We also need to go back to the 1980's of having European computers, operating systems and programming languages.
(but please refrain yourself for spreading FUT of how awful and autoritarian the EU is)
I'm genuinely curious for the formal answer. But the simple one is European institutions seem to be built for consensus and around the assumption of a Pax Americana. They're a cross between a colony and confederation.
If you were rebuilding Europe for strategic autonomy, you'd rejigger several electoral and decision-making systems. (The historic handicap of multiple languages may actually be a case where technology (live translation) solves a social problem.)
Moreover, EU is a child of US hegemony. It was created because of this hegemony (US was actively helping create EU), it existed because of this hegemony and global order enforced by it, and now there is big chance it will dissolve because hegemony is gone, and with it the world that gave birth to EU.
The other alternative would be to change the nature of EU towards centralization or federation, but no member state will go with it.
Contrary to some claims, EU main problems were not industry or economy, even though they suffered from the same neoliberal virus that destroyed US. Problems always were, and will be, political.
I never said "Europe will fall too!", for Europe and EU are not referring to the same thing. This is why discussing these matters with people here is usually pointless, as there is so much misconception floating around about what EU is. EU is set of bureaucratic institutions facilitating cooperation between some countries in Europe. It cannot fall, it will simply stop working. And it cannot create OSes, as suggested in this thread.
As for "socialist Europe" - please. Social democracy, maybe with exception of Nordics, is on decline for quite some time now, although the extent to which Nordics are socialist is debatable as well.
In 2024 European countries paid more to Russia for gas than to Ukraine for aid, and I think this is still the case in 2025. We shut down industry because it's not environmentally friendly and then import from the worst polluters in the world.
If I was China and Russia and I wanted to completely neutralize Europe as a rival there is no better way I could ever imagine to do it than what the EU is doing.
You could say that EU can be fixed, sure, in principle, but we know it won't be fixed. We know it will only get worse because the rot has become systemic.
If we were to objectively consider Europe, and say what could one do to prevent a war between Europe and other powers, there generally are two things. Prevent others from attacking Europe, and prevent Europe from resisting when others attack it. European politicians have chosen the second option. You can see it from how many people are willing to fight, you can see it from Europe's response to Russian aggression. Europe may be stronger than Russia on paper, but it pains me dearly to say that we have already surrendered to Russia.
And EU just decided last week to forbid all Russian gas imports starting Jan 1st 2027, among other things.
I don't think you have your story straight.
> EU imports of Russian fossil fuels in third year of invasion surpass financial aid sent to Ukraine
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/feb/24/eu-spends-more...
> EU spends more on Russian oil and gas than financial aid to Ukraine – report
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cdxk454kxz8o
> How the West is helping Russia to fund its war on Ukraine
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/3/27/europe-imports-more...
> Europe imports more Russian gas, aiding wartime economy, report finds
https://europeannewsroom.com/why-is-europe-still-paying-russ...
> Why is Europe still paying Russia billions for oil and gas?
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> I don't think you have your story straight.
I do. You don't.
The commitment for 2027 is great, but that is about 3 years later than it should have come, and it's also made without an actual plan to implement it.
> that is about 3 years later than it should have come
We can always wish it would be possible to arbitrarily turn a big faucet closed overnight, the harsh reality is that one can't turn their own economic, industrial, and ultimately social system to a grinding halt as well, which is counterproductive to any effort at fighting this war.
Note that the original plan from 2022 was to cut by two thirds within a year and completely by 2030, so 2027 is 3 years earlier.
You could argue that the mistake was to have 45% of pre-war gas imports coming from a single source... but it's hard to argue that EU is not pulling their weight in this fight given the hole they were in.
Europe dug their own hole, against the advice of others. German diplomats were laughing at Trump in 2019 when he warned them against total dependency on Russian energy. They don't get extra points for creating the conditions for the war and then creating the conditions for its continuation.
By definition if any money not spent by the EU is somehow compensated by China buying the then-unsold gas then EU decisions regarding spending money on Russian gas don't matter and the whole rhetoric falls on its face.
Germans were laughing at Trump because - however in a position of power he may be - he's a total clown. Everyone knew that the dependency was a problem, way before the war.
Fun fact, the U.S continues importing goods from Russia, including massive amounts of fertilisers, as well as palladium, uranium and plutonium.
But I see we're moving goalposts here, and the discussion is largely unproductive, so I'll disengage.
However, I disagree that stopping to buy Russian fossil fuels is a great short term goal. It's not like they would ever have left it in the ground and go bankrupt as a consequence. While we buy shale oil and LNG from the US at a premium price, Russia just sells its supply to other countries, which use it to produce our food or manufactured goods. It's making us poorer and weaker but we can pretend our euros aren't buying weapons to kill Ukrainians.
We don't have natural resources, factories, armies, but at least we have the highest horse.
Same goes for energy.
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https://energyandcleanair.org/publication/eu-imports-of-russ...
> EU imports of Russian fossil fuels in third year of invasion surpass financial aid sent to Ukraine
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/feb/24/eu-spends-more...
> EU spends more on Russian oil and gas than financial aid to Ukraine – report
I meant mostly everything else in your comment.
If EU is doing something, and what it is doing is resulting in the deindustrializing EU and making EU dependent on Russia and China ... that is the entirety of my claim.
You could say that it's not in China's interest to have EU dependent on it, maybe, that is a pretty wild claim, but maybe. But we have seen how dependence on despotic powers has worked out with Russia, and it has not gone swimmingly.
China is also incidentally one of the biggest buyers of Russian gas today. All the gas that Europe no longer buys from Russia goes to China on the cheap so they can further undercut European industry.
Drastic times call for drastic measures.