Trump Called European Leaders 'Weak' And Said The Continent Lacks Direction, France Says In A 'World Of Carnivores' Respect Must Be Earned

France's junior army minister blasted Washington's new security doctrine on Tuesday, calling it a harsh wake-up call for Europe as President Donald Trump derided European leaders as "weak" in a separate interview.

Rufo Urges Europe To Rearm And Awaken

As per a Reuters report, Alice Rufo told lawmakers the U.S. National Security Strategy, unveiled last week, amounts to a shock to the system. "The new American security strategy is an extremely brutal clarification of the United States' ideological posture," she said, arguing Europe must accelerate rearmament if it wants to be taken seriously.

“We live in a world of carnivores, Europe is no island, and Europe will be respected only if it knows how to make itself respected,” Rufo said.

The strategy warns Europe faces "civilisation erasure" and vows to "cultivate resistance" inside the European Union, language that has rattled Western capitals. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said the document shows why Europe must become more militarily independent from the United States, even as he seeks to preserve transatlantic ties.

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New Strategy Seeks Stability With Russia

The Trump administration issued its first national security strategy since Trump’s return to office, breaking sharply from President Joe Biden's approach by seeking not only to end the nearly four-year war as a "vital" U.S. interest but also to "reestablish strategic stability with Russia" after years of treating Moscow as a pariah.

Trump Mocks Europe And Pushes Peace Plan

Trump, meanwhile, escalated his rhetoric in an interview with Politico, calling Europe "a decaying group of nations led by weak people" and blasting its immigration policies.

"I think they're weak," he said of Europe's leaders. "But I also think that they want to be so politically correct." He added, "I think they don't know what to do. Europe doesn't know what to do."

Trump said during the interview that he will keep backing favored candidates in European elections, even if that angers local voters.

He said he is now more focused on Russia's war in Ukraine than on elections, claiming he has offered a new peace-plan draft that some Ukrainian officials like but President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has not yet read, remarking, "It would be nice if he would read it."

Photo Courtesy: Joshua Sukoff on Shutterstock.com

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