Munaeem's Blog

 Europe is no longer treating the United States as a certainty. It is treating it as a variable. I see the shift in policy, not rhetoric. European leaders still speak the language of alliance, but their decisions show caution. The relationship has not broken. It has thinned. The numbers tell the story. The U.S. Inflation Reduction Act, passed in 2022, allocated roughly $369 billion in subsidies for clean energy and manufacturing. European officials warned that these incentives were pulling industry out of Europe. The European Commission responded with its own Green Deal Industrial Plan to retain investment. This was not coordination. It was competition inside an alliance. Energy exposed the deeper imbalance. After the Ukraine war began, Europe cut Russian gas imports sharply. According to the International Energy Agency, U.S. liquefied natural gas became Europe’s largest external supply source in 2023. Prices surged. European industry absorbed the shock. Washington gained leverage....