“We will need extreme leadership” in Europe in the face of Donald Trump, warns Thierry Breton

The former European Commissioner for the Internal Market reacts, on France Inter, the day after Donald Trump's victory.

“It will take extreme leadership, to have [quelqu’un] in our institutions to manage all of this with a master's hand”believes, Thursday, November 7, on France Inter Thierry Breton, former European Commissioner for the Internal Market, the day after Donald Trump's victory in the American presidential election.

Thierry Breton fears that the results of the American election will contribute to “divide Europe” and that Donald Trump rallies Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban behind him, “its main European speaker”, but also the Italian “Giorgia Meloni, the Slovakian Robert Fico, the Swedes, the Dutch and perhaps soon the Slovenes and the Czechs”.

For Thierry Breton, it is therefore up to “the President of the European Parliament, Roberta Metsola, to the President of the Council, Antonio Costa, and to the President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, this existential task of holding Europe together.” But the former European commissioner recognizes that this “isn’t going to be easy.”

Thierry Breton regrets that “Europe is not prepared” to the victory of Donald Trump. The former European Commissioner therefore hopes that Europe “will prepare to ask the real questions”, especially those “related to our security”. “We will have to ask ourselves fundamental questions” to “massively increase together our defense production capacities to defend ourselves alone”, without depending on NATO “and therefore on the United States”, he insists.