The last frontier. Europe’s psychological war
Europe now finds itself sandwiched between two autocrats, each working to weaken Europe for his own purposes. Those purposes may not be joint, but they intersect and are clear: they want to activate the Trojan horses of anti-EU, illiberal, political insurgency and thus undermine EU policies and democratic values from within. At stake now is the survival of Europe.
February 23, 2026 -
Paul Bell
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Hot TopicsIssue 1-2 2026Magazine
European Parliament building showing banners with democracy in action
Photo: 4kclips/Shutterstock
They looked so pleased with themselves. There they were, four millionaire soldiers – the top tech executives from Meta, OpenAI and Palantir – their right hands raised, swearing their oaths to support and defend the American constitution as they signed up as lieutenant-colonels and part-time advisors to the US Army’s Detachment 201, a new recruitment vehicle for Silicon Valley’s further hardwiring into the machinery of war.
The photograph, reproduced in US tech and military media last June, was striking and disturbing. Not because we do not already know how deeply embedded big tech has become in the US military-industrial complex, or how intimately it is allied with the Trump administration. No, what was striking and disturbing about it was the openness, the triumphal brazenness of it. This was an oblique statement of the seemingly unstoppable and of a world beyond limits and nation states in which no alliance is too unholy, no restraint too sacrosanct, no remedy too unpalatable. It said, quite simply: we are in charge now.
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Europe, transatlantic relations, United States
