European leaders brace for their ‘5-minutes-to-midnight’ nightmare summit – POLITICO
www.politico.eu

While French President Emmanuel Macron has talked of the need for “an incredible awakening” and German Chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz described Europe as being “five minutes to midnight,” the worry from those close to the discussion is that events are happening more quickly than they can cope with.

“The nightmare scenario is that the U.S. announces a deal soon that accepts most of Russia’s demands and then tells Ukraine and Europe to take it or leave it,” said Malcolm Chalmers, deputy director general at the Royal United Services Institute in London.

And they’re not only scared of the United States. They’re also wary of some of their own. While Thursday’s hastily arranged summit, just days after less formal gatherings in Paris and London, signals an intention to come up with solutions, diplomats are already bracing for a pro-Russia group of leaders led by Hungary’s Victor Orbán derailing the whole thing.

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    • IcePee@lemmy.beru.coEnglish
      319·
      1 day ago

      What can they do? They’re wiped out, democratically at least until the mid terms. Considering the speed of events, the mid term is too late.

      • Tinidril@midwest.socialEnglish
        412·
        1 day ago

        The Republicans never seem so pathetic when they are out of power. Besides, they have been (intentionally) pathetic for decades, not six weeks. Do you remember Trump disappearing when he lost to Biden?

        At least the midterms is right. This midterm should be an easy sweep for the Democrats, but they are already blowing it. Democratic strategists are already openly declaring their intention to double down yet again on strategies that always fail. No matter how many elections you bungle as a Democratic strategist, they will always take you back.

          • Tinidril@midwest.socialEnglish
            2·
            12 hours ago

            I’m quite familiar with Biden’s accomplishments. How much of that won’t be undone by Trump? It’s no good to make what are really minimalist gains if you are going to throw the next election to a fascist. Biden certainly was an improvement over what we had with Obama and Clinton. So what?

            The sad fact is that the Democratic party oligarchs just figured out the populist mood the country is in and gave Biden permission to loosen the reigns a bit. So he partially turned back just a few of the things we lost over the last 50 years. Income inequality continued getting worse though. That cannot continue if this country is going to survive, and neoliberals are incapable of doing anything that doesn’t make it worse somehow.

            • parrhesia@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
              1·
              12 minutes ago

              Well I guess my thought process is that this country keeps voting in Republicans in Congress, for judge seats, for presidents, so legally how much can they accomplish when they are in control for just 2 years? Personally I think they should target smaller communities and do more grass roots stuff but that doesn’t help when such important laws like human rights or environmental protections are being immediately stripped.

        • in4apenny@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
          91·
          1 day ago

          It’s almost as though Democrats are beholden to the same corporate sponsors/donors as the Republicans or something.

          • Tinidril@midwest.socialEnglish
            71·
            1 day ago

            They are definitely the controlled opposition. In some cases it’s the same sponsors and in other cases it’s not. It’s a slightly more benevolent but also more elitist bunch of oligarchs funding the Democrats. There is more overlap in corporate interests though.