Europe has committed to cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 90 per cent by 2040, but the political compromises needed to secure that target are creating new uncertainties.

Europe depends on two global powers it increasingly struggles to trust, but the threats they pose are fundamentally different. An ISDP policy brief by Niklas Swanström warns that Brussels risks wasting resources by treating economic dependence on the United States and China as the same problem.

Europe is facing an unprecedented surge in economic pressure from its biggest trading partners, but its main weapon against coercion remains unused. An ISPI DataLab investigation finds that attempts to force the EU into political concessions through trade restrictions, tariffs and supply-chain controls have increased eightfold since 2018.

Europe is facing growing security threats, but its institutions remain too divided and cumbersome to respond quickly. Russia’s war against Ukraine, intensifying hybrid attacks and uncertainty over American commitments have pushed European governments into temporary coalitions that bypass Brussels’ slow decision-making.

The EU was built to manage markets, not defend a continent. Now Russia’s war against Ukraine, American unpredictability and growing pressure from China are forcing Brussels into security decisions its institutions were never designed to handle.

Germany’s political establishment is losing voters while Washington risks misreading the war in Ukraine. Holger Friedrich, writing in The National Interest, argues that both crises spring from the same dangerous failure – political elites increasingly trust their own assumptions rather than confront evidence that contradicts them.

Germany is trying to rebuild its intelligence capabilities just as a scandal involving a former spy chief threatens to derail the effort. The arrest of August Hanning, former president of the Federal Intelligence Service (BND), has exposed serious questions about the protection of classified information and the agency's internal safeguards.