We print an interview with Alain de Benoist, given by this French thinker to the Breizh Info portal from Brittany.
De Benoist remains a key thinker and theorist of the European fresh Right, but under the current conditions of geopolitical accelerationism, he needs to redefine his existing views on Europe.
Breakthrough
How do you feel about the evolution of global relations following fresh statements by Trump and Vance on Ukraine and their impact on relations between the European Union and the United States?
– So far only 1 historical event in my life has survived: the fall of the Berlin Wall and the implosion of the russian system. I think I'm witnessing another 1 now. The “watchers”, as usual, could not see it. past speeds up rapidly to the level where regular news indicates dystopia. Trump's choice alone was a major historical breakthrough. Another breakthrough was to resume contacts between the White home and the Kremlin on February 12. 2 days later in Munich, Vice president J. D. Vance declared a real ideological war of Europe overwhelmed by immigration and suffering from collective amnesia, without covering it up as an antimodel based on decadence and civilizational suicide. Then we had a message that Ukraine would never join NATO and would never recover the territories that it lost in Donbas or Crimea. On March 3, Donald Trump announced a halt to all aid to Ukraine. Finally, we are watching live disintegration of the Atlantic alliance. Also, even if we inactive deficiency the right perspective, this is simply a historical moment.
Trump is an instigator of trade wars.
What does the hallucinational argument between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenski, which occurred on 28 February in the White home Oval Office?
– Focusing on raised voices is like focusing on a finger pointing to the moon. What has been said matters. In the face of Zelenski's refusal to end the war unwinnable and his demands for a "security guarantee", which the Americans refuse to grant, Trump recalled that Zelenski has no right to dictate the conditions, due to the fact that he does not have adequate cards or negotiating resources to use. He besides told him that if he did not accept the offer he had received, he would be forced to sign an agreement even more for his unfavorable country, and possibly face the full surrender. First of all, let us note that there is nothing extraordinary about the destiny of Ukraine being determined by Russia and the United States, due to the fact that Russia and NATO were the real parties to this war. The war in Ukraine was a replacement war from the very beginning. At the same time, however, we must realize that not only Ukraine has lost it. Emmanuel Todd correctly predicted that "Trump's task will be to manage America's defeat with Russians". That's truly the point. So we begin to see this terrible, fratricidal war that has been going on for 3 years in a different light. This war is personally hard for me, due to the fact that I have friends, both Ukrainian and Russian, and I feel large sadness erstwhile I see them massacre each other. All serious experts realise that the main origin of this war was the American quest to deploy NATO units close the borders of Russia. Putin reacted as any American president would if he faced a threat from Russian rockets placed close the border in Mexico or Canada. Therefore, the war began long before 2022. And it could have been avoided. For example, Ukraine's interior problems could be perfectly resolved by the introduction of a national strategy in which its Russian-speaking part would enjoy any autonomy. But the other happened. Montesquieu distinguished those who started wars, and those who made it impossible to avoid them. They're not necessarily the same people. François Fillon late stated: “I have always said that this war could have been avoided if Western leaders had tried to realize its causes, alternatively of wearing the garments of the good side”. This can be translated as follows: if they analysed situations in political alternatively than ethical terms. In fact, nothing forced Europeans to support a circumstantial side, whether Ukrainian or Russian, or to respond in a uniform manner (as the “collective West”). They could at least work out their position based on their own interests. For ideological reasons, however, they preferred to view this conflict as a "fair war" in which the opponent must be criminalised and found guilty. Standing on 1 side from the start, they found themselves in a situation where they could no longer propose mediation, losing the anticipation of acting as a "balancer". Trump's a realist. After 3 years of weekly televising to us the inevitability of Russia's collapse, he stated that Ukraine lost the war, despite the military equipment and the hundreds of billion it received; and that Europeans were incapable to find the objectives of the war over the 3 years. But war is simply a means of serving certain purposes. As Clausewitz wrote, “Its intent is simply a political issue and war is simply a means; it is hard to imagine a means without purpose”. Europeans no longer realize what war is: an act of force aimed at peace. In this regard, they have never had any political, diplomatic, strategical purpose, preferring to force Zelenski to plunge into a trap which he himself fell into. Contrary to what any say, Trump is not an isolationist, nor a “defendant of peace”. On the contrary, like many of his predecessors, he believes that defending American interests requires constant interventionism. The fundamental difference is that it does not hide this interventionism behind subtle ideals, specified as defending liberal democracy and the regulation of law ("democracy and freedom"), and alternatively of engaging in war activities, it wants to bet on trade. He's a war instigator, but he's instigating trade wars. Just look at how he talks about Greenland, Canada or the Panama Canal, adopting an imperialistic kind based on the old American story of "border". For him everything is simply a transaction, everything can be bought or sold, everything is negotiable, everything is based on factors of commercial value, free from remorse. He is well aware that "peaceful trade" does not preclude aggression, blackmail or conquest. Its “pacifism” is based on a simple consensus that armed conflict brings more losses than profits, and the United States is better prepared to win trade wars than clashes on the battlefield. His quest for power tries to carry out erstwhile with threats to introduce duties, and another time with the support of deregulation and free trade as shortly as it suits him.
