The USA Is DESTROYING Europe from Within | Prof. Glenn Diesen

The most urgent lesson emerging from the Istanbul exchange is less about a single battlefield and more about a systemic unraveling: Europe’s political class appears to be locked into a pattern of behavior that amplifies confrontation, erodes autonomy, and risks turning strategic anxiety into self-fulfilling catastrophe. The conversation with Prof. Glenn Diesen framed this not as mere miscalculation but as a structural consequence of a shrinking unipolar order and deliberate American instruments of influence. The result is a Europe that, by choice and pressure, is transforming itself into a frontline polity—militarized in rhetoric, centralized in governance, and increasingly divorced from the pragmatic diplomacy that could limit escalation. ## Europe’s leaders and American influence A central theme was how much of contemporary European foreign policy is shaped by transatlantic levers. The speakers traced a long arc from post–Iraq War dynamics to the present: the United States, having mastered the levers of soft power—think tanks, media networks, NGO channels, and elite training programs—has cultivated a cohort of European leaders predisposed to align with Washington’s security priorities. But the relationship is not purely colonial. European elites have absorbed those priorities and internalized a political logic that rewards unity against external threats while penalizing dissent. The result is a paradox: Europe pursues autonomy rhetorically, yet in practice consolidates decision-making in ways that mirror U.S. strategic aims. This does not imply Europe is a puppet with no agency. Rather, the conversation suggested a deeper pathology: European governments face domestic political incentives—identity politics, crisis narratives, and the demand for visible leadership—that make wartime posturing electorally attractive. The interplay between American influence and European political survival creates a governance loop where escalation becomes a tool for internal cohesion. Leaders find themselves both shaped by and reliant upon the transatlantic consensus, and the space for independent strategic thinking narrows. ## Drone incidents and the rhetoric of war The proliferation of alleged "hybrid" incidents—drones, sabotage, and ambiguous attacks on NATO or EU soil—was singled out as more than an intelligence puzzle. It is a rhetorical instrument. When an entire polity repeats a single narrative in lockstep, it becomes difficult to parse accidental damage from deliberate provocation, or legitimate response from strategic theater. The Leipzig drone episode and subsequent patterned messaging were interpreted as signs that Europe’s public discourse is being prepped for harsher measures. What makes this dangerous is not just the possibility of misattribution but the political logic that weaponizes uncertainty. Anxious publics and nervous leaders are more likely to accept emergency measures and military escalations when presented with curated evidence of an external menace. The conversation warned that normalizing a climate of imminent war—military fatigues on politicians, casual talk of striking enemy capitals—lowers the threshold for conflict and normalizes policies that, in calmer times, would be seen as reckless. Put simply: when politics becomes theater for war, policy follows. ## Russia, nuclear risks and uncontrolled escalation Perhaps the most sobering strand of the discussion concerned escalation dynamics. Russia’s security calculus, the interlocutors noted, is not rooted in expansionist mythologies but in a cold assessment of strategic encirclement. NATO enlargement, in Russian narratives, is existential, and the West’s failure to engage with that perception has produced profound risks. Moscow’s deterrent posture—especially its capacity to threaten rapid, decisive responses—complicates any European plan that imagines limited, controllable escalation. The danger of misreading deterrence was stressed repeatedly. Once strikes occur on Russian territory, the conversation argued, the ladder of escalation is unlikely to be contained by diplomatic niceties. Europe lacks a viable strategy for either victory or calibrated deterrence against a nuclear-armed peer; yet public leaders talk as if limited strikes and symbolic blows can be managed indefinitely. The conclusion drawn was stark: a strategic class that openly discusses war without articulating how it would be controlled is courting disaster. Nuclear risks are no longer theoretical background noise; they occupy center stage of any honest assessment of European strategy. ## Trump, Anchorage and outsourcing the war American domestic politics and its global repercussions featured as a recurrent subtext. The conversation referenced moments like the Anchorage talks as symbolic of a shifting U.S. posture: America’s willingness to centralize confrontation at times, and at other moments to decouple from responsibilities in Europe, has produced strategic whiplash. One notable risk identified was outsourcing conflict management: the United States can alternately energize European military commitment and then expect European actors to assume the grunt work of risking escalation. This creates a dangerous asymmetry. Washington benefits politically from a unified Western posture while ceding the immediate costs—economic pain, refugee flows, battlefield casualties—to European governments. The long-term strategic effect is to incentivize European leaders to take steps that increase regional danger while receiving limited direct influence over strategic decision-making. The conversation framed these dynamics as a form of leveraging: the United States can preserve primacy by shaping European choices without being fully accountable for the outcomes those choices generate. ## Why the unipolar order resists change One of the most analytically rich points raised was why a unipolar order fights its own obsolescence so fiercely. Hegemony creates both material and ideational interests that resist the diffusion of power. Economic tools, military alliances, normative frameworks, and institutional architecture all became instruments to slow or prevent a multipolar redistribution of influence. From trade sanctions to alliance enlargement, the West’s toolkit is designed to preserve privilege. Resistance to change is therefore structural: unipolar actors lose leverage and face internal elite fragmentation when new centers of power—China, Russia, regional coalitions—assert themselves. The conversation suggested that those losses are not merely geopolitical but also epistemic: a unipolar elite has built narratives, professional careers, and institutional legitimacy on a certain global ordering. Admitting its decline involves political costs that many leaders find unacceptable. Hence the temptation to double down on confrontation—an attempt to restore the status quo ante rather than adapt to a more complex world. ## Spheres of influence and Europe’s dependence The debate over “spheres of influence” was reframed away from Cold War caricature and toward a pragmatic recognition of strategic geography. Power projection requires nearby access, logistics, and political footholds; actors naturally care about their immediate neighborhood. The conversation underscored a simple but often-ignored truth: European security cannot be fully guaranteed by remote guarantors if the underlying political alignments on the continent remain brittle. Europe’s dependence manifests economically as well as militarily. Energy ties, trade routes, and investment relationships create mutual vulnerabilities that simplistic narratives of moral clarity obscure. The speakers argued that Europe’s survival strategy should be diversification of connections—engaging Moscow and Beijing economically and diplomatically—rather than attempting to secure protective shells from distant patrons. Failure to do so is not merely strategic folly; it is to allow the continent’s ex

The USA Is DESTROYING Europe from Within | Prof. Glenn Diesen The war-mania in Europe is heating up. People are starting to see drones everywhere, and all of them must be the product of Russian "hybrid warfare". What does this irrational psychosis mean for the future of the continent? Today I'm talking (in person) to my friend and colleague, Glenn Diesen. We examine Europe’s confrontation with Russia and the dangers of uncontrolled escalation. Diesen argues that European leaders are struggling to accept a changing balance of power, while questioning Washington’s willingness to end the Ukraine war. They discuss nuclear deterrence, NATO, Iran, economic dependence and America’s emerging spheres of influence. The conversation also explores whether transatlantic elites serve national interests, and how liberalism, democracy and multipolarity are reshaping the international order today. Glenn's Links: Glenn Diesen on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@GDiesen1 Glenn Diesen on Substack: https://glenndiesen. substack.com East-West Forum: https://east-west-forum.com/ Harici: https://harici.com.tr/en/ Neutrality Studies Links: Neutrality Studies Substack: https://pascallottaz.substack.com Support Neutrality Studies: https://neutralitystudies.com/donate Neutrality Studies shop: https://neutralitystudies.com/shop Time Stamps 00:00 An in-person conversation in Istanbul 02:53 Europe’s leaders and American influence 07:59 Drone incidents and the rhetoric of war 12:52 Russia, nuclear risks and uncontrolled escalation 26:10 Trump, Anchorage and outsourcing the war 31:48 Why the unipolar order resists change 36:59 Spheres of influence and Europe’s dependence 39:58 Transatlantic elites, liberalism and democracy #Pascal Well, welcome everybody to a special episode of Neutrality Studies. Today live—or not live, but in person from Istanbul, in fact. And I do hope that you are not getting bothered too much by the background noise. But with me is my friend and colleague, Glenn Diesen. Glenn, how are you? Good. It's good to see you in person. #Glenn Diesen Good seeing you too in person. #Pascal Last time we did that was in Tbilisi, Georgia. And now we're in Istanbul in order to take part in the East-West Forum. That's going to take place tomorrow, also co-organized by Harici, wonderful -- 1 of 14 -- people. That will also be linked below. But Glenn, this forum wants to talk about the future of the multipolar world, and we're seeing all of these huge changes right now that are taking place. How hopeful are you that we can get to a peaceful multipolar world without a large European war first? #Glenn Diesen It can go both ways, I would say, at this point in time, because, well, as we see, the United States, but also the Europeans, are pushing back in a very big way. I always make the point: if you're in the United States and you want to resist the multipolar world—that is, the emergence of new centers of power—and preserve your global primacy, what would you do? Well, you would probably try to break the Chinese economy through economic—well, economic war. If that doesn't work, perhaps use a proxy in military conflict. You would want to try to break Russia. You could use proxies there as well, like Ukraine. And you would try to take down Iran, which would then weaken both the Chinese and the Russians. And you're going to see all of this is happening. And so I don't think there's going to be a smooth transition. It doesn't look like it. But again, an all-out war, I don't think we can do that usually. This is the problem in history. If you have a massive shift in the distribution of power, a change in world order, you see it usually being followed by a war because you need to readjust or recalibrate the entire world order. Usually you get those agreements after big wars. So you get a new agreement after the Napoleonic Wars, after World War I, after World War II. This is when the great powers are willing to sit down and agree to a new status quo. The problem now is that all the major powers are now armed with nuclear weapons. So we can't really do this anymore if we want to survive. So it's a unique situation, point in history, and you would think that leaders were more responsible now, but again, they, yeah, we are unfortunately not blessed with responsible leaders. #Pascal What is your view on the leaders in Europe? There's one school that says they're just puppets, basically, of the Americans. And then there's the others who say, no, no, no, they do have their very own agendas and so on. And you can see how the Europeans, especially the EU Brussels Centre, used the last four years to centralize power under itself, and just how the nation states in Europe are being hollowed out. Where do you fall? How much do you think are the European leaders independent of the Americans? And how tight is this network of domination from across the Atlantic? #Glenn Diesen Well, I do think that the Europeans have been influenced by the Americans, but they don't want to restrict their leaders of this autonomy of their own. Whenever I speak to Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, who you also know, he always makes the point that after the Iraq War, when he was there in the White House, they figured out that they needed more obedience from the Europeans. So since then, they really put in a lot of work through their journalists, NGOs, think tanks, and -- 2 of 14 -- different programs to bring forth the right warmongering European leaders. So they had a great deal to do with it. And also, even in 2022, when the Russians went in, it was the United States that had to talk the Europeans into this. That's something Viktor Orbán made a point of. Once he had a press conference with Trump and made this point that Biden had to pull in the European leaders. But now something has happened. They have taken it over completely, in full ownership of this warmongering. Even now that the U.S. is pulling back, Europeans are quite eager to continue. So what has happened to them? I think some of it's just human nature. When humans go into war, some basic impulses kick in. I mean, this is the contradiction. In international relations, what you want to do to resolve a conflict, you want to put yourself in the shoes of the opponent and see where compromise can be made. The problem is that there's an instinct also in human nature, which is when you face an external threat, you seek internal solidarity. You divide stricter into the in-group and the out-group, and in order to make everyone march in line, they shouldn't show any empathy at all to the out-group. And you kind of see this in Europe now. We criminalize the whole idea of seeing the conflict from the side of the opponents. So they all kind of unified under this narrative that this was an unprovoked war. And again, then there's only one conclusion: it was unprovoked. It's simply Russian expansionism. Then the logical thing would be to deter, to send weapons, elevate the cost so it's more than the benefit. But this is why it's problematic, this whole Hitler narrative that they're fighting World War II all over again, because what I argue, and many others would, is that this is not another Hitler. This is not an opportunistic war, a war of expansion. We learned over the past 30 years, and this is confirmed by leadership across the West, that Russia sees NATO expansion as a real threat. So they see this as an existential threat. And given that this is the problem, not the rise of a new Hitler, that means you have to do the exact opposite. You have to recognize that they have some security concerns. And the more weapons we push in, the more we escalate, the more they will have to respond in kind. #Pascal Now we could talk about all of the reasons why this isn't sinking in. I mean, just last week, I had again Ambassador Jack Matlock on my channel. He's now 96 or 97, and he was there. He was in the Soviet Union, right? And he said in the '90s, together with George Kennan and others, you know, this NATO expansion will lead to war with Russia. This is the most unwise thing we can do. But this is now already kind of a moot or past discussion, because this is what happened. NATO was enlarged, was expanded. The Russians actually did, in the end, go to war in Ukraine because they said, like, we cannot take this. Whether you argue that this is just Russian lies or not, the fact is the Russians say that this is what it is. -- 3 of 14 -- So their official—at least on an official level—there's no question of why they are doing this. From the Russian narrative, it's clear. But the thing I wonder now is why it is that the Europeans seem dead set at creating even more threat from, or making the Russians into an even bigger threat. This whole drone narrative that's being built up right now, and you tweeted about that quite a bit, it's like, it's insane to believe that Russia could, under any circumstance, think that just doing little pinprick attacks with drones on European—on EU, NATO soil—would do anything else but increase the resolve of the Europeans, right? Why are the Europeans so dead set at using these drone incidents and Leipzig, the Leipzig drone incident, right? This is such a dumb narrative, but it seems to be these people are dead set on putting that out in order to somehow justify something that might be coming next. How are you interpreting that? Hey, just a very quick note. The best way to support this channel is by signing up for my free Substack. You can also help with a paid subscription there, or you can get some of our new merch on neutralitystudies.com. Links below. See you there. #Glenn Diesen Well, I think there's reason to be concerned why all the European leaders are suddenly repeating the same talking points as well. Not just talking points, but they're all showing up in their military fatigues. And you hear from Britain—you probably saw Jacob Rees-Mogg arguing that it's the duty of all British to go essentially die in a war, you know, to fight for Britain now. And this argument that war is coming, we shouldn't be fearful, we should be prepared, as a given that war is coming, preparing the public mentally for the war so it doesn't come as a surprise that they're all doing this now at the same time. And of course this drone incident in Leipzig, that's quite ridiculous. But this is the kind of talk you would expect before a war. So, no, it is of great concern that they're all suddenly now saying the exact same thing. I spoke just yesterday to the former CIA director for Russian analysis, George Beebe, and he was also expressing some great concerns about this. Why are they all now saying— you know, seemingly they all got their talking points delivered, and they're now all repeating the same things. And this is... yeah, so this is dangerous. And I don't know if they're preparing for war, or if they want to show the Russians that they are willing to go to war because they anticipate some negotiations, because something is cracking now in Ukraine. Yeah. So that means the Europeans have two options. Either you start to talk to the Russians, which they refuse to do, or you go to war. But they don't have the capabilities. They don't have a strategy. And I don't even know what victory against the world's largest nuclear power would even look like. So, yeah, they're in a bit of a bind. And I don't even think they have a clear strategy. I mean, I talk to people in the EU Parliament who say, well, people are just talking, and we have to confront them. -- 4 of 14 -- They speak in slogans. I mean, but they don't actually have anything concrete. There's no strategy. There's no real arguments. It's just this emotional rhetoric. And I think what makes this even worse is, if it was just a war in Ukraine, it would be one thing. But I think this is a symptom of something even larger, which is the shift in world order. That is, again, NATO expansion was about creating a collective hegemony in Europe, cre