Close Menu
    Neoliberalism

    The Greenland moment: 10 points on the shift in European opinion against Trump [article in French]


    Submission statement: those are the results of a recurring continent-wide poll called "Eurobazooka" conducted by the pan-European magazine Le Grand Continent partnering with Cluster 17. The present study was conducted last week among 7.500 respondents from seven countries: Belgium, Denmark, Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Poland – the article is available in French and Spanish, but you can use the Translation tool of your browser to read the content, and I will post a summary of the 10 points in the comments.

    The study highlights a "Greenland moment" in the US-Europe relationship: Donald Trump's threats to annex Greenland, an autonomous territory of Denmark whose inhabitants are citizens of the EU, is causing an unusual amount of attention for an international question and shows that far from neglect or ignorance, Europeans have very strong opinions on the attitude to adopt with the US and Donald Trump in particular, consolidating previous trends but also impulsing new shifts in the perception of their historical ally.

    Europeans now clearly identify Donald Trump's America as a potential threat to their security, rather than a sometimes unreliable ally, and re-evaluate their relationship with China not as a long-term strategic rival, but as a power to be balanced with the US to better defend European interests.

    Perceiving the US as adopting a predatory and hostile foreign policy, and Donald Trump as an authoritarian ruler, Europeans judge the US President as a force weakening the Western bloc and a risk to European security on its own, while remaining a much lower threat than Russia. They support the military option to protect Greenland, consider that Europe should stop relying on the US for defense, and now favor opposition to compromise in demanding a more assertive stance to their national governments and EU leadership in dealing with the US – the trans-Atlantic relationship is now perceived as durably damaged, even among more Atlanticist nations like Poland or Denmark.

    Posted by RaidBrimnes

    View 5 Comments

    5 Comments

    1. RaidBrimnes on

      1 – **The hypothesis of a war with an ally is now clearly articulated in public opinion** | The Greenland crisis is unusually well-identified by Europeans for an international question (93% can identify the topic), there is an overwhelming majority of respondents qualifying Donald Trump’s threats as either “serious” or “rather serious” (84% combined), and would consider a military intervention by the US as an act of war against Europe (81% yes).

      2 – **US foreign policy is now perceived as predatory** | Faced with four choices to qualify Donald Trump’s foreign policy: “Recolonization and resource predation”; “Isolationism and disengagement”; “Defense of freedom and legitimate protection of their own interests”; “I don’t know”, the first option gathers a majority of two-thirds in most countries, and a plurality of 43-44% in Denmark and Poland, reputed to be among the most Atlanticists in the EU. The low amount of “I don’t know” responses shows a strong structuration of political opinions on the US’ foreign policy; in this context, a majority of respondents (60-70%) call the US intervention in Venezuela as an illegal action violating international law, and the same proportion consider that Donald Trump’s actions are weakening the Western bloc. It should be noted that respondents who identify with the right or far-right are more likely to approve of the current US FoPo as part of a worldview based on a more confrontational approach.

      3 – **The US are the only actor whose perception really changed** | Compared to the previous polling wave in December 2025, the US are the only actor whose perception has visibly changed: terrorist organizations and Russia remain the actors most cited by respondents as potentially declaring open war on their home countries (68 and 48% respectively), but the US is now identified as a geopolitical actor more likely to enter open war (21%, doubling since last month) than China (9%) or Iran (18%). As of January 2026, one in five Europeans consider that there is a high risk of a hot war between their countries and the US in coming years.

      4 – **A change of status: the ally enters the hierarchy of risks** | Among the five geopolitical actors cited: terrorist organizations, Russia, China, Iran and the US, the latter used to be ranked dead last as potential military enemies, with only a third of respondents considering there is no risk of a hot war between Europe and the US. This illustrates a new paradigm: Donald Trump’s America has ceased to be exclusively perceived as an unreliable ally, and now appears as a potential adversary in parts of the public opinion – unsurprisingly, Denmark shows the highest threat perception with 44% saying an open war with the US is possible soon. That said, it should be noted that the US remains way behind Russia in terms of perceived threats to their home countries.

      5 – **Public support to a European military response** | Two-thirds of respondents approve sending European troops as a defensive measure to deter US threats of Greenland annexation, once again showing strong opinions as only a single-digit portion declare not knowing what to do (Poland is still an outlier). While the question was worded as a defensive deployment – thus strengthening its legitimacy – , European public opinion is not afraid of the military option to deter threats of annexation.

    Leave A Reply