The USA is now the least reliable Nato member - and we need to get real on security - Stephen Gethins

In the end the US election wasn’t even close, Trump won handily, including for the first time the popular vote. Across Europe, not least in Kyiv, politicians sought to consider the implications for them and our continent.

None of this should have come as a surprise. It is almost a decade since Donald Trump burst onto the political scene, as an electoral force to be reckoned with, in US and global affairs. Of course, in Scotland we had been given early sight of this particular circus, with his appearance in front of a Holyrood Committee in 2012 to give evidence about the development of an offshore wind farm near one of his golf courses.

His style of politics, and views, have been a part of our political discourse ever since. It is difficult for anyone to argue, not least those of us involved in politics, that we are unaware of Donald Trump and his policies including his approach to foreign policy and security with an unashamed America first policy.

For years European leaders and security experts have flagged Trump’s lack of commitment to the trans-Atlantic alliance and that he is a little too fond of Vladimir Putin than makes most of us comfortable. During a period of insecurity and uncertainty, our common inability to face up to that challenge and the need for we Europeans to take greater responsibility for our own security is inexcusable. However, as the President of Lithuania said this week ‘the free ride is over for Europeans’.

The President-elect is less committed to European security than any of his predecessors. The USA is now the least reliable NATO member.

For the past four years that questionable accolade went to Hungary, but allies have worked around Viktor Orban’s Government and sought to ostracise and minimise the Hungarian Prime Minister’s influence. Yet it was he who was among the first to congratulate Donald Trump on his victory and is closest to him. Orban’s populist approach and proximity to the Kremlin gives us some insight into what a second Trump Presidency might look like. Crucially, however, whereas allies could work around Orban, like a slightly awkward distant relative at a wedding, it is going to be very difficult to do that with Trump given US military might.

This situation was perfectly foreseeable. President Macron of France and Prime Minister Tusk of Poland have regularly reminded us of what is at stake and that European security cannot be subject to the whims of voters in say Wisconsin or Arizona. To be fair Trump himself has a point when he asks why US voters should foot the bill for the security of perfectly wealthy European states.

The countries closest to Russia understand what is at stake best. Poland dramatically increased defence spending and the Baltic states have proportionately contributed more to the Ukrainian war effort than others. Little wonder the reality of Kremlin brutality is a living memory for these states. Citizens and their politicians in these countries either have direct experience of Soviet brutality or their parents did. This is not a far off threat but rather one at their borders that has been a lived experience for their citizens. When former foreign secretary Jeremy Hunt compared the EU and USSR it was met with horror across Europe but especially the Baltic states.

The rest of us must follow the lead of these Baltic and Nordic states and face up to some challenging questions about how we take our security more seriously. The United States can no longer be relied upon. We must ask ourselves whether we spend enough on defence, how resilient we might be to the threats posed by actors most obviously Russia but also China and Iran for instance and whether Europe is as integrated in countering these threats as we need to be. Threats that have become more acute since Trump was last in power.

Furthermore, is it really viable to sit outside the Single Market and Customs Union at a time when threats include those to food and energy security for instance? Furthermore, the EU is becoming a hard security actor as well as deepening work in areas such as cyber-security and the dangers of polarisation in society. Whilst that collaboration deepens between similar European democracies, is it feasible for the UK to sit outside? There is a reason why many pundits view Brexit and a Trump victory as having been twin Kremlin foreign policy successes.

The past decade since Trump’s first election and even further back, since Russia first invaded Ukraine in 2014, has been largely wasted both in the UK and the rest of Europe in making ourselves prepared. The fact that Europe, which has a significantly higher GDP than Russia, is incapable of supplying Ukrainians, at the front line of defending European democracy, with the weapons and supplies they need is deeply concerning. Russia’s deployment of North Korean troops to fight in Ukraine, that China must have been aware of, signifies the scale of the challenge.

Ukraine is the front line in the defence of democracy in Europe. For those who think the Kremlin will stop if they win in Ukraine have not learned the lessons of history as anyone in Helsinki, Warsaw or Vilnius will remind us. The EU has been the most successful peace project Europe has known, but it needs to keep on evolving, and like it or not the UK and Scotland have few other options than to join in. The US is changing and we can’t afford another wasted decade.

Stephen Gethins is the MP for Arbroath & Broughty Ferry and a Professor of International Relations at the University of St Andrews