Putin Chess, Trump Monopoly
According to the media, Trump speaks the same voice as Vladimir Putin today. It is referred to as the fresh American-Russian condominium, and even the Washington-Moscow-Pekin triangle. Do you think that's real?
– It's smoke and mirrors. They disagree besides much: Putin is simply a chess player, Donald Trump is limited to golf and playing Monopoly. Above all, they have conflicting geopolitical interests. However, on the another hand, it is actual that Trump wants to start a fresh relation with Moscow, as he believes that normalizing relations with Putin's Russia involves more benefits for America than the Atlantic Alliance. This may consequence in the abolition of sanctions imposed on Russia, joint energy projects, peculiarly in the Arctic region, and even the improvement of a plan to avoid war with Iran. Trump may besides hope to weaken the strength of the alliance (the word "soy" does not be in Chinese), but alternatively the bond of "unlimited friendship" between Putin and Xi Jinping, announced in February 2022. He will not effort to dominate Russia with “Western hegemonism”. I besides do not believe in the American-Chinese-Russian “non-liberal triumvirate” due to the fact that specified an agreement would be filled with interior contradictions. Trump is surely a large personality with paranoid tendencies (which is not different in politics). He does not care about ideas, morality or global law (such as Netanyahu). He likes winners, prefers charisma to legalism. He admires the strength and believes that everything can be handled with violent threats. With his presidency, power relations replace the law, which at least makes the full situation clearer. Trump and Putin combine their perception of Europe as old and tired, incapable of political solutions to global problems, incapable to be firm, old and divided, ruined, dominated, unremembering of their past and traditions, beating themselves in the chest and practicing constant ethical censorship, mostly incapable to cope with exceptional situations. From this point of view, the remainder of the planet consists of partners who were never equal, but who served as vassals, protégés, were dominated entities, not allies. This does not mean that the United States can talk from the position of force with China, decide on a multipolar strategy or defy threats of de-dollarisation. Let us not forget that since Trump wants to make America "again great", it means above all that it is not "great" at present.
Deliric inciting escalation
What do you think of the feverish actions of Europeans with Emmanuel Macron leading the militarisation of Europe?
Europeans are unreformable. They don't see the populist wave coming, they bet on Kamala Harris' election victory, for decades they relied on an American "parasol" alternatively of taking responsibility. Only now are they beginning to realize that Americans are abandoning Ukrainians, as they had previously abandoned Vietnamese from the South or Afghans. There is specified a popular maxim: being the enemy of America is dangerous, but being her friend is fatal. They did not see the tropism that has kept the United States distant from Europe for years. It is only now they see that, by saving their strength to face China, the Americans cease to engage in European safety matters, leaving them vulnerable. They don't realize what's happening to them. They are incapable to believe in the expanding width of the bay dividing both sides of the Atlantic. They are paralyzed like a rabbit blinded by traffic lights, despairing about the dissolution of NATO, an organization about which Macron spoke in 2019 of being in a state of “brain death”. But they cannot learn from it. They could take advantage of the situation and think about how much the war in Ukraine cost them. They lost EUR 150 billion, lost access to Russian gas and oil, lost hundreds of billions of investment in Russia, silently accepted sabotage on the North Gas pipeline, and on the another hand they inactive think they have the right to give Ukraine safety guarantees and prolong the slaughter. In another words, their only reaction is to throw more coins into this slot machine. After half a century of telling us that “Europe means peace” today, they want to proceed the war, risking designation as its direct participants. They never learn from their mistakes and are willing to push their finger between modes without knowing what's going to end for us. Even environmentalists preach militarism. They plunged their heads into a totally delirgic inciting escalation that proves that Europeans inactive do not realize anything from the fresh planet Deal, the fresh Nomos of Earth, which forms before their eyes. They were aboard a drunken ship, and now they want to nail the dead comet. The same people who have been destroying the industrial and defence possible of European countries over the past 30 years are now proposing a transition to a European “war economy” and “militarisation” by Ursula von der Leyen ("Hiena"). Macron, president of a country increasingly isolated on the global stage, paralyzed politically and indebted to a level where interest payments (more than EUR 50 billion per year) are the second largest in public spending. The French army, whose weapons are almost empty and whose budget has been stripped of its bones, is incapable to participate in a high-intensity conflict for more than 8 days, but inactive we hear assurances that we will show everyone what we can do. How wonderful war is if you never fought yourself! Macron, who advised his partners in June 2022 not to "degrade Russia", is doing precisely the other today. He is incapable to look into the eyes of the president of Algeria and face the president of the Comoros, but tightens his muscles and assures that he is ready to face the "Russian threat" which he believes is coming to France and Western Europe. This threat is nothing more than a grotesque fantasy whose sole intent is to make fear. It's like a scarecrow. It would make sense to have an excellent Georgian proverb: sheep are afraid of a wolf all their lives, but at the end their shepherd eats them! For Europeans, war is no longer a confrontation between 2 opponents in the conventional sense, but a conflict between an "aggressor" and a "victim of aggression". The erstwhile is guilty, even if he acts in a situation of legitimate defence necessary. This change of vocabulary confirms the return of the concept of "fair war". The simplification of war to the dichotomy of the “aggressor” – “victim” (as in a knife attack or sexual harassment) plunges us into pure morality. We return to the old good times of the League of Nations, whose past we know well, or possibly even more to the 1928 Briand-Kellogg Pact, or times in which irrenomism was based on the presumption that wars could be banned. Today, the speech is much more militant. However, this is simply a likewise non-political approach. It would surely not be incorrect if any European countries built a powerful defence manufacture at their disposal, but provided it is independent, that is, provided that we do not pay attention to the United States. This is surely not going to save Zelenski in any case: if Ukraine is no longer receiving American aid, the specified modest means available to the European Union will not origin it to abruptly start to prevail. There are besides also many contradictions between the associate States to be able to identify their common interests or objectives and, consequently, a common policy at operational level. There is no place for the European Army until Europe is politically united, which means that it is only a chimera today. As regards the "European umbrella", which would arise as a consequence of France's decision to extend deterrence to its neighbours, it would be even little credible than the "American umbrella". As Jacques Sapir concluded, I don't think anyone thinks France would agree to “to level Paris in defence of Bucharest, Prague or Warsaw”. In short, in the close future we will inactive be immersed in discussions about the military and financial resources that we do not have, we will inactive be trampling on the ground.
