The end of the war will shake the bloc up no less than the war itself, propelling the suppressed New Right to power
Despite continuing if dwindling Western European attempts to play spoiler, the prospects for an end to the Ukraine War have never been so good, with the exception, of course, of the almost-peace of spring 2022 that the West sabotaged. Since then, there’s been much water – or rather blood – under that bridge not crossed.
Now there is a real chance that the presidents of Russia and the US, Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump, will compel – “persuade,” if you wish – both the Zelensky regime in Kiev and its remaining backers in NATO-EU Europe to return to reality: namely, to accept, if tacitly, that Russia is winning the war on the ground and that a later peace will only bring further unnecessary losses for Ukraine and its Western users.
Nothing, except death, is certain until it is in the past. This peace is still in the – hopefully near – future. Yet we can already think about its consequences. Regarding the 32 European countries that are either in NATO, the EU, or both, this is usually done with an eye to military posture, foreign policy, and the economy (oddly enough, in that order). How long, for instance, will it take for hysterical predictions of a Russian attack on at least the Baltics if not Warsaw, Berlin, and – who knows – Luxembourg, to wear off? What will happen to the new monster-debt-driven militarism? Will the NATO-EU Europeans ever be sensible enough again to rediscover diplomacy and cooperation with Russia? If so, when? Before or after they finally collapse under the weight of energy prices, deindustrialization, and public debt?
The answer to all questions above will depend on how the domestic politics of key European states develop. In that respect, the single most important question is about the future of Europe’s currently rising, even surging New Right (an umbrella term for parties that are commonly labeled, for instance, “right-populist,” “hard right,” or “far right”). But this logic also works the other way around. If the Ukraine War ends mostly on Moscow’s terms, as now supported even by Washington, this peace will inevitably influence politics inside NATO-EU Europe and in particular the chances of the New Right.
The New Right advance is especially significant in three key countries: France, Germany, and Great Britain. They have in common that their respective New Right parties – Rassemblement National (RN), Reform UK, and Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) – are leading national polls. While this is similar to several other European states, such as Spain and Austria, the British, French, and German cases are special because of their economic and political weight.
The New Right surge is by no means new. It has been building for about two decades now, and for some observers, its triumph is already an accomplished fact: It was last spring, in the run-up to EU parliamentary elections, that Politico acknowledged that the “longstanding effort” to keep the New Right out of government was “officially over.”
That turned out to be a little premature: In Austria, Germany, and France, current government set-ups are still based on excluding the New Right. Yet sometimes, another word for “premature” is “prophetic.” The pressure from the New Right parties has not slackened but increased. Current measures to ignore their popular backing at all costs have a whiff of despair about them and may fail entirely in the near future.
Take, for instance, the cases of Germany and Romania. For Ian Bremer, a popular American geopolitical consultant, commentator, and reliable organ of the Centrist mainstream party line, they stand for success in fending off the New Right. Yet, ironically, both cases are telling, but not for the reasons Bremer imagines. In Germany and Romania, he reminds us, elections this year produced Centrist governments “despite a rise in support for the far right.”
What Bremer forgets to mention is that in both cases, these Centrist victories were the outcome of foul play. In Romania, on the fringes of the EU, the methods used were particularly brutal and shameless. A massive challenge from the new right under Calin Georgescu could only be stopped by flagrant lawfare. Without it, Bucharest would already have a New Right president, just like Warsaw.
In Germany, land of order and rules, things were only a little more subtle. To keep Berlin under Centrist control despite an electoral breakthrough success of the AfD, two things were done, one “merely” against the spirit of the constitution, the other in all likelihood amounting to either literally unbelievable incompetence or deliberate electoral falsification, even if carried out locally.
The so-called “firewall” (a euphemism), an establishment policy to treat the AfD unlike all other parties and exclude it from coalition building, is an offense to basic fairness, as well as the German constitution’s substance, since it treats the votes of AfD voters as, in effect, of lesser weight. This makes a real and decisive difference. Without the “firewall,” a New Right-Centrist coalition would already rule in Berlin.
