The 2018 G7 Summit took place on June 8-9 in La Malbaie, Quebec, Canada and the small town attracted global attention, since the so-called “West”, which mainly consists of the United States and the European Union wrestles with trade protectionism, terrorism, climate change and the potential economic consequences after US President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal.

“America First” is the banner and core of Trump’s foreign policy philosophy. According to his logic, Trump would like to promote US interests at the expense of other countries’ interests.

The US has not put European policy as its priority ever since former US president Barack Obama put forward the strategy of “Asia-Pacific Rebalance”. Trump’s neglect of European demands and feelings constitutes a second strike to transatlantic relations.

In such context, both trade and the Iran nuclear issues have become the thorny problems between the US and EU. On trade issues, Trump tends to play the card of uncertainty and resolve problems via unilateralism rather than multilateral platforms because he firmly believes that if those competitors or opponents have no idea of his next move, the US will get an upper hand on negotiations. In addition, bilateral negotiations will benefit the US more because of its supremacy and if the US joins a multilateral mechanism like the Trans-Pacific Partnership, other countries can unite together to pressure the US to make concessions.

On Iran nuclear issue, the EU is almost humiliated by its old ally. Trump thinks that the Obama administration made a very bad deal with Iran and bought Iran more time and space to maneuver and cheat. Therefore, Trump is eager to correct the mistake of his predecessor that Iran had benefited much more from the deal than other parties. Europe has played significant role on Middle East issues by adopting multilateralism, and a binding nuclear deal is conducive to Middle East stability and the security of the European periphery, which is not taken into consideration by Trump.

Moreover, the European enterprises doing business with Iran will bear the brunt of secondary sanctions if the US reimposes its sanctions on the country. During the 1990s, Europeans successfully pressured then US president, Bill Clinton, to give waivers to European companies under US sanctions on Cuba. However, Trump is not Clinton, and the prospect for a waiver on European companies this time is dim, as the new US Ambassador to Germany, Richard Grenell, has already warned German companies to halt activities in Iran after Trump’s declaration to pull US out of the Iran nuclear deal.

Europeans hope that the US can continue to shoulder its international responsibilities like ensuring European security or leading the international trade system and respecting Europe as an important ally as well as a global power. The EU also has taken some actions to prove that it is a helpful partner for the US to achieve its strategic goals. For example, EU member countries condemned and imposed sanctions on Russia over the Skripal event in the United Kingdom, and the UK and France joined the limited air strikes led by the US against Syria. The EU also shared concerns with the US on steel overcapacity and intellectual property issues targeting China.

The EU has made great efforts to solidify the Western world and try to court the US and change US views on Europe. However, Trump’s learning curve on the EU is too steep and it is not easy for him to change the idea that Europeans had benefited so much from the unbalanced transatlantic trade relations, especially when Germany and other European partners failed to pay enough for NATO which Trump deemed should be their own responsibilities.

It is gradually obvious that the US has become a reluctant partner on almost every issue related to the EU’s interest and this forces the EU to face a strategic choice: whether to yield to the US or challenge the “big brother”. The choice is hard to make, especially when the US is still committed to security ties between the two sides and Europeans will hardly realize its strategic autonomy before getting rid of its heavy security reliance on US-led NATO.

But the most worrisome trend for Europe is that the US might no longer support the current liberal international order based on principles of multilateralism, free trade and openness, which is also the bedrock of the transatlantic relations. After over one year’s high level visits and multiple meetings, the European countries have not found effective ways to bring Trump back to the traditional track.

For the first time after the Cold War, the US-EU relationship is standing at a tipping point. A post-American Europe has to decide its response and next move, whether to compromise or fight back. It is no longer true that the US will involve itself in every part of European politics or kindly take every facet of European interest into consideration like the good old days. A strategic split is the new normal of the transatlantic relations no matter whether the US president is Trump or not after 2020.

For the EU’s own interest, to safeguard its sovereignty and maintain a stable international environment, instead of appeasing Trump or kowtowing to US pressure and actions of disrespecting, disrupting and dismantling the world order, the EU should work together with other countries like China to support the multilateral international system and hopefully to shape and change US actions by further engagement in the future.

Sun Chenghao is an assistant research professor at Institute of American Studies, China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations. He contributed this article exclusively to China Watch. 

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