Europe and America: Shared Values, Different Instincts

And Who Is Ready to Defend Them Today?

In international politics, we love to repeat certain phrases automatically: “shared values,” “transatlantic unity,” “the democratic world.”

For decades we sustained the illusion that Europe and America think alike—and would act alike—when those values come under threat.

But recent years, and especially the new U.S. strategic doctrine, have made something crystal clear:

European and American values do not fully overlap. Perhaps they never did.

America is a republic built on the idea of freedom as action.

Europe is a civilization built on dignity as a limit on state power.

And this shapes their reactions to war.

Europe instinctively rejects war. The United States accepts it as part of reality.

The European project was designed to remove war from its continent—forever.

To make escalation unthinkable.

To replace conflict with diplomacy, law, institutions.

That is why any action that might “anger” an aggressor feels dangerous in Europe.

For years, we heard:

“Don’t provoke Russia, or there will be war.”

But Europe refuses to accept the obvious:

The war is already here.

Since 2014.

Every gesture of appeasement, every attempt “not to irritate,” every illusion of compromise has not stopped Russia—it has encouraged it.

European inaction is itself a provocation, because it signals weakness.

And aggressors strike at weakness.

2014 — “Let’s not provoke.”

2022 — “No one believed Russia would go this far.”

2024–2025 — the same debates about “risk of escalation.”

Belgium has now politically “announced” Ukraine’s defeat—not legally, but politically—and in doing so contributes to making that defeat possible.

So where is the famous:

“We stand with Ukraine as long as it takes”?

It seems the European mindset still does not believe in the victory of its own values.

It is shameful—and alarming.

Ukraine is defending values Europe no longer dares to name as its own

Paradoxically, Ukraine today carries the very “conservative values” Europe is embarrassed to articulate:

• freedom as the foundation of national existence;
• dignity as the boundary against state arbitrariness;
• the right to defend one’s land, language, and home;
• responsibility for one’s community and future.

Ukraine speaks the language of conservative forces in the West—yet many of them refuse to acknowledge it.

Ukraine also speaks the language of liberal forces—yet many of them fear that freedom must be defended, not just proclaimed.

Ukraine is the last country in Europe behaving as if values have a price—and a line that cannot be crossed.

International law: we either rebuild it, or it becomes a decorative relic of the past.

When Europeans say that frozen Russian assets cannot be given to Ukraine because “international law does not allow it,” this is a selective reading of international law.

Because international law has one principle that appears in every convention, every precedent, every doctrine:

The aggressor pays.

So I ask a simple question to anyone who wants to “protect” international law from the transfer of frozen Russian assets to Ukraine:

Let them name a single article of international law that allows Russia to:

• abduct Ukrainian children;
• torture civilians;
• bomb cities;
• invade a sovereign state.

Let them show the provision that makes Russia “right” and Ukraine “wrong.”

Let us be honest:

International law is compromised because no one is defending it.

Law works only when someone is willing to uphold it.

We must build a new framework of international law—one that reflects the realities of the 21st century.

And we must be the ones to defend it.

Europe now faces a choice that will define its future.

America has already made its choice: it defends its strategic interests and the values it considers fundamental. Its strategy openly states its limits and priorities.

Europe, meanwhile, stands in a moment of historic crisis.

The question is not about Ukraine.

The question is whether Europe is ready to defend its own model of civilization, built on the dignity of the human being.

Dignity is the foundation that prevents the state from doing “whatever it wants.”

It is what stops tyranny.

But if Europe does not defend this foundation externally, on its eastern border, it will not be able to defend it internally.

Dignity must be defended, or it disappears.

This is not only a principle of law—it is a law of history.

Ukraine is not asking for help “for itself.”

Ukraine is holding the line for Europe.

And the question that now echoes from Washington to Brussels is this:

Is Europe ready to defend the values it claims as its own?

Is Europe ready to act, not merely proclaim?

America has made its choice.

Ukraine makes it every day.

Now it is Europe’s turn.

Inaction is no longer an option. Stand with Ukraine.

Join both demonstrations in support of Ukraine:

📅 12 December at 10:00

📅 18 December at 09:00

📍 Schuman Roundabout, near the European Council

In 2022, European leaders and citizens were inspired by Ukrainian courage.

Let us remind them that this courage has not disappeared—

and let us help awaken it within themselves.