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, it was obvious that Europe is readying itself to push back.
What rattled Europe most was the American president’s quick moves toward Russian President Vladimir Putin and their fears that they will be cut out of negotiations over ending the Ukraine war. You hear it everywhere: Europe and Ukraine should be at the table, and nothing about the war should be decided without Ukraine’s involvement.
Some criticized the new US administration’s negotiating style, with German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius taking issue with giving everything at the start of talks. “If I were (negotiating), I would know that I don’t take any essential point of negotiations off the table before the negotiations begin,” he said.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen warned that “authoritarians are watching whether you have impunity if you invade your neighbor,” in a reference to Europe’s fear that the US administration’s peace overtures to Putin may embolden others to invade their neighbors and get away with it.
Steinmeier highlighted how important it is not only to end the war, but to settle the conflict in a way that benefits Ukraine, Europe and the US. “That outcome — an end to this war — is what we all hope for. How this war concludes will have a lasting impact on our security order and on the influence of both Europe and the US in the world,” he said, adding: “I firmly believe that simply ‘making a deal and leaving’ would weaken us all: Ukraine and Europe but also the US. For this reason, every scenario — be it before or after the end of fighting — requires our combined power of deterrence and strength. That is why, in every scenario, support for Ukraine must continue — namely from Europe and the US.”
This sentiment was also echoed by Von der Leyen, who said that Ukraine “needs peace through strength.”
But despite their warnings and aversion to the new US administration’s approach, they highlighted the importance of stepping up defense spending, a key ask by Trump.
Steinmeier said: “Expenditure on security must continue to rise. Our Bundeswehr must become stronger. Not to wage war — but to prevent war.” He seemed to respond to Trump’s request when he said: “The 2 percent (defense spending) target, which we formally agreed in Wales in 2014, belongs to another era that was confronted with different threats. A decade on, we will need to spend considerably more than what was agreed back then.”
Von der Leyen also called for stepping up military spending, and warned that Europe had outsourced its defense.
The calls for Europe to stand up for itself were everywhere, as were the calls for unity but with the acknowledgment that Europe does not have the deterrent capability needed to confront the Putins of the world. But they seemed willing to resist. The words of the German president created the outlines of the push back by calling on Europe not to be intimidated by what is coming out of Washington.
He said: “We are subjects, not objects, in the international order. We must not allow ourselves to be paralyzed by the flood of announcements. We must not freeze in fear, or as the English saying goes: We cannot be like a deer in the headlights! It is clear that the new American administration holds a worldview that is very different from our own — one that shows no regard for established rules, for partnerships or for the trust that has been built over time.”
This was only the first day of the conference but it set the tone for what is awaiting the transatlantic relationship in the era of an even stronger and more “populist” US administration. This fear is real for Europe, and especially Germany, which faces crucial elections next week and where Vance met the far-right AfD leader and criticized efforts by German officials to avoid working with the party. It is a new era of what Europeans consider American election interference and America calls defense of democracy, which rests “on the sacred principle that the voice of the people matters.”
It is the dawn of a new uncharted transatlantic fist fight.

CONGO: Chaotic scenes unfolded in the eastern Congo city of Bukavu on Saturday after Rwanda-backed M23 rebels reached its outskirts, while a threat by Uganda’s army chief to attack a Congolese town raised fears of the conflict flaring into a wider regional war.
The rebels have been pushing south toward Bukavu, the second-largest city in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, since they seized Goma, the largest city, at the end of last month.
On Saturday, the World Food Programme’s depot in Bukavu, which housed 6,800 metric tons of food, was being looted, a spokesperson told Reuters.
The stolen supplies would deepen the difficulties faced by those in need, Claude Kalinga said, with the agency’s activities already suspended for weeks due to the deteriorating security situation.
Sporadic gunfire was heard overnight and into Saturday morning, according to multiple Bukavu residents, who said the shots were fired by looters.
Corneille Nangaa, leader of a rebel alliance that includes the M23, said on Friday evening that the rebels had entered Bukavu and would continue their operation in the city on Saturday.
Two residents of the northern Bukavu suburb of Bagira said they had seen rebels on the streets and no sign of fighting.
An M23 source, two Congolese army officers and multiple Bukavu residents, however, said on Saturday that the rebels had not yet entered the city center.
One of the army officers said soldiers were being evacuated in order to avoid “carnage” like in Goma. About 3,000 people were killed in the days preceding the capture of that city, according to the United Nations.
Congolese soldiers could be seen on the streets of Bukavu on Saturday, according to eyewitnesses. The soldiers set fire to a weapons depot at their army base there, according to five residents and a military source.
The capture of Bukavu, a city of about 2 million according to the mayor, would represent an unprecedented expansion of territory under the M23’s control since the latest insurgency started in 2022, and deal a further blow to Kinshasa’s authority in Congo’s eastern borderlands, which are rich in minerals.
On Saturday, the chief of Uganda’s defense forces, General Muhoozi Kainerugaba, said in a post on X that he would attack the town of Bunia in neighboring eastern Congo unless “all forces” there surrendered their arms within 24 hours.
The threat by Kainerugaba, whose father is President Yoweri Museveni, adds to fears that Africa’s Great Lakes region risks slipping back into a broader war reminiscent of conflicts in the 1990s and 2000s that killed millions.
Uganda’s military has since 2021 supported the Congolese army in its fight against Islamist militants in the east, and deployed another 1,000 soldiers there in late January and early February.
But UN experts say Uganda has also backed the ethnic Tutsi-led M23.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged dialogue between the warring parties in a speech at an African Union (AU) summit in Addis Ababa on Saturday.
Leaders from Eastern and Southern African regional blocs last weekend also urged all parties to hold direct talks, but Congolese President Felix Tshisekedi has repeatedly refused to talk directly to the M23 and canceled his appearance at the AU summit, sending his prime minister to represent Congo.
Tshisekedi returned to Kinshasa on Saturday morning, according to the presidency, after attending the Munich Security Conference in Germany on Friday.
Kigali has denied backing M23, and President Paul Kagame said on Facebook on Saturday that he had told the AU peace and Security Council that “Rwanda has nothing to do with Congo’s problems.”
The United States has warned of possible sanctions against Rwandan and Congolese officials. The European Union said on Saturday it is considering using all the means at its disposal to protect Congo.