{"id":13971,"date":"2026-01-20T11:36:17","date_gmt":"2026-01-20T11:36:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/?p=13971"},"modified":"2026-01-20T11:36:17","modified_gmt":"2026-01-20T11:36:17","slug":"i-have-been-coming-to-davos-for-16-years-i-have-never-seen-such-a-crisis-in-u-s-european-relations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/?p=13971","title":{"rendered":"I have been coming to Davos for 16 years. I have never seen\u00a0such a crisis in\u00a0U.S.\/European relations\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Every\u00a0year\u00a0business leaders,\u00a0politicians\u00a0and campaigning groups\u00a0from around the world\u00a0don their snow boots and\u00a0$1,000\u00a0Arc\u2019teryx Macai coats\u00a0and head for the\u00a0Swiss ski resort of Davos.\u00a0Just as New Year\u00a0follows\u00a0Christmas,\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0January and\u00a0time for\u00a0the World Economic Forum\u2019s annual meeting.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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WEF\u00a0has its fair share of critics\u00a0\u2013\u00a0a\u00a0hot air\u00a0playground for the rich and powerful, out of touch with the realities of life on Main Street, obsessed with\u00a0\u2018global\u00a0dialogue\u2019\u00a0and the\u00a0\u2018rules-based\u00a0order\u2019.\u00a0The\u00a0detractors charge sheet\u00a0has a familiar ring.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But\u00a0when that\u00a0rules-based\u00a0order\u00a0is\u00a0itself under threat\u00a0and crisis is in the\u00a0air,\u00a0this meeting in the\u00a0mountains suddenly\u00a0has a point.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

After the 2008 financial\u00a0crash,\u00a0and\u00a0with\u00a0Western capitalism on the brink of seizure,\u00a0the sessions buzzed as banking leaders,\u00a0including Jamie Dimon,\u00a0chief executive of\u00a0JPMorgan,\u00a0and Bob Diamond, chief executive of Barclays, clashed with presidents and prime ministers. I was in the\u00a0main\u00a0congress\u00a0arena\u00a0in 2011\u00a0when Dimon\u00a0insisted that the regulatory reaction\u00a0of governments\u00a0had gone too far (\u201cToo much is too much\u201d\u00a0he said) only to be slapped down by Nicolas Sarkozy, then\u00a0president of\u00a0France,\u00a0direct from the public stage. It was a row for\u00a0the ages.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I have been coming to Davos for 16 years,\u00a0and this year is the most reminiscent of those post-credit-crunch\u00a0flare-ups\u00a0when the very fundamentals of\u00a0capitalism\u00a0were\u00a0being questioned. This time, it is\u00a0the\u00a0international\u00a0order\u00a0and the ability of the West to hang together\u00a0in the face of\u00a0glaringly different approaches to\u00a0an intense\u00a0series of\u00a0risks.\u00a0<\/p>\n

President Donald Trump, here for the first\u00a0time since\u00a02020,\u00a0will dominate.\u00a0On Gaza,\u00a0Venezuela, Ukraine\u00a0and most shockingly for Europe, Greenland,\u00a0the president\u00a0has thrown multiple boulders\u00a0into\u00a0a\u00a0diplomatic sea already\u00a0frothing\u00a0with sharks.\u00a0<\/p>\n

At the weekend,\u00a0he\u00a0threatened\u00a0to impose\u00a0increased\u00a0tariffs\u00a0on those who stand in the way of the US annexation of Greenland (a self-governing\u00a0island\u00a0and part of\u00a0Denmark)\u201410%\u00a0now, rising to 25%\u00a0in June.\u00a0France, Germany, the U.K.,\u00a0the Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, Sweden,\u00a0and Finland, who have all been\u00a0critical,\u00a0are his target.\u00a0<\/p>\n

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\u201cI have been coming to Davos for 16 years,\u00a0and this year is the most reminiscent of those post-credit-crunch\u00a0flare-ups\u00a0when the very fundamentals of\u00a0capitalism\u00a0were\u00a0being questioned\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n

The European Union\u00a0has responded,\u00a0signaling a\u00a0new\u00a0trade war between two of the world\u2019s most powerful economies.\u00a0Emannuel Macron, president\u00a0of France,\u00a0has\u00a0demanded\u00a0that the EU\u00a0use its\u00a0\u2018anti-coercion instrument\u2019\u00a0for the first time, a\u00a0trade weapon\u00a0brought\u00a0in\u00a0to defend EU member states against Chinese tariffs\u00a0in 2023.\u00a0In Brussels, talk is of\u00a0\u20ac93bn\u00a0($108bn)\u00a0of new\u00a0levies\u00a0and\u00a0restrictions on\u00a0American companies trading\u00a0in the EU. European indices are sliding.\u00a0The price of gold\u2014a hedge against market risk\u2014has risen to new\u00a0highs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ursula von der Leyen, the President of the European Commission, speaks tomorrow\u00a0and Trump is\u00a0due on Wednesday,\u00a0with the largest American contingent\u00a0ever\u00a0to visit the World Economic Forum\u00a0\u2013 including\u00a0five Cabinet\u00a0Secretaries and hundreds of officials.\u00a0Multiple\u00a0bilateral\u00a0meetings\u00a0aimed at\u00a0finding\u00a0a solution\u00a0to the increasingly fraught\u00a0war of words\u00a0are being hurriedly arranged.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cTerritorial integrity and sovereignty are fundamental principles of international law,\u201d\u00a0von der Leyen\u00a0said over the\u00a0weekend.\u00a0\u201cThey are essential for Europe and for the international\u00a0community as a whole. Tariffs would undermine transatlantic relations and risk a dangerous downward spiral.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

I was at Davos in 2017 when Xi\u00a0Jinping spoke of the value of free trade. And in\u00a02018, when Trump\u00a0reassured\u00a0the audience\u00a0that America First did not mean America Alone.\u00a0In 2026,\u00a0Trump\u00a0will again dominate, a president in a hurry\u00a0to reshape the global order.\u00a0How Europe\u00a0acts\u00a0now\u00a0will set the tone for the rest of\u00a0his\u00a0presidency.\u00a0Can a\u00a0defense\u00a0deal\u00a0on\u00a0Greenland be done, satisfying Trump\u2019s demands\u00a0for greater security? Will he follow through on the new\u00a0tariffs? Will the EU accelerate its retaliation?\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

For many at the World Economic Forum\u00a0this week, it seems almost preposterous to be writing such sentences.\u00a0We are in\u00a0uncharted\u00a0territory.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

#coming #Davos #years #seensuch #crisis #inU.S.European #relations<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Every\u00a0year\u00a0business leaders,\u00a0p… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13972,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[3917,359,9404,486,3451,9645,9641,9642,9646,9644,490,9643,9405,84],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13971"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13971"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13971\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/13972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/microvibenews.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}