During the Cold War, the huge and influential Communist Party of Western Europe remained in touch with Moscow, from sympathy to surrender. The United States keeps its distance, and in many cases, supports its opponents economically and politically.
Now, Europe faces a loose alliance of Russian-inclined parties, this time on the other side of the spectrum: the far right. The U.S. government took the opposite approach: a warm hug.
By doing so, the United States is forgiving Russia’s post-war subversion of Europe has helped create and ensure. Russian parties have hostile attitudes toward the European Union, oppose higher military spending, and accept Russian arguments about NATO expansion and the need to advocate right-wing Christian values.
If these parties and their populist cousins eventually rule Europe – they were in governments in Croatia, the Czech Republic, Finland, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, the Netherlands and Slovakia, and had influence in France and Germany – they might have been in NATO and geography On the contrary, it tends to be neutral, if not to conquer Europe itself. That is of course Russia's hope.
Such a lasting Europe will enable the United States to have a post-Cold War vision for the continent’s “total and freedom”, as all the problems of the EU and the Atlantic Alliance have been promoted a lot and have become a lasting source of geopolitical stability.
Of course, the Trump administration expresses its clear disdain for these achievements.
Earlier this month, Vice President JD Vance advised European leaders at the Munich security conference to stop the extreme parties in the middle. He believes that German politicians should evacuate the “firewall” of cooperation with populist parties, which obviously refers to the Für Deutschland (AFD) party, the far-right and anti-immigrant alternative. Afterwards, he met with the AFD leaders. Elon Musk acted like Prime Minister Trump, who congratulated the party's leaders on their second place in the elections held in Germany on Sunday.
Then, further denying transatlantic solidarity, Secretary of State Marco Rubio met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia to discuss the future of Ukraine, freezing Ukraine itself and Europe . It seems obvious that the United States intends to reconcile with Russia, which may mean an end to sanctions, causing Ukraine to abandon its occupied Ukrainian territory and even guarantees Ukraine's permanent exclusion of NATO.
Mr. Trump followed up with the meeting, as the saying goes, suggests to journalists that Ukraine refused to ced its territory to Russia and began the war. He called Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky a “dictator” and laid the stage for meeting President Vladimir Putin's ultimate war purpose: expelling Jewish leaders in Ukraine , as the prelude to install Russia in the “excuses” of “mocking” the country.
Moscow can hardly match its questionable argument that NATO expands to force it to regain its influence and invade Ukraine. If Ukraine is defeated or forced to surrender, this narrative is largely influenced by Europe's largest right, strengthening Russia's threat to members of NATO in the east.
Mr. Trump and his circle members also expressed sympathy for the right-wing populist parties in Austria, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Spain and influenced the right-wing populist parties. In the UK, Mr. Musk is trying to undermine the Labor Party in support of the British right-wing reform party. Mr. Trump and those around him expressed admiration for Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who has visited Mar-A-Lago’s several times and for The president's authoritarian policy provides a true blueprint.
The similarities between European tilted parties during the Cold War and those of the far-right in the 21st century are certainly not exact. The far-right parties also show sympathy for Russian interests.
The Western Communist Party has a more formal connection with the Soviet Union than the far-right European party today is related to Putin's Mr. Russia. Before World War II, they belonged to the Communist International directed by Moscow, and Stalin eventually disbanded his new American and British allies during the war. The post-war successor group ComInform included French and Italian communists, as well as Eastern European parties who were directly responsible for Moscow before it was abolished in 1956. By the 1970s, some Western communists (especially in Italy and Spain) were separated from the degree of independence of the Soviet Union under the banner of “European Communityism”.
The consistent factor, however, is Moscow’s affinity for the fifth column to improve its interests – in the early days of the Cold War, today was the international right-wing group. The right today includes quasi-fascists and Christian white supremacists whose views strengthen and attract Christian nationalist conservatism in the United States. Mr. Putin's nationalist dictatorship was protected by the Russian Orthodox Church; Mr. Orban's “liberal democracy”.
Moscow is very busy in Europe. The Kremlin's political and material support for far-right groups has deepened social and political divisions in Europe, allowing it to continuously discredit Western democracy. Russian interventions include secret influence, which German officials believe has penetrated into German political institutions and AFD. Last year, German journalists revealed emails and text messages between Russian intelligence officers and AFD members of the Federal Army to push the party to block Germany's attempt to transport tanks to Ukraine. Officials and consultants denied participation.
Czech authorities believe that Prague-based news website Voice of Europe has gathered funds to politicians in at least six European countries, part of what the authorities call Russian influence action. Russia has been denied participating in a disinformation campaign against the West.
Regardless of Russia’s tactics, European extremist parties today share the Trump administration’s hostility to beatings and immigration, as the reason the Western Communists advocated in the 20th century was that the Cold War democratic government discovered good social justice in the Cold War: Africa Civil Rights of People, Civil Rights of Africans Americans and Anti-colonial Agenda. However, unlike Mr. Vance, the democratic government never suggested that the European government should accommodate them.
At that time, the U.S. government assessed that the Soviet threat was too dangerous to indulge in political experiments. Today, the stakes are at least as high: if Russia’s good winds completely penetrate European politics, its far-right agents could undermine the political structures that European countries have struggled to build to prevent the region from restoring authoritarianism.
Amid a moderate condemnation of Mr. Trump, Mr. Vance and Mr. Musk, the AFD fare is less than expected in Sunday's election in Germany. However, with the rise to the far right, today's European governments were more susceptible to their influence than communism in the 1960s, when the political center of Europe became stable.
The Trump administration doesn't seem to care. Mr. Vance made it clear that moderate European leaders cannot rely on American moderation, and Trump administration officials are unlikely to welcome intelligence to clarify the depth and breadth of Russia's threat to Europe, and ignoring and betrayal have become part of U.S. policy.
Dana H. Jonathan Stevenson is a senior fellow at IISS and a director editor of Survival.
Times are committed to publishing Variety of letters To the editor. We want to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. These are some Tip. Here is our email: letters@nytimes.com.
Follow the New York Times' opinion section Facebook,,,,, Instagram,,,,, Tiktok,,,,, Bruceky,,,,, WhatsApp and Thread.
