Trump Can Cut a Great Deal with Europe. Really.

The world’s most successful alliance needs a transformation and, paradoxically, Donald Trump might just be the leader who delivers it. His presidency offers a timely opportunity for the US and Europe to update the terms of their strategic bargain — if Trump can resist the temptation to trash that relationship instead.

The post-1945 bond between America and Europe changed the course of history. The creation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949 stabilized a violent, war-ravaged continent. Transatlantic cooperation defeated the Soviet Union in the Cold War and created the core of a thriving democratic world. Yet every alliance needs to be updated periodically, and it’s time for Washington and its allies to revisit the terms of their relationship again.

The fundamental problem is the combination of Europe’s military weakness and America’s Pacific preoccupation. Even as some countries, such as Poland, make themselves into serious military powers, too many remain incapable of contributing meaningfully to the common defense. And as the US grows more concerned about a potential fight with China, it simply can’t prioritize Europe to the same degree as before.

The Ukraine war, which caused a burst of transatlantic unity in 2022, momentarily concealed this divergence. But now it is accentuating the problem, as the prospect of an end to US aid to Kyiv reveals just how bare Europe’s armories are, and how pathetic its defense industrial base really is. If Trump negotiates an end to the war in Ukraine that overwhelmingly favors Putin, it would split Washington and its European allies further.

Improving security isn’t the only challenge. The US needs Europe on its side, economically and technologically, against China. But many European countries remain reluctant to come along. This year, the leaders of France, Germany and the European Union all met with China’s Xi Jinping to discuss economic cooperation. Meanwhile, tensions between Washington and Brussels over trade were shelved, rather than solved, during Joe Biden’s presidency. Into this unsettled situation walks the destabilizing figure of Donald Trump.

Unlike his predecessors, Trump has zero sentimental attachment to NATO or Europe. He certainly doesn’t see the world through the democracies-versus-autocracies framework that Biden favored. Trump has called the EU America’s worst economic competitor and threatened to pummel it with tariffs. He has even implied he might gut NATO, by leaving defense-spending delinquents on their own if Russia strikes them.

Fortunately, a full US withdrawal from NATO is unlikely. Quitting the alliance would cause a bipartisan revolt in Washington. It would also deprive Trump of valuable negotiating leverage. If the president-elect is smart, he’ll use that leverage to renegotiate the transatlantic bargain.

The outlines of this new compact are relatively simple. European countries would set much higher military spending floors — say, 3% of GDP, up from the existing 2% goal — and establish concrete timelines for getting there within a half-decade. They would focus, in particular, on capabilities needed to blunt Russian aggression on Europe’s Eastern front, including tanks, artillery and tactical aircraft.

The EU would also come into closer alignment with US curbs on investment in China’s high-tech sector, restrictions on certain sensitive tech exports (the company that makes the most important semiconductor-manufacturing equipment is Dutch), and planning on what sanctions to impose if China attacked Taiwan.

In exchange, Trump would forego a new trade war with Europe. He would develop a long-term, US-European program for supporting Ukraine while the war continues and giving Kyiv meaningful security guarantees — inside or outside of NATO — thereafter. Most critically, Trump would pledge to keep American troops in Europe, and to continue treating the continent’s security as a solemn obligation, even as the allies assume greater responsibility for collective defense.

Such a bargain won’t solve every problem: The EU’s carbon border adjustment mechanism and its treatment of US tech giants might remain points of dispute. But it would create a more balanced, globally effective free-world community and give Trump a big win of the sort he craves.

None of this will be easy. Trump would have to overcome his instinctive dislike of Europe, and recognize that there is more profit — politically and geopolitically — in building the continent up than in tearing it down. Yes, it would require him to go back on his tough talk on tariffs and Ukraine, but let’s face it, consistency has never been one of the man’s strong points.

In addition, Trump would have to resist the temptation to empower Europe’s illiberal populists, like Hungary’s Viktor Orban, who view China and Russia more as allies than foes. He would have to take on a complex, multi-issue negotiation with uncharacteristic discipline and subtlety. And at some point, he’d have to stop threatening to cast Europe to the wolves.

There are also challenges on the other side. Some European countries understand that the continent needs much more military power; others may object to being bullied by an American president that their populations detest. Forging a new bargain with the US will demand unity and purpose, but key countries — such as France and Germany — are will demand unity and purpose, but key countries — such as France and Germany — are politically weak or even paralyzed right now.

Yet if the path ahead is hard, the alternatives are terrible. One is a Trump presidency that sows so much turmoil and division that the relationship never really recovers. Another is a scenario in which the US and its friends spend four years stumbling from one self-inflicted crisis to another, while their autocratic enemies move with the strength and determination the transatlantic community lacks.

Second terms are about legacies. Trump must decide if he wants to be the president who broke the transatlantic alliance, or the one who made it great again.