The other dirty trick without which the current German government could not have been made was to somehow “misplace” a large number of votes – no one knows exactly how many, because the urgently needed nationwide recount is being stalled – for its insurgent challenger from the Left, Sarah Wagenknecht’s BSW. Otherwise, the BSW would almost certainly have taken enough seats in the new parliament to make the current ruling coalition arithmetically impossible: German democracy has the dubious – yet not unique – distinction of having systematically disadvantaged both its New Right and its new Left Parties to “save” itself from, in effect, the citizens.
Add the case of France, another country where an electoral outcome was manipulated shamelessly to, in effect, disenfranchise both New Right and New Left voters, and the question becomes even more obvious. How much more of this kind of chicanery before the word “democracy” loses any meaning it may still have? Crucially, hence, the methods that Europe’s Centrists use to hold back the New Right’s advance undermine Centrist credibility and increase that of the New Right. Not to even speak of the obvious boost that the European New Right is getting from the success of the US variant.
So, here we are. Driven by voters’ concerns over immigration, the economy, social and cultural norms, and the general failure of cynical elites to care, Europe’s New Right is on the offensive. Centrist defenses are desperate and counterproductive. And help from “daddy” across the Atlantic won’t come for the Centrists but for the New Right. While its lead is not (yet) overwhelming and the timelines of national elections, as well as complications of coalition building mean it is too early for firm predictions, one thing is certain: there is a real possibility of one or several domestic-politics earthquakes with far-reaching consequences for international politics.
It’s no wonder the Russian leadership makes no secret out of watching attentively, as is its right, in fact duty as a matter of due diligence in foreign policy. Because the obvious question is: what would New Right participation in or even domination of government mean in France, Germany, and Great Britain, the three problem-ridden but still comparatively powerful countries that are home to NATO-EU Europe’s biggest economies and have traditionally set much of the political tone, too? And what would be the effect of an end to the Ukraine War – in effect, a Russian victory – on the New Right’s chances to make these earthquakes happen?
In France, Germany, and Great Britain, Centrist politicians and their mainstream media have long charged the New Right with serving Russia. Genuine affinities in ideological and political aims – whether you like or dislike those aims is a different matter – have been maliciously misread as, in effect, nothing but an outcome of Russian subterfuge and bribery.
Oddly enough, the same “logic” never applies to the massive, almost indecent overlap of Centrist positions that has produced, for instance, Atlanticism. If Europeans align with Washington’s positions, as the rule implies, that must be their free choice and could not possibly have anything to do with American influence channeled through, for instance, mainstream media, think tanks, and of course covert means as well. But if Europeans even show a desire to at least understand Moscow’s positions, now that simply must be something the big bad Russians made them do.
In this regard, an end to the Ukraine War is likely to deprive European Centrists of one of their favorite tools of neo-McCarthyite New Right bashing. In Britain, for instance, the ruling Labour Party has just started a fresh campaign explicitly geared toward damaging Reform UK and its leader Nigel Farage by hammering the local version of the daft Russia-Russia-Russia theme.
In the German AfD, some politicians seen as too close to Russia have just been marginalized to create an overall less Russia-friendly image. And yet, fortunately, that is a surface effect due to media pressure. Witness recent X posts by the AfD’s single most important leader, Alice Weidel. Weidel has not stopped criticizing the aggressive course of the German government and its waste of billions on arming Ukraine. She keeps demanding a normalization with Russia through a realistic foreign policy focused on German national interest.
Peace in and over Ukraine is very likely to benefit Europe’s New Right and make life even harder for European Centrists. Centrists will lose one of their main instruments of whipping up war scares among their populations. The New Right will be less vulnerable to smears of being Russia’s fifth column, while its realistic and constructive positions on policy toward Russia will become only more plausible.
Finally, once peace happens, the war and those in the West who provoked and prolonged it may finally come under the intense scrutiny they deserve. An honest, critical assessment of the bloody Centrist war folly – including politicians, experts, and mainstream media – would further undermine Centrism’s hold. Everyone knows that the Ukraine War brought great change to Europe. And so may the Ukraine Peace.
