How Trump forces Europe to be realized on steel – Politico

Admitting that the details must be postponed, an EU diplomat said: “This will always require some work here and there”. In any case, however, “there is a shared understanding that we are faced with major challenges that force us to take measures together as a block”.

Reformists unite

Putting a historical industry at the center of policies under pressure from an erratic American president Donald Trump, an expansionist Russian president Vladimir Putin and an ambitious Chinese president Xi Jinping, has sense coming from Brussels.

“I would consider Euco as a success, well considered,” he said. “And the leaders are just working well together for the moment. But there is still a lot to do.”

Tordoir underlined a trap of national leaders first supporting their national industry on a joint European program. “A solution could be to keep (the) headquarters in Germany as the country which would spend the most, but which then built factories elsewhere,” he said.

Brussels will maintain the pressure, that’s for sure. The first head of the Commission noted that two reformers’ camps inside the executive have more or less merged under external pressure.

“There were previously three types of people inside the commission,” they said, characterizing them as conservatives, reformists and revolutionaries. “The first said that the EU was good and that we just need to adapt, not to change. The second would like a careful reform. And the third wanted to change everything boldly. The second and third groups now have the same vision.”

Despite the geopolitical upheavals, the Conservatives continue to argue that things cannot change because of the law, complained of the manager. “But we make the law, so let’s change it.”