The choice often invoked in recent days between the EU and the US is as manipulative as it is false.
This choice can only be the ultimate consequence of the main, essential choice, regardless of circumstances. What Romania must choose now and always are the principles, led by the supremacy of truth. Everything stems from here.
Therefore, the solution for Ukraine, a hot topic on the transatlantic agenda, should start from some simple, undeniable truths. The first one is that we have an aggressor state, which sent soldiers and tanks into the territory of another state, the aggressed, where it also committed all sorts of atrocities.
Donald Trump says that the aggressor state, Russia, was provoked by the former American administration through favoring Ukraine's accession to NATO. And even if it were so, according to legal principles, provocation is at most an attenuating circumstance, not a cause for impunity.
On the other hand, in a free world, who has the right to impose on another state, recognized as such by all international treaties, including Russia, to give up some of its objectives? If in the '90s someone had told us that we had no right to join NATO, that we could find ourselves under the wheels of Russian tanks if we desired it?
In a world that proclaims democracy and sovereignty as essential values, there can be no excuse for Russia's aggression and no solution that eludes the truth.
Of course, everyone wants peace. For all imaginable reasons, whether humanitarian or economic. But an unjust peace can be worse than war itself.
Because a peace that means validating the aggressor, the direction Donald Trump is heading, implies, implicitly, validating the next aggression, inevitable, especially if we talk about Vladimir Putin and Russia's imperial nostalgias.
The correct peace can only be in terms accepted by sovereign Ukraine and Europe, the continent where the war is taking place, at the table. And, extremely important, a peace that does not represent a victory for Vladimir Putin, one that encourages him to attack again as soon as he has the opportunity.
A peace on terms dictated by Putin, at a table whose composition is dictated by Putin, is the premise of a certain future war. An old saying goes: give Ivan an inch, he'll take a mile.
Romania can only remain faithful to the above principles. After all, no membership or partnership can be more important than membership and partnership with principles. And it is not just a moral issue, for those who will falsely claim that we are too small to uphold moral standards, but also a pragmatic issue.
Just because we are small, the best defense is to respect principles and values, because only that can ensure solidarity with us in times of crisis. If we were attacked, if we were in Putin's sights, which is not absolutely impossible, what would we prefer?
EU solidarity remaining firm regardless of costs and pressures or a partnership on paper with a Donald Trump who conditions our support on everything he can extract from Romanian lands and negotiates over our heads with the aggressor? If we were in Ukraine's situation, and we can never be sure that we will never be, would we prefer the EU's attitude or Donald Trump's?
The US vote at the UN on the issue of Ukraine, where it stood alongside Russia and North Korea, is not only dishonorable but also a warning signal for all those who could ever depend on Trump's decisions.
It is not about whether we like Ukrainians or not, whether we like Donald Trump or not, but about the criteria of choices, the criteria we would want to be applied to us.
Therefore, the choice is not between the EU and the US, but about principles, truth, and values, the ones we assume to be applied to us.
Winner of the elections under historic voter turnout conditions, the future German chancellor, Friedrich Merz, a conservative, not a progressive, admirer of Ronald Reagan, took a principled stance towards the US, sending Trump's bluff back. As we see the UK, traditionally a US ally in Europe, joining forces with the EU from which it exited.
There is a fear that in Romania, an anti-American sentiment could arise. But it is not about Americans here. It is about the decisions made by a temporary political leader with his immediate interests.
Because for the political and economic interest of a weak Europe, as future Chancellor Merz pointed out, the Trump team encourages extremist forces. Not conservative, because in Germany, they did not support the conservative Merz, but the extremist Weidel. This is also what is happening in Romania, about which I doubt that Elon Musk, for example, knows where it is on the map and what its capital is called.
- Why Does Elon Musk Help Călin Georgescu. A Perfect Storm Approaches Romania - Interview
- What Does Elon Musk Want from Romania?
Moreover, the former administration, equally representative of the US at that time, acknowledged Russia's involvement in the elections in Romania.
Not bowing to Trump, as our cardboard sovereigntists do, remaining faithful to principles questioned by a Washington president, does not mean being anti-American. On the contrary, it means remaining faithful to principles historically promoted by the US, but in danger of being derailed by a temporary leader.