FTI Consulting UK-EU Public Affairs Snapshot: Munich Security Conference 2025: Transatlantic turmoil 

Dubbed the “Davos for defence”, the Munich Security Conference (MSC) has become a key fixture on the diplomatic agenda for Western leaders. In an annual display of synchronised unity, heads of government take it in turns to recommit to the post-war transatlantic security alliance and demonstrate that this remains as resolute as ever. 

Since 2022, the agenda of the conference has necessarily been dominated by the conflict in Ukraine and the growing threat to international norms from Russian aggression. Far from fracturing the Western alliance, the unconditional commitment to the defence of Ukraine has in recent years instead served to reinforce it – until now. 

The 61st edition of the conference that unfolded in Bavaria last weekend was one of the most tumultuous in its history. MSC25 saw European leaders scrambling to respond to an explosive shift in narrative from the US, as the newly-elected Trump administration ripped up the 80-year old multilateralist playbook at an astonishing pace. 

Only time will tell the extent to which this signals a decoupling of the United States from the security architecture of Europe. However, nations across the continent are now on warning for a generational strategic realignment. This is already exposing profound insecurities about Europe’s future role and its relevance in a new era of global competition between great powers.  

In the days leading up to the annual three-day gathering, allies – already confronting the prospect of new US tariffs – faced significant America-First shaped broadsides. Leading figures from the new Trump administration, Vice President JD Vance, and Secretary for Defense, Pete Hegseth, landed in Europe and delivered what they viewed as a series of hard truths on US expectations at the AI Action Summit, the Ukraine Defence Contact Group and a meeting of NATO ministers.  

They called for dramatically higher defence spending from European governments and set questions running on Washington’s future commitment to securing the continent, due to the need to counter China as a peer competitor. Their message: the United States remains in NATO, but it “will no longer tolerate an imbalanced relationship that encourages dependency”. In addition, Ukraine’s security must be guaranteed by European and non-European troops – but not American – guarding a post-war frontier, rather than Ukrainian membership of NATO.     

But that was a mere prelude. Without consultation, President Trump also fired the starting gun on negotiations for a Ukraine post-conflict settlement during a telephone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin, breaking a taboo extending back to the beginning of the invasion three years ago. This, along with a rapid decision for US and Russian delegates to meet for first talks in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday 18 without Ukrainian or broader European involvement, injected urgent energy into discussions at MSC25.     

Events took on a breathtaking pace, as European leaders and NATO’s Secretary General, Mark Rutte, sought to corner US officials and demonstrate progress already made in raising defence spending over the past few years. They also sought to reassure Ukraine about their determination to see Kyiv involved in negotiations. 

Further robust commentary came from Vice President Vance, who warned of a European-wide retreat of “fundamental values”. Vance waded into European immigration debates and called on German political parties to dismantle an internal “firewall” against the AfD, which saw a frenetic MSC25 intersect awkwardly with Germany’s federal election campaign. 

It is worth noting too, given the overwhelming focus on transatlantic relations, other items on the MSC’s agenda, in particular Israel-Gaza, decidedly took a back seat.  

Following the MSC, and despite being left out of the United States-Russia talks in Riyadh, European allies rallied to meet at an emergency summit in Paris to calibrate a response. At the time of writing, a second summit has also been arranged to take discussions further and will potentially include more NATO partners, including Norway and Canada. 

However, despite announcements from Britain and a number of EU member states, significant differences remain on key topics, namely troop deployments and how to deliver meaningful security guarantees to Ukraine without US involvement.  

The dramatic interventions from the Trump administration have been astonishing in their frequency and potential implications, painfully exposing European leaders who, to date, have failed to agree any common exit plan to the Ukraine conflict. Indeed, the administration is potentially advancing a generational reset in geopolitics that sits in counter to the underpinning assumptions of Western multilateralism, and it appears unwilling to be constrained by the reservations of traditional allies as it does so. 

European defence spending has been on the rise consistently, if not uniformly, in recent years, a trend evident even before the war in Ukraine, and it has grown at an accelerated pace since. European nations now need to respond quickly, effectively and collectively to demonstrate that they can recapitalise their combined military capabilities to defend Europe’s territorial integrity and international interests even without the unconditional support of the United States. 

That necessarily requires tough decisions by governments across Europe on where spending priorities lie. In a world of finite budgets, knowing that electorates do not always prioritise defence at the ballot box makes this no simple task. 

Regardless of where this situation goes, all of these divergences in the fabric of the transatlantic alliance have taken place just over a month into the new Trump administration. This leaves one certainty among all the discord: after years of warnings, Europe’s leaders are facing mounting pressure to move at pace to reinforce their contribution to their collective defence, with significant implications potentially ahead for strategic autonomy and defence industries across the continent.