Eclectic Trumpism
The rising star of Trumpism, J. D. Vance, appears to embody the fresh American right hand, which is antiliberal and conservative, and at the same time completely unfettered by levitation. Do you think his character symbolizes the permanent reorientation of American conservatism?
– Trumpism is an improbable mixture of pluralist populism, technological caesarism, anarcho-capitalism, anti-state sovereignty and libertarian ideology. Donald Trump, along with Elon Musk, creates a caesaristic duumvirate, which brings evident associations with the end of the Roman Republic. J. D. Vance has interesting qualities, but it is hard to admit precisely who he is in this constellation, in which we have American myths: Manifest of Destiny and the fresh Promised Land, analyzing society through the prism of the individual, self-sufficiency of the market, the primacy of economics and trade, attachment to technology and Messianic optimism. too everything, we should not forget that Donald wants to reconstruct not the size of Europe, but the size of America, which is threatened, which he realizes.
The top threat is chaos.
As you see the deep, impermeable division between conservative anti-woke And progressive or left American? Are not European nations and nations entering a akin path?
– The United States may be on the brink of civilian war or a fresh civilian War. However, I do not think that this could apply to Europeans. The biggest threat to Europe is not civilian war. This is worse: chaos.
Detention excludes moral dominance
The European Union (or, in fact, its leaders) is taking part in ideological battles, while the remainder of the planet is becoming increasingly pragmatic and violent. Can this be seen as a manifestation of decadence or a desperate effort to preserve moral dominance over nations?
– Neither – especially since ethical dominance cannot go hand in hand with decadence! The European Union besides does not lead "ideological battles"; rather, it closes within a very circumstantial ideology whose 3 main pillars are a society consisting of individuals, liberal capitalism and human rights. On the basis of this, it refers to liberal democracy, the regulation of law and the prevailing marketplace values.
Ectoplasm and lunaticics
What will be the function of Europe in the fresh planet Order, which is in front of our eyes? What strategies should it apply to preserve its influence?
– It makes no sense to talk about strategies if no 1 knows or intends to implement them. Europeans are sick people today. They have no thought what Europe's destiny might be, due to the fact that the word "destination" is meaningless to them. These are people who follow the ectoplasms, lunatics who have never waged any war, and now they announce that they are ready to bring their nations into the atomic war. Europe is in a state of extinction, as Spenngler predicted. Here are the terrible words of Cioran: “The West vainly seeks a form of agony worth his past”.
Either the Civilization State or chaos
You frequently warned against the uniformization of the world. Do you see in the current changes a global chance for European peoples to regain their cultural and civilizational identity?
– There is simply a decisive clash in which the choice is at stake: either a planet governed by 1 hegemonic power (or 1 universalist ideology), or a planet divided between respective poles of power and civilization, "great spaces" corresponding to the large regions of the world, each of which will be directed by this state, which will be able to take over influence over the area of civilization to which it belongs. As long as we proceed to believe that the planet is populated by individuals alternatively than divided among different peoples, languages, nations, civilizational areas with their own ambitions and principles, it will not be possible. The fresh Nomos of Earth means that these large civilizational spaces consider their identity and past to be the most important, while refraining from interfering in another civilizational spaces and imposing on them pseudo-universal values, which in fact are only the values of the former. So we will have either “Civil States” or chaos!
Is the acceleration of the course of past that we are now witnessing dead Do you feel optimistic?
– I'm not optimistic or worried. I'm just trying to realize what's going to happen.
Source:https://www.breizh-info.com/2025/03/12/244645/alain-de-benoist-trump-usa-2/
