Several European leaders have responded to JD Vance’s friendly encouragement to raise their standards for practicing democracy and freedom of speech by talking openly about America as an adversary from which they must liberate themselves, whether by building their own security architecture within the EU or seeking other options. I think this is a hysterical, unjustified reaction that doesn’t reckon at all with just how far behind Europe is on a defense basis. Absolutely painful increases in investments would only render them non-scofflaw partners in NATO. Gargantuan ones over a decade would barely bring them to “full and equal partner” status, considering that over the lifetime of the alliance, the U.S. has made 61 percent of the military investments while having 36 percent of the bloc’s GDP.

Turkey’s authoritarian president, Recep Erdoğan, has offered an alternative. Let Turkey into the EU, and his massive armed force will guard the European frontier:

It would be quite the thing to let distaste for populism drive Europe into a second, more shambolic, Ottoman Empire. As several of my interlocutors suggested, this time, the sick man of Europe is Europe.