“Promoting European Greatness” – Trump style
The US national security strategy report has not gone down well in the EU
Montage © Facts4EU.Org 2025
Meanwhile, Starmer's UK has got off very lightly
Last week the US Administration published its National Security Strategy for the coming year. This caused headlines across Europe for its generally negative assessment of the continent’s economic prospects and its prospects due to immigration and its attitude to President Putin.
Here is how it starts:
“Promoting European Greatness”
(This is the heading for the 'Europe' section)
“American officials have become used to thinking about European problems in terms of insufficient military spending and economic stagnation.
There is truth to this, but Europe’s real problems are even deeper.
“Continental Europe has been losing share of global GDP - down from 25 percent in 1990 to 14 percent today - partly owing to national and transnational regulations that undermine creativity and industriousness.”
- US National Security Strategy, Dec 2025
Whilst ‘continental Europe’ is not the same as the EU, it is difficult to define, so we have looked simply at the figures for the EU, as a percentage of world GDP.
The EU's share of total world GDP
© Brexit Facts4EU.Org 2025 - click to enlarge
[Source(s) : IMF Dec 2025]
We were unable to find the precise figures used by the State Department. We tried the World Bank as its figures go back to the very start of the European Community, but its figures were hopelessly inaccurate. The most accurate were from the International Monetary Fund which are the ones we have used above.
What is striking about the falling share of the EEC/EU is that during this time period many countries joined. It might have been expected that the EEC/EU's share of World GDP would have risen at various points. This did not happen, however, and the decline continued.
The US document swiftly goes on to other topics.
“But this economic decline is eclipsed by the real and more stark prospect of civilizational erasure. The larger issues facing Europe include activities of the European Union and other transnational bodies that undermine political liberty and sovereignty, migration policies that are transforming the continent and creating strife, censorship of free speech and suppression of political opposition, cratering birthrates, and loss of national identities and self-confidence. Should present trends continue, the continent will be unrecognizable in 20 years or less.”
This has of course attracted opprobrium from the capitals of Europe, although given the tidal wave of criticism deluged on President Trump’s administration from this side of the Atlantic, the criticism seems hypocritical, to say the least.
“It is not on us, when it comes to elections, to decide who the leader of the country will be, but on the people of this country … That’s the sovereignty of the voters, and this must be protected.”
“Nobody else is supposed to interfere, without any question,” Ursula von der Leyen added, when asked specifically about the U.S. National Security Strategy.
- Ursula von der Leyen, Brussels, 11 Dec 2025
How have the UK and the US done in comparison with the EU?
The US ‘National Security Strategy’ document does not give economic figures such as those above for either the United Kingdom or the United States, in terms of their shares of global GDP. We have therefore done the job for them, in respect of both the UK and the US.
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The UK
The United Kingdom's share of total world GDP
© Brexit Facts4EU.Org 2025 - click to enlarge
[Source(s) : IMF Dec 2025]
As can be seen, the growing economic strength of so many countries around the world has meant that the UK’s share of world GDP has also fallen, although not by as much as the EU has experienced. It must be remembered that the UK’s annual GDP growth was higher for many years before the UK joined than it was during all the years of EU membership.
The United States
Below is the astonishing success story of the USA. In effect, it has held its own against the plethora of fast-growing countries in Asia and elsewhere.
The USA's share of total world GDP
© Brexit Facts4EU.Org 2025 - click to enlarge
[Source(s) : IMF Dec 2025]
Finally, the UK does get a mention in the document
“America is, understandably, sentimentally attached to the European continent - and, of course, to Britain and Ireland. The character of these countries is also strategically important because we count upon creative, capable, confident, democratic allies to establish conditions of stability and security. We want to work with aligned countries that want to restore their former greatness.”
Observations
Naturally this document did not go down well in Europe and in the UK we have even seen criticisms of it as though the Administration was somehow interfering in European politics. We should stress that this is a review written for internal consumption. Furthermore, there is nothing in there about Europe that the Administration has not said openly.
The President in particular has been highly critical of the direction in which Europe is going.
When it comes to the UK and Ireland, we think the authors have been remarkably generous, as both have hardly been supportive of US foreign policy. Developments in Ireland have been especially interesting, given it is supposed to be a neutral country. We will be writing about the Irish government as soon as we can.
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[ Sources: IMF ] Politicians and journalists can contact us for details, as ever.
Brexit Facts4EU.Org, Mon 15 Dec 2